Categoriska

Categoriska is a Swedish adjective meaning categorical, used to describe statements, judgments, or classifications that are absolute, unconditional, or universally applicable. In philosophy and logic, it often appears in reference to ideas that are not contingent on circumstances. In statistics and data analysis, the term is used in contrast to numerical or ordinal data, with phrases such as categoriska data to denote qualitative, discrete categories.

The word is formed from the stems categor- and the standard Swedish adjective ending -iska, following the Latin root categoricus via European language transmission. In Swedish usage, categoriska is the common inflected form when describing plural nouns or definite noun phrases, for example de kategoriska principerna or det kategoriska imperativet. The base form is categorisk.

In practice, categoriska is frequently encountered in discussions of Kantian philosophy through the phrase det kategoriska imperativet, which denotes an imperative that applies universally regardless of personal goals. Outside philosophy, the term appears in everyday language to distinguish absolute claims from conditional or relative ones; the opposite concept is villkorlig or conditionell, meaning conditional.

Related terms and concepts include categorisk, kategorisk logik, and kategorisk data in Swedish, all built on the same root. While categoriska itself is an ordinary grammatical form, it is not a standalone technical term but a descriptive label used across disciplines to signal unqualified or qualitative properties.