CATEGORY OF BEING
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In
metaphysics (in particular, ontology), the different kinds or ways of being are
called categories of being or simply categories. According to the
Aristotelian tradition, a being is anything that can be said to be in
the various senses of this word (see being). Hence, to investigate the
categories of being is to determine what the most fundamental senses are in
which things can be said to be. A category, more precisely, is any of the
broadest classes of things - 'thing' here being used to mean anything whatever
that can be discussed - that cannot be reduced to any other class
It is hoped, moreover,
that a full account of the categories would be exhaustive in the sense that
everything can be placed into at least one of the categories. Sometimes
ontological category schemes have included nonexistent or even impossible
objects; Meinong, who thought we can talk
unobjectionably about nonexistent objects such as the golden mountain, was an ontologist
For example, what it
means to take the category physical object seriously as a category of being is
to assert that the concept of physical objecthood cannot be reduced to or
explicated in any other terms - not, for example, in
terms of bundles of properties. In this way, as it turns out, very many
controversies of ontology can be understood as controversies about exactly
which categories should be regarded as the (fundamental, irreducible,
primitive) categories
Category came into use with Aristotle; one of his treatises is called
the Categories (which can be found online, for example, here). [Somebody
should list Aristotle's categories here.] Aristotle's particular list of
categories is widely rejected nowadays, however, in part because the
Aristotelian notion of substance has been widely rejected
Philosophers have many
differing views on what the fundamental categories of being are. In no
particular order, here are at least some items that have been regarded as
categories of being by someone or other:
Physical
objects. Physical objects are beings; certainly they are said to be in
the simple sense that they exist all around us. So a house is a being, a
person's body is a being, a tree is a being, a cloud is a being, and so on.
They are beings because, and in the sense that, they are physical objects. One
might also call them bodies, or (physical) particulars, or concrete things, or
maybe substances (but bear in mind the word 'substance' has some special
philosophical meanings)
Minds. Minds - those the "parts" of us that think and perceive - are
beings. Each of us, according to common sense anyway, has a mind, a mind that
exists or has being. So each of our minds is a being.
Of course, philosophers rarely just assume that minds are a different
category of beings from physical objects. Some have thought that mind is in
a different category (this is the view of dualism), while some have thought
that concepts of the mental (e.g., our notion of the mind) can be reduced to
physical concepts (this is the view of physicalism or materialism)
Classes. We can talk
about all human beings, and the planets, and all engines as belonging to
classes. Within the class of human beings is all of the human beings, or (in
other words) the extension of the term 'human being'. In the class of planets
would be Mercury, Venus, the Earth, etc. - and all the other planets that there
might be in the universe. Classes, in addition to each of their members, are
often taken to be beings. Surely we can say that in some sense, the class of
planets is, or has being. Classes are usually taken to be abstract
objects, like sets; 'class' is often regarded as equivalent in meaning to 'set'
Properties. The redness of a
red apple is a property. One could also call it an attribute of the
apple. Very roughly put, a property is just a quality that describes an object.
This will not do as a definition of the word 'property' because, like
'attribute', 'quality' is a near-synonym of 'property'. But these synonyms can
at least help us to get a fix on the concept we are talking about. Whenever one
talks about the size, color, weight, composition, and so forth, of an object,
one talks about the object's properties. Some - though
this is a point of severe contention in the problem of universals - believe
that properties are beings; the redness of the apple is something that is
Relations. An apple sitting
on a table is in a relation to the table it sits on. So we can say that there
is a relation between the apple and the table - namely,
the relation of sitting-on. So - some say - we can say that that relation has
being. Or how about this: the
Properties, relations,
and classes are supposed to be abstract, rather than concrete. Many
philosophers say that properties and relations have an abstract existence, and
that physical objects have a concrete existence. That, perhaps, is the paradigm
case of a difference in ways in which items can be said to be, or to
have being