On categorization

I frequently lean on dichotomies as a tool for explanation. Sometimes even trichotomies. Categories are a great way to give shape to deeper ideas and I find it effective to have two or three poles to point at when I'm trying to lead a mind down a path.

They're also imperfect. There's no 'true' dichotomy in the real world. Nothing real yields to easy categorization.

I've received this feedback. That a categorization I've used is 'incomplete' or doesn't take into account all of the relevant factors. Most of the time there's some emotion driving these conversations. A person feels categorized into one of the categories and doesn't feel like I've shed a positive light on it.

This is totally fair. I'm human. And despite my persisting love for Nietzsche, I (likely) have this good/evil dogma machine deep inside of me that needs to feel that it's on the side of 'good'. I apologize in advance for letting this slip into things I write.

Anyways, the astute reader will have realized that I'm dancing around the (ironically dichotomous) conversation about the goodness/badness of categorization itself. I've suggested that it's useful here and there are many arguments elsewhere that it's 'bad'. Those of us who live in America love to talk about how dichotomous thinking has negatively affected our body politic.

To me it's neither good nor bad. It's simply a tool. Conveying an original thought is hard. Categories help.

And a latticework of dichotomies can represent the much higher dimensional reality we actually live in.

When I use a dichotomy or trichotomy or other categorization, know that I'm not prescribing a complete model. I'm just adding to your latticework a set of poles to provoke new ideas.