more from this thinker     |     more from this text

Single Idea 13135

[filed under theme 7. Existence / E. Categories / 5. Category Anti-Realism ]

Full Idea

What ontological category a thing belongs to is not dependent on its inner nature, but dependent on what other things there are in the world, and this is a contingent matter.

Gist of Idea

A thing's ontological category depends on what else exists, so it is contingent

Source

Jan Westerhoff (Ontological Categories [2005], §89)

Book Ref

Westerhoff,Jan: 'Ontological Categories' [OUP 2005], p.218

A Reaction

This is aimed at those, like Wiggins, who claim that category is essential to a thing, and there is no possible world in which that things could belong to another category. Sounds good, till you try to come up with examples.

The 19 ideas with the same theme [belief that our categories can't or don't map reality]:

20896 It is not possible to know what sort each thing is [Democritus]
16654 Our words and concepts don't always correspond to what is out there [William of Ockham]
16608 Ockham was an anti-realist about the categories [William of Ockham, by Pasnau]
13436 There are no gaps in the continuum of nature, and everything has something closely resembling it [Locke]
22079 Hegel said Kant's fixed categories actually vary with culture and era [Hegel, by Houlgate]
7174 Categories are not metaphysical truths, but inventions in the service of needs [Nietzsche]
7175 Philosophers find it particularly hard to shake off belief in necessary categories [Nietzsche]
4484 Nihilism results from valuing the world by the 'categories of reason', because that is fiction [Nietzsche]
17654 A world can be full of variety or not, depending on how we sort it [Goodman]
11096 Discourse generally departmentalizes itself to some degree [Quine]
21907 We don't want another new set of categories; we want a variety of flexible categories [Deleuze, by May]
15730 Extreme nominalists say all classification is arbitrary convention [Quinton]
4574 If some peoples do not have categories like time or cause, they can't be essential features of rationality [Cooper,DE]
7020 Concepts don't carve up the world, which has endless overlooked or ignored divisions [Heil]
13115 Ontological categories are like formal axioms, not unique and with necessary membership [Westerhoff]
13119 Categories merely systematise, and are not intrinsic to objects [Westerhoff]
13135 A thing's ontological category depends on what else exists, so it is contingent [Westerhoff]
10495 Continuous experience sometimes needs imposition of boundaries to create categories [Ellen]
18565 There may be ad hoc categories, such as the things to pack in your suitcase for a trip [Machery]