Abstract

This chapter focuses on one of the common fallacies in Western philosophy, 'reification'. A relative newcomer to the world of logical fallacies, reification is difficult to place and its status as a fallacy not that well understood. In general, reification involves taking something that is abstract, like an idea or concept, and making it concrete, or assigning it a concrete, 'real' existence. The standard analysis of reification presents it as a fallacy of presumption, which can be avoided by minimizing the assignment of causal agency to the abstractions used in logical reasoning. However, the perhaps deeper and more serious consequences of what has been called “pernicious reification” have been further explored by the pragmatist philosophers William James and John Dewey. Both philosophers emphasize the indispensable value found through the use of abstract thought.