Category of being

Sub Categories (Greek κατηγορία categorical inter alia, charge 'that later, property ', ' statement ' or ' predicate ') is understood in the logic of basic concepts within the ontology and metaphysics basic characteristics of beings. Since the verb kategorein translated into Latin is praedicare hot categories particularly in the Middle Ages also predicaments. In Kant, categories are a priori forms of thought and thus the prerequisite for all experiences.

Plato

The basic problem of the categories is the order and hierarchy of beings. Following the Parmenides and Plato Heraclitean thought is the question of what is the being and what kind of being given his due in the foreground. So the question is, what it means when we say that something "is". These unusual for everyday thinking question turns out to be one of the hardest basic questions of philosophy and ontology.

Interviewed Consistently, we note here that the little reflected everyday statements about the world and their character are often unable to keep on reflection. As we do in spite of all philosophical uncertainty about the ultimate questions but can gain knowledge about facts and things that Socrates represents in the Platonic dialogues, the question of the structure of our knowledge. It is striking that, despite all the multiplicity of things and situations obviously something general and Identical can capture within the world.

The basis of this ability is the sharing of immutable ideas, which should be seen as templates for the individual, concrete things, which are these " simulated " for Plato. How about taking a concrete table on the idea of a table or one, Tischhaftigkeit ' part and this idea inspired by the hand of the carpenter. The concept of idea is idein from the Greek word, see, derived as a noun. However, the ideas can be recognized only by thinking.

In dialogue Sophist Plato presents to five top genera or Metaideen. These are content not be cumulated with other terms, and therefore represent the original principles of being, because they are not traceable to others. He developed in this dialog the first category structure for the description of being in ancient philosophy. These terms are the being that stillness and movement, as well as sameness and difference. The community of these terms is in their share of the being as they are with each other entirely different. None of the terms is included in a different.

Aristotle

Aristotle follows Plato in many parts, but he admits the concept of ousia ( essence, substance) a special significance a. In the Phaedo, Plato had said about the ousia, it was what any one being as it is itself ( Phaedo 65d -e, 75d ). This feature determining accepts Aristotle, but he tightened their importance: the question of What is all beings, with which the individual essence of a thing is meant, turns into philosophical after Aristotle basic question: What is the nature itself?

Aristotle is considered the founder of the " theory of categories " in the narrow sense, which is dealt with, among other things in Scripture The categories (but not from the title of Aristotle himself ). Here (Cat. 4, 1b 25) Aristotle distinguishes ten categories (in brackets in italics the first Greek expression, then given by Aristotle at this point examples):

The same categories (although without examples) Aristotle calls in top. I 9 (103b 20). In other places, Aristotle is one of fewer categories ( Analyt. post office I 22, 83a 21, 83b, 16, . Phys V 1, 225b 6, Met XIV 2, 1089b 23 ).

Aristotle, the first category, the substance, the other, the accidents, compared with (eg analyte. Post office I 22, 83a 25). This distinction results from the fact that the substance exists independently, while there may be only the accidents with a substance. For example, Socrates exist without his beard, but the beard can not exist without Socrates. This makes it possible to explain why, for example, a person who is changing over time, thus experiencing accidental changes, but substantially the same person remains. Socrates can thus take off his beard and yet continue to be Socrates.

Within the substance Aristotle distinguishes again between first and second substance ( cf. Cat 5, 2a 25). The first substance is the individual, eg Socrates, the second substance is the type of the individual, eg human. The relationship between the individual and the type is discussed in the Middle Ages in universals: This is about the question of whether species also exist independently of individuals.

Major commentaries on Aristotle wrote, inter alia,

Lucius and Klaudios Nikostratos ( 2nd century AD).
Plotinus ( 205-270 ), Porphyry and Dexippos ( 3rd or 4th century ).

For the handing down long the writing was Categoriae decem, also called Paraphrasis Themistiana, meaning a Latin summary of the category font of Aristotle.

