ABSTRACT
There is some call for a brief examination of the spatial relations inherent in the unfolding of actions in situations that require practical intelligence. Certainly reflected abstraction, or becoming conscious of the results of reflecting abstraction, arrives later than reflecting abstraction. Reflecting abstraction begins for these subjects, from Stage I onwards, when they translate these practical successions into an ordered recitation that captures the overall order in situation I or II. What is still lacking at this level is a second step of reflecting abstraction, which consists of extracting the common form from these two particular successions, thus advancing the differentiation of form with content and integrating this system into a structure of operations. Reflecting abstraction draws out of this coordination an ordering scheme, along with its possible empirical return.1212*Piaget does not normally connect reflected abstraction with empirical return. But it appears that he cannot accept purely empirical abstraction of an ordering scheme either.
