Few habits feel more natural than categorising. We sort the world into kinds: animals and plants, objects and events, mind and matter, living and non-living. These categories feel stable, as if they reflect divisions already present in reality.
From this everyday practice arises a deeper question: do these categories exist in the world itself, or are they imposed by us?
“Are categories real in the world?” appears to ask whether classification tracks reality or constructs it.
But this framing depends on a prior move: treating categories as if they were either intrinsic partitions of the world or arbitrary impositions upon it.
Once that move is examined, the question no longer opposes discovery and invention. It reveals a familiar distortion: the projection of classificatory processes onto ontological structure.
1. The surface form of the question
“Are categories real in the world?”
In its everyday philosophical form, this asks:
- whether kinds exist independently of human thought
- whether classification reflects natural divisions
- whether categories are discovered or constructed
- whether reality is inherently structured into types
It presupposes:
- that categories are things that can exist
- that they can belong either to the world or to the mind
- that classification must be either objective or subjective
2. Hidden ontological commitments
For the question to stabilise, several assumptions must already be in place:
- that categories are entities rather than operations
- that the world is pre-divided into discrete kinds
- that classification could occur without a system performing it
- that categories must be either fully real or merely imposed
- that there is a fixed partitioning underlying all variation
These assumptions turn dynamic processes of differentiation into static structures.
3. Stratal misalignment
Within relational ontology, the distortion involves reification, projection, and binary collapse.
(a) Reification of categories
Categories are treated as things.
- instead of processes of grouping and differentiation
- they become objects that either exist or do not exist
(b) Projection of classification onto the world
Classificatory outcomes are attributed to reality itself.
- stable patterns are interpreted as pre-existing divisions
- the role of construal in producing these divisions is obscured
(c) Binary collapse of origin
Discovery and invention are treated as exclusive.
- categories are either “out there” or “in here”
- the relational coupling between system and world is ignored
4. Relational re-description
If we remain within relational ontology, categories are not intrinsic partitions of the world, nor arbitrary impositions. They are relational achievements of construal operating over structured variation within systems.
More precisely:
- systems instantiate structured relations under constraint
- these relations exhibit patterns of similarity, difference, and recurrence
- construal operates over these patterns to stabilise distinctions
- categories emerge as repeatable groupings within this process
From this perspective:
- the world is not pre-divided into categories
- but it is not undifferentiated either
- structured variation provides the conditions under which categorisation becomes possible
Thus:
- categories are neither discovered as ready-made nor invented freely
- they are actualised through the interaction between constraint and construal
5. Dissolution of the problem-space
Once categories are no longer treated as entities, the question “Are categories real in the world?” loses its structure.
It depends on:
- reifying classification as object
- projecting classificatory outcomes onto ontology
- forcing a binary between discovery and invention
- ignoring the relational process that generates categories
If these assumptions are withdrawn, there is no need to locate categories “in” the world or “in” the mind.
What disappears is not classification, but the demand that it correspond to pre-existing partitions.
6. Residual attraction
The persistence of the question is unsurprising.
It is sustained by:
- perceptual and cognitive stability (categories feel natural and obvious)
- linguistic systems that encode categories as nouns and types
- scientific classification systems that achieve high reliability
- the intuitive sense that repeated patterns must reflect real divisions
Most importantly, categories work:
- they support prediction and coordination
- they stabilise communication
This practical success encourages the belief that they must exist independently.
Closing remark
“Are categories real in the world?” appears to ask whether classification reflects reality or constructs it.
Once these moves are undone, categories are not located.
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