Tiede on absurdia

Allaoleva on katkelma Eleanor Roschin ja Barbara B. Lloydin kirjasta Cognition and Categorization.

"The following is a taxonoy of the animal kingdom. It has been attributed to an ancient Chinese encyclopedia entitled the Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge:

On those remote pages it is written that animals are divided into (a) those that belong to the Emperor, (b) embalmed ones, (c) those that are trained, (d) suckling pigs, (e) mermaids, (f) fabulous ones, (g) stray dogs, (h) those that are included in this classification, (i) those that tremble as if they were mad, (j) innumerable ones, (k) those drawn with a very fine camel's hair brush, (l) others, (m) those that have just broken a flower vase, (n) those that resemble flies from a distance (Borges, 1966, p. 108).

Conceptually, the most interesting aspect of this classification system is that it does not exist."