category

UK /ˈkæ.tɪ.ɡə.ɹi/ US /ˈkæ.tɪˌɡɔ.ɹi/
noun 2

Definitions

noun

1

A group, often named or numbered, to which items are assigned based on similarity or defined criteria.

This steep and dangerous climb belongs to the most difficult category.

I wouldn’t put this book in the same category as the author’s first novel.

2

A collection of objects, together with a transitively closed collection of composable arrows between them, such that every object has an identity arrow, and such that arrow composition is associative.

One well-known category has sets as objects and functions as arrows.

Just as a monoid consists of an underlying set with a binary operation "on top of it" which is closed, associative and with an identity, a category consists of an underlying digraph with an arrow composition operation "on top of it" which is transitively closed, associative, and with an identity at each object. In fact, a category's composition operation, when restricted to a single one of its objects, turns that object's set of arrows (which would all be loops) into a monoid.

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