noun

• The act of abstracting, separating, withdrawing, or taking away; withdrawal; the state of being taken away.
• (euphemistic) The taking surreptitiously for one's own use part of the property of another; purloining.
• (engineering) Removal of water from a river, lake, or aquifer.
• A separation from worldly objects; a recluse life; the withdrawal from one's senses.
• The act of focusing on one characteristic of an object rather than the object as a whole group of characteristics; the act of separating said qualities from the object or ideas.
• Any characteristic of an individual object when that characteristic has been separated from the object and is contemplated alone as a quality having independent existence.
• A member of an idealized subgroup when contemplated according to the abstracted quality which defines the subgroup.
• The act of comparing commonality between distinct objects and organizing using those similarities; the act of generalizing characteristics; the product of said generalization.
• An idea or notion of an abstract or theoretical nature.
• Absence or absorption of mind; inattention to present objects; preoccupation.
• (art) An abstract creation, or piece of art; qualities of artwork that are free from representational aspects.
• (chemistry) A separation of volatile parts by the act of distillation.
• An idea of an idealistic, unrealistic or visionary nature.
• The result of mentally abstracting an idea; the product of any mental process involving a synthesis of: separation, despecification, generalization, and ideation in any of a number of combinations.
• (geology) The merging of two river valleys by the larger of the two deepening and widening so much so, as to assimilate the smaller.
• (computing) Hiding implementation details from the interface of a component, to decrease complexity through interdependency and improve modularity; a construct that serves as such.