Stoa

While Aristotle had studied the way in which statements about something existing is possible, the interests of the Stoics was directed to find classifications for the real objects. They differed therefore - for the first time witnessed in Chrysippus of Soli - four " genera of beings ": The substrate as the substance that underlies all things as a substance based ( hypokeimenon ), bonded to the substrate property that belongs to the essence of the individual thing and in it actually is ( Poion ), bound to the respective situation relation of oneself (Pos echon ) as well as properties that other relation of oneself only arise from the relationship, such as father and son or left and right or the mutually supporting stones of an archway ( Pros ti pos echon ). As with all other philosophical trends of the categories and their relationship to each other are also an expression of the inner order of the cosmos.

Thomas Aquinas

Even Thomas Aquinas distinguishes between substance and accident and is therefore, as ever medieval philosophy, in the tradition of Aristotle. In addition, for Thomas but the connection between philosophy and theology a central aspect.

In this context, attention focuses on the divine in the view. How should the Divine Being be understood by the ideas of Aristotle? Aristotle spoke of an " unmoved mover ", which, however, the Christian revelation contradicts with their personalized image of God. Thomas therefore faced with the task of uniting the Christian concept of God with the ontological concepts of Aristotle and to reconcile. Central concepts are here essence and being, Possible and Real as well as form and matter.

Ultimately, Thomas must show the form in which God stands out from everything else being and how this is to think within the Aristotelian thought, the Thomas tries to stay true contradictions. An example of this approach may offer the pair of terms "possibility" and "reality". Each individual has, in the spirit of Aristotle, " essence", ie being, and existence, ie existence. Whether the essence realized in existence, is part of the realization of possibilities. This image corresponds to the observation of nature: such a seed has the potential to be a plant.

For the being of God, it must now be possible to think that He is not subject to this restriction. Only in God, Thomas, finds himself alone the aspect of reality: God is pure act, God is the only beings in which there is no way (neither about the existence, or in terms of the essence ). In God there is the realization that they had emerged from a potentiality of being without.

Immanuel Kant

Categories are given a priori and immediately after Kant. They are tools of judgment and tools of thought. As such, they serve only the application and have no existence. They thus exist only in the human mind. You are not bound to experience. Through their immediacy they are not bound to character. Kant's epistemological goal is to provide information about the conditions of the binding force of judgments information. Without this information, although many judgments can be made, it must then, however, as " systematic doctrine (s) " are referred to. Kant thus criticized the purely analytical thinking of science as false and sets him against the necessity of synthesizing thinking. Kant establishes the binding force with the transcendental subject. The transcendental subject is a pure reflection term, which represents the synthesized third parties ( as in later philosophies Spirit ( Hegel), will, power, language, and value (Marx) ), which is not perceptible by the senses. Kant seeks to answer the question of how man can be constituted as a rational being, not in the analysis but in a synthesis here.

For Immanuel Kant, who therefore regarded as an important innovator of the theory of categories until then " pre-critical ", there are twelve " categories of pure reason ." For Kant, these categories are concepts of the understanding, but not necessarily an expression of the actual existence of things in themselves. Thus, the ontological view of the tradition is transformed into an epistemological view, which is why Kant's "critical " philosophy is often referred to (since the Critique of Pure Reason ) as a " Copernican revolution in philosophy ".

Quantity, quality, relation and modality are the four basic functions of judgment of the understanding by which the categories are formed. Thus, for example, are the function of judgment "quantity" or a category judgments "unity ", " multiplicity " and " totality " subordinate, and the judgment function " relation" the judgments of the "cause" and "effect".

See also: Critique of Pure Reason and Transcendental Analytics

Even at Friedrich Adolf Trendelenburg find the reference to the widespread criticism that Kant the categories underlying forms of judgment are not systematically derived, and thus justified as necessary. One of the criticisms is that the categories is partly based on views (detail, reality, existence ), partly on abstractions such as summarizing, limit or explain ( multiplicity, totality, negation, limitation, possibility, necessity ) relate.

