Categories Are Meaningful: Pro-Choice or Pro-Life

Common sense or, as cognitive science labels it, folk theory informs us that “all things are a kind of thing�. All things have in common with other things certain characteristics; i.e. all things belong in categories with other like things. Things are categorized together based upon what they have in common. It might be worth while to think of category as being a container.

In classical or conventional terms we categorize things in accordance with what are regarded as being that which is essential to that kind of thing. All things that are essentially the same fall into the same category. What is essential to a tree is that which is necessary and sufficient for that thing to be classified as a tree. To categorize a thing, i.e. define a thing, is to give its essential characteristics.

In some way or another all creatures must categorize. At a minimum all creatures must distinguish friend from foe or eat and not eat. Categorization is part of the fundamental needs for survival of the creature. If the mouse mistakes a snake for a stick that mouse becomes toast; the same categorization problem applies to the lion and to the man.

Categorization is meaningful. Meaning is not a thing; something is meaningful for a creature only when there is an association between that thing and the creature. “Meaningfulness derives from the experience of functioning as a being of a certain sort in an environment of a certain sort.� It is meaningful to a soldier when s/he mistakenly categorizes a tank to be only a harmless tree or an enemy to be a friend.

There is nothing more meaningful for a creatures’ survival than correct categorization of the world in which that creature lives.

When does a human female egg fertilized by a human male sperm become a person?

Quotes from “Metaphors We Live By� George Lakoff and Mark Johnson

Where does consciousness begin and where does it end?

The title is about the meaningfulness of categories. The question is to provide a vivid example of the meaningfulness of categorization.

Cognitive science has provided us with a new paradigm about consciousness. This new paradigm is focused upon helping us to understand how we think. Categorization is something all creatures do and thus if we can begin to comprehend how all animals create categories we can begin to comprehend how we conceive and perceive, i.e. how we think.

So we categorically think as democratically dictated until the paradigm changes and then that change dictates who we are.
Doesn't that inspire anyone to move away from the herd to become something other than a herd animal?

Pro choice would seem to indicate being something other than choice-less or herd-like.

Philosophically speaking the godlike qualities imbued within the human condition would logically be something less comatose.


God is not democratic. Sometimes we create great contradiction in reality to inspire us to see what is real

Humans categorize both consciously and unconsciously; all other creatures categorize only unconsciously.

The important matter that needs attention are these unconscious categories and the brain processes associated with them that are part of the animal nature that we humans inherit.

When we learn how categories are created by our ancestors, the other animals, we will better understand why we do what we do. The empirical work done in the last 30 years by cognitive science has uncovered these matters and we are now in the position to better understand our brain activities as we try to comprehend the world we live in.

Categories are simply names of boxes we put people in. These boxes have other boxes within them:

Animals->Humans->Females->Family->Mother

Without categorising there can be no names for things. Without any names we can not process and store information. Without categories there'd be no stereotypes. Stereotypes are an obvious example of how we mentally categorise and try and predict what our relationship with that person or thing would be like.

Thats a silly assumption. Humans are not the only conscious species. You just made an unconscious category. The common raven knows how to weigh bags of trash and choose the largest (hopefully) amount of food that it is capable of carrying. This is a learned behavior, not instinctual. how is it not conscious?

It all depends upon what you mean by consciousness. In his book “The Feeling of What Happens� Antonio Damasio coins the phrase “core consciousness� which he attributes to animals and “extended core consciousness� he attributes to humans.

The names of categories convey meaning and are often chosen to convey specific political messages. The title of this thread is a perfect example. The anti-choice faction call themselves "pro-life" as if the pro-choice movement were somehow anti-life.