Concepts function as abbreviations compressing infinite particularity.

Evidence

For what a host of particulars of outer existence and actions is embraced by a conception – battle, war, nation, ocean, or animal, for example. And in the conception of God or of love there is epitomized in the simplicity of such idealizing an infinite host of ideas, actions, states, etc.! … From all this, an initial definition of the principle of simplification can be extracted: it merges with the labour of the concept itself in the way it brings about ‘the immeasurable abbreviation of the multitudes of particular things (die unermeßliche Abbreviatur gegen die Einzelheit der Dinge)’. — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 1023

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the Hegelian concept’s ‘simplification’ as an immeasurable abbreviation of particulars — the concept as a compression device.
• XREF: Places Hegel’s concept-abbreviation against contemporary plasticity debates about form compressing/inflecting matter — a bridge toward Malabou’s own brain-work application. — connects to: Heterogeneity is a disposition against conceptual closure; Concepts are reflections that explain things through context beyond immediate experience — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 423; A concept is defined by etymology as both seizing and understanding — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 207

Broader Connections

• Concepts are reflections that explain things through context beyond immediate experience #expands (0.80) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 423
• Heterogeneity is a disposition against conceptual closure #complicates (0.78)
• A concept is defined by etymology as both seizing and understanding #expands (0.72) — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 207