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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 14 ideas from Jan Westerhoff

13117 How far down before we are too specialised to have a category? [Westerhoff]
13116 Maybe objects in the same category have the same criteria of identity [Westerhoff]
13118 Categories are base-sets which are used to construct states of affairs [Westerhoff]
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]
13124 Categories can be ordered by both containment and generality [Westerhoff]
13123 All systems have properties and relations, and most have individuals, abstracta, sets and events [Westerhoff]
13125 Categories are held to explain why some substitutions give falsehood, and others meaninglessness [Westerhoff]
13126 Categories systematize our intuitions about generality, substitutability, and identity [Westerhoff]
13130 Categories as generalities don't give a criterion for a low-level cut-off point [Westerhoff]
13129 Essential kinds may be too specific to provide ontological categories [Westerhoff]
13131 The aim is that everything should belong in some ontological category or other [Westerhoff]
13134 We negate predicates but do not negate names [Westerhoff]
13135 A thing's ontological category depends on what else exists, so it is contingent [Westerhoff]