Empirical economists may be increasingly pressing theorists, but abstract thinkers still dominate academic economics with their explanations of how people and markets behave.

But even the most abstract thinker does not wholly escape the need to impregnate thought with joy.

Lord Monboddo (1714-1799) was one of the early abstract thinkers whose works illustrate the knowledge of species relationships and who foreshadowed the theory of evolution.

He said that the ancient seers were the ones who were the abstract thinkers.

Decline of abstract thinkers, and the rise of specialized academic philosophy.

The French are very abstract thinkers - but they could also produce a poet of particularity like Ponge, who writes an epic poem on soap.

Annan is not, in any case, an abstract thinker.

He is a genius, a philosopher, an abstract thinker.

As an abstract, open-minded thinker, he presented experience first as perception or sense.

They don't often seem to turn up mathematicians, or composers of music, or inventors, or abstract thinkers.