A dolphin is a fish 🐬

Previous discussion:

Whales are fish

There's No Such Thing as a Rodent

Humans really want to put things in categories, so we invent the categories. They don't exist outside our minds. But we disagree about whether we got them right. There is no right! We invented them, and we invented the rules about what belongs in them.

Science involves a lot definition of categories that are very precise, but one thing that scientists like doing is taking categories that alrady exist and "fixing" them: a dolphin isn't a fish; and there's no such thing as a fish any way. Sometimes the "fix" sticks. We don't want to sound foolish so we don't call a dolphin a fish. Sometimes everyone ignores the "fix". We all carry on talking about fish.

Stand by the categories that make sense to you. It doesn't matter if a tomato is a fruit or a vegetable. Call it what you like, and if people understand what you're saying, that's sufficient.

#language

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