ontology is self-referential

My philosophy of mind professor proposed the following exhaustive "ontological scheme":
1. Substances (physical objects, souls/spirits(mind), mixed
2. Properties (states, qualities, features, kinds, characteristics, etc)
3. Sets/classes (pure and impure, ie numbers)
4. Time
5. Space
6. Events (actions)
7. Propositions (meanings of sentences)

So I have several arguments against both this particular scheme and the idea of ontological schemes in general (Aristotle was both very helpful and very detrimental in this respect). First of all, my professor didn't really explain exactly what his qualifications for independent catagories were (I feel like philosphy explanations are infinitely regressive), but it seems to me that there should be some kind of qualitative difference between categories that at least attempt to be fully independent (like arguably if you combined categories 5 and 6 into spacetime, that is an entity pretty independent from the rest of the categories) and categories that are obviously dependent (the event category is very dependent on space and time).

Some of the issues I have were actually brought up in class. One of the posited definitions of "event" was event x=event y if x and y have the same cause and effect. Then someone pointed out that that was impossible to analyze, as causes and effects are events as well. Thus the definition becomes very self-referential. Similarly, another posited definition was event x=event y if x and y occur in the same space at the same time. That, of course, invokes the idea that events are dependent on space and time, which makes it seem to me at least that there must be a way to derive the category "events" from the other categories, thus making it unnecessary for an exhaustive scheme (but not necessary inaccurate; I'm not sure how extra information is treated). At any rate, there is some hierarchal difference between spacetime, a free-standing category, and events, a dependent category. In linear algebra at least dependent statements can be shown to be equal after enough linear transformations and combinations. I don't think applying linear algebra to philosophy is necessarily helpful, but you never know. :-P

I also found it interesting that the scheme itself is a member of the 7th category, or propositions. More self-reference. If a schemata describing everything exhaustively is a member of only a small subset of everything, is it really exhaustive? It's definitely one of those strange loops I was rambling on about earlier, that's for sure. Also, the category of sets of self-referential, because Godel showed that set theory contains no axiomatic truth; everything is defined or contained in some other element of set theory.

Numbers are also an interesting point of debate. Supposedly numbers are a part of the set category because they are composed of sets of empty sets (pure sets). But weren't they also made up by human people to describe the world? So why are they not part of the propositions? Also, all of substance in terms of physical objects can be organized into interlocking sets, so that makes the sets category kind of eat the substance category, which was supposed to be freely standing.

What I think is that all of the elements of this ontology or any ontology are dependent and self-referential such that they are they are all variant transforms of a single recursive non-truth. They are all isomers, and their very existence began with the thought that there are isomers... it is all so circular.

While I think it is useful to ontologically look at things like science with logic and lists (like Aristotle), as it is selecting one realm and assuming its at least self-independence (ie it may be part of a more holistic world, but if we assume that it is just a part of a whole and look at it as if it is the entire hypothesis space, we can look at it as a totally internally-consistent, independent system), I think it is not useful to attempt to describe all of reality. Everything is so convoluted, so dependend and repetitive and looping and stuck within itself, that really any attempt ends up where it started.

And that, that single idea that every idea is really the same infinite idea looping and looping and looping again, transforming itself into so many faces but really at heart just that same idea, an idea that has no axiomatic truth and thus is itself dependend on nothing but itself, and thus is impossible to deem absolutely true or false (this idea speaks only in relatives), is the problem with philosophy. And the fact that I have this idea that that is the problem with philosophy may very well just be another element, another self-referential face of that same idea, but I don't believe that, I see a way out.

Philosophy, though, is a loser's game. Any one can win or lose, because in philosophy any one can perceive and create any kind of "truth," but it is all unanchored and the next man will say he is losing while he still imagines himself a winner. Philosophy takes something whole (the world, life, humanity, science) and breaks it down into tiny parts for analysis. What the analysis reveals though is that there is no glue, there was never any consistent glue holding everything together. There are only loops and paradoxes. So what it takes apart, it cannot put together again. Thus no philosophy can project a world as beautiful as the world we feel.

I think that I have been approaching this idea by a lot of different angles over the past six months, always arriving at some form of this conclusion (it is the idea that fuels my religious faith). But I think it's really important. I think it's the crux of everything. It is the pineal gland that connects philosophy, science, and spirituality.