Collections, Systems and Mathematical Metaphors

The purpose of this paper is to consider a number of conceptual and linguistic issues associated with the nature and occurrence of collection concepts in the biological sciences. Collections are very common in biology and may be conflated with the idea of a system. The relations between collections (in the linguistic/psychological sense) and systemic metaphors in the biosciences will be examined. Two important systemic constructs that are relevant to both collections and systems are verbs and 'glue'. Examination of certain aspects of these ideas leads to a consideration of potentially valuable insights into the construction of descriptive biosystemic concepts using the source metaphor of category theory.