  However, it is not entirely clear that this observation constitutes an objection to abstractionism. For abstractionists can argue that the goal of their analysis is the converse of the reductionist's goal: The reductionist wants to understand modality in terms of worlds; the abstractionist, by contrast, wants to understand worlds in terms of modality. That is, abstractionists can argue that we begin with a primitive notion of modality and, typically upon a certain amount of philosophical reflection, we subsequently discover an intimate connection to the notion of a possible world, as revealed in the principles Nec and Poss. The analysis that abstractionists provide is designed to make this connection explicit, ideally, in such a way that Nec and Poss fall out as theorems of their theory (see, e.g., Plantinga 1985 and Menzel and Zalta 2014). 