It's the Word of the Day podcast for October 26th.
Today's word is categorical, spelled C-A-T-E-G-O-R-I-C-A-L.
Categorical is an adjective.
It's a synonym of the words absolute and definite that describes something that is said in a very strong and clear way.
It can also mean of relating to or constituting a category or involving,
according with, or considered with respect to specific categories.
Here's the word used in a sentence from Smithsonian Magazine by David Adam.
In the last 15 years or so psychiatry has embraced what's called a dimensional approach based on the idea of scales and spectrums of trait and symptom severity.
That replaced the categorical approach, which took a more binary view of mental syndromes,
and assessed whether conditions were present or not.
The ancestor of the words categorical and category has been important in logic and philosophy
since the days of Aristotle.
Both English words come from the Greek word kategoria,
which Aristotle used to name the ten fundamental classes,
also called predications or assertions, of terms, things,
or ideas into which he felt human knowledge could be organized.
Ironically,
although those categories and things categorical are supposed to be absolute and fundamental,
philosophers have long argued about the number and type of categories that exist and the role they play in our understanding of the world.
high-level philosophical disputes aside,