Categories…
Estudia: Hi Phi. Last time I saw you, we were discussing entities. Are entities what makes up existence?
Philo: Well, in the sense that entities are what we perceive. Everything in the world, everything that we can detect, is related to entities. I mean entities make up the world we perceive.
Estudia: What can we say or know about these entities? Anything?
Philo: Lots. When we observe any entity, we become aware of its attributes, and/or its actions, and/or relationship to something else. Philosophers get even more focused on these things and call them categories of being.
Estudia: What does that mean?
Philo: Well, they isolated things like qualities — the color or other physical property of the entity. There are lots of these that can be measured and defined by scientists to distinguish one entity from another. In addition to qualities, a category of something is its quantity like length in feet or inches. Also an entities weight would fall in the quantity category.
Estudia: Qualities and quantity are simple categories of entities. What else?
Philo: Relationships and actions. Something can be referred to in relation to something else. It’s on top of, or, it’s under, et cetera. Action is a category. Say something is running or walking or flying or whatever. The important thing to remember is that all these categories of attributes represent aspects of entities. You can’t have one without the other.
Estudia: So if you have an entity, it is such and such and its flying overhead but you can’t have flying overhead without the entity. Right?
Philo: Exactly. Flying overhead is an action, an action which certain entities do.
Estudia: Oh, OK. So we know, or at least we come to know implicitly that existence consists of entities. That these entities have identity with certain attributes. Cool. And so?
Philo: Now you have enough knowledge to do what any child does — arrive at the …drum roll please… ta ta dum … the natural law of causality!
Estudia: Really! Well it will have to wait. Got to run, see ya later.
Philo: Well, in the sense that entities are what we perceive. Everything in the world, everything that we can detect, is related to entities. I mean entities make up the world we perceive.
Estudia: What can we say or know about these entities? Anything?
Philo: Lots. When we observe any entity, we become aware of its attributes, and/or its actions, and/or relationship to something else. Philosophers get even more focused on these things and call them categories of being.
Estudia: What does that mean?
Philo: Well, they isolated things like qualities — the color or other physical property of the entity. There are lots of these that can be measured and defined by scientists to distinguish one entity from another. In addition to qualities, a category of something is its quantity like length in feet or inches. Also an entities weight would fall in the quantity category.
Estudia: Qualities and quantity are simple categories of entities. What else?
Philo: Relationships and actions. Something can be referred to in relation to something else. It’s on top of, or, it’s under, et cetera. Action is a category. Say something is running or walking or flying or whatever. The important thing to remember is that all these categories of attributes represent aspects of entities. You can’t have one without the other.
Estudia: So if you have an entity, it is such and such and its flying overhead but you can’t have flying overhead without the entity. Right?
Philo: Exactly. Flying overhead is an action, an action which certain entities do.
Estudia: Oh, OK. So we know, or at least we come to know implicitly that existence consists of entities. That these entities have identity with certain attributes. Cool. And so?
Philo: Now you have enough knowledge to do what any child does — arrive at the …drum roll please… ta ta dum … the natural law of causality!
Estudia: Really! Well it will have to wait. Got to run, see ya later.
posted by Rp | 9:02 AM
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