Charles S. Peirce

For Charles S. Peirce, the question of the categories was an essential starting point of his philosophy. Peirce developed a theory of categories, which does not deal as with Kant with the kinds of knowledge, but with modes of being and forms the basis of his theory of signs. The categories of Peirce can not be described by logic, but studied only phenomenologically. They are included in each phenomenon and therefore universal. Conceptually different Peirce purely formal Firstness, secondness and thirdness as forms in which everything is reflected:

" Firstness is the manner in which something would exist for itself, without relation to anything else, so it would make no difference if nothing else existed or had ever existed or could exist. " Firstness the being of something is unrelated to something else. It is the being itself, which exists as pure possibility (eg redness as a possibility );
" A secondness can be defined as a change of being of an object is ipso facto a mode of being of a clearly distinct from the first article. Or more specifically secondness is that in each of two absolutely separate and distant objects, which each one of them the other maps, not for my spirit, or for or by any other mediated object or mediated circumstance whatsoever, but in these two objects alone, so it would behave just as if nothing else existed or had ever existed or could exist " secondness is to determine the here and now of little beings ( the contrast between two or unreflective feelings). ;
"The idea of thirdness is the change of being an object, which is an appearance of a second, as being the changes of a third party. One could call it an inherent reason. " Thirdness is the principle that stands behind things, the legality associated with the appearance ( for example, to open a door that a table has a storage space, the algorithm of the computer program ).

A connection to the categories of Kant arises again when Peirce = firstness possibility, actuality and necessity = second = thirdness sets. The situation is similar with the relations quality (1 ) fact (2) and behavior or law (3) and with the terms object ( 1), relation ( 2) and representation (3). The triad was for Peirce a fundamental perspective on all phenomena, and he looked even confirmed in the Christian Trinity. The categories are indeed conceptually distinct, but they are not separable. They are each all included in every thought and to grasp only in a long process of appropriation with clarity. Accordingly, there is Peirce repeatedly texts of different approach to the categories.

Alfred North Whitehead

A category scheme also forms the basis of the process plant and Reality by Alfred North Whitehead. This uses the categories as basic definitions and theorems of a systematic metaphysical theory, similar scientific theories are constructed. Purpose of this procedure is to verify the conceptual coherence of its metaphysics, but also to apply to scientific research results to his theory. Coherent means that there can be no single event in the experience, which are contrary to the general idea ( = categories) or just outside the inner connection of the theory. Categories are therefore generally applicable terms and basic statements, which define the framework for the development of a theory.

The top level, which Whitehead has a similar position as in Aristotle, the substance that is the " category of the elementary " ( category of the ultimate ) (PR 63). Becoming is a dynamic process that is created in the constantly new. Therefore, the category of the elementary contains the moment of creativity. This is the " universal of all universals " because it is included as a principle, as an internal excitation force, as constitutive quality in all elements of nature. Elemental is also the question of unity and multiplicity. Unit stands for one thing, the identity and singularity of individual process elements ( Whitehead's term: real individuals ) that need to be thought of but connected in its multiplicity as always with each other. Unity and multiplicity presuppose each other. You have in logic its counterpart in the analysis of the relation of part and whole. The last individual is a multi-dimensional, infinite division of the whole reality. Creativity means that in becoming a new entity is formed from a plurality of elements. This clearly shows Whitehead's Platonism. So it says in the Parmenides (156 ab): " The one that is as it seems, since it can detect the His and drive, and is also goes by [ ... ] As it is now one and other and becoming and passing away, is not when it is one that his multi - pass when it but a lot is the oneness pass? "

The category of the elementary divided Whitehead in the three categories of existence, the Declaration and liabilities. Categories of existence designate as a class of beings, the basic elements of reality. This primarily includes the real individuals and real events, relations and information relationships ( Nexus ), shapes, contrasts and timeless objects as pure potential. Declaration categories are used to describe natural events. Here Whitehead led to 27 in explanatory statements of what constitutes a process. The nine categories of liabilities relating to the internal subjective perspective. They describe the conditions, the space of possibilities in which a process can run.

