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Abstract or not abstract? Well, it depends …

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2009

Alison Pease
Affiliation:
School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH8 9AB, Scotland, United Kingdom. A.Pease@ed.ac.ukA.Smaill@ed.ac.ukM.Guhe@ed.ac.uk
Alan Smaill
Affiliation:
School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH8 9AB, Scotland, United Kingdom. A.Pease@ed.ac.ukA.Smaill@ed.ac.ukM.Guhe@ed.ac.uk
Markus Guhe
Affiliation:
School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH8 9AB, Scotland, United Kingdom. A.Pease@ed.ac.ukA.Smaill@ed.ac.ukM.Guhe@ed.ac.uk

Abstract

The target article by Cohen Kadosh & Walsh (CK&W) raises questions as to the precise nature of the notion of abstractness that is intended. We note that there are various uses of the term, and also more generally in mathematics, and suggest that abstractness is not an all-or-nothing property as the authors suggest. An alternative possibility raised by the analysis of numerical representation into automatic and intentional codes is suggested.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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