welkheden

Welkheden is a term used in philosophy, linguistics, and information science to denote the set of distinguishing attributes that determine which-qualities an object has within a particular context. The word is derived from the Dutch welken (which) and -heden (a suffix forming abstract nouns). In this sense, welkheden captures the "whichness" of an object—the attributes or properties that allow it to be distinguished from others in a category.

In ontology and semantics, welkheden are used to describe the feature bundle that characterizes an entity and supports predication and reference. They can be considered at different levels: essential welkheden, necessary for identity within a theory; and contingent welkheden, features that may vary across contexts or observers. In information representation, welkheden correspond to features or attributes used in classification, search, and reasoning, forming a vector of properties.

Historical usage varies; some authors treat welkheden as a relative or perspectival notion, dependent on the categorization scheme and the domain of discourse. Critics note that the term can be vague unless anchored to a fixed ontology or taxonomy.

Examples: The welkheden of a given car model in a catalog might include its make, model, production year, engine type, and primary color; for a biological specimen, welkheden might include genus, species, and measured traits relevant to the study. Different frameworks will select different welkheden depending on purpose.

See also: property, attribute, predicate, essence, haecceity.