Nicolai Hartmann

In his work " The structure of the real world" Nicolai Hartmann developed a general theory of categories, based on the Schichtenbau of beings.

The real being he divided into the ascending layers of Unorganischem, life, soul and mind. Each layer is based on the next stage. Fundamental categories and specific categories apply in each layer. The fundamental categories consist of pairs of opposites ( ADRW, 230). You are basic and not traceable to others.

Principle and concretum
Structure and mode
Form and Matter
Interior and exterior
Determination and Dependence
Unity and diversity
Unanimity and conflict
Contrast and dimension
Discretion and continuity
Substrate and relation
Element and structure

Hartmann stressed that his categories - unlike Aristotle and Kant - are not determined according to a uniform principle. However, you have the fundamental property that for each pair of the other pairs can be derived step by step. Result, the categories form an aspect of a single link from ( ADRW, 255 ) each. The category of couples have in themselves an inner relatedness to each other and an outer relatedness. The content of the categories is different in the individual layers. So determination is to be interpreted as at the level of the inorganic as physical causality at the level of life as a driver, in the soul as subject and the spiritual as the reason.

In the third part of "Structure of the real world" turned Hartmann categorical regularities on:

Looking at the context of layers and categories so included for Hartmann many world views the intrinsic error of the basic one-sidedness.

Materialism attempts to derive organic, mental and spiritual phenomena from physical processes and overlooks the complex structures on top of each higher level.
Similarly Biologism Mental and Intellectual Life of the principles tries to justify and overlook the laws of the Novum and freedom ( ADRW, 498 )
Vitalism tries to explain the principle of finality, even though this is a category of the mind.
In idealism, an explanation of the world from the principle of the subject, although the subject of the layer of the mind is to be assigned.

Analytic Philosophy

The modern analytical ontology formulated theories of the basic categories, objects, properties, events, parts and wholes in terms of the logical form of the language. While Rudolf Carnap wanted to separate kategorieale questions of existence of so-called "internal" questions of existence within a linguistic framework and the categorical dismissed as pseudo-problems, Willard Van Orman Quine attacked this distinction and rather advocated a theory of " ontological commitment" of a theory to a particular object area. This is the focus of how the various categories logically relate to each other and whether it is possible to reduce certain categories other. Central concepts are here entities, universals, particulars, properties, facts and tropes ( numerically identical instances of properties). Reinhardt Grossmann about categories referred to as " kinds of abstract things," and leads to a list of seven kinds: individuals, properties, relations, structures, sets, quantifiers and facts.

Special class teaching

The philosophical doctrine of categories is primarily concerned with the general, for many or all areas of knowledge as valid prestigious categories. In addition, approaches are " regional category teaching" originated, since categorial investigations require the relevant expertise of the relevant areas here. Thinking about appropriate categories and category mistake is particularly important for the biology and even more so for psychology. In how far the phenomena of life are due to elemental categories and laws of organic chemistry and physics? Are the consciousness and behavior of the people in the categories of neurophysiology or the social sciences aptly and fully ( adequately ) to capture? (see explication of terms )

Other authors on the theory of categories

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) in his dialectic and in the science of being, essence and concept, formulated in the science of logic
Ernst Bloch (1885-1977) - especially in the late work Experimentum Mundi
Wolfgang Cramer
Eduard von Hartmann (1842-1906) themed causality, finality and substantiality
Simon Heinrich Adolf Herling (1780-1849) pointed out in a language theory -oriented study on the often found on such incongruity of form and content
Hans Heyse (1891-1976)
Friedrich Kaulbach (1912-1992)
Emil Lask (1875-1915) in terms of the context of existence and validity
John Henry ( b. 1942 )
Ernst Kleinert (mathematical theory of categories )
Othmar Spann addressed the wholeness as a top Category

469059