Conceptual analysis

Conceptual analysis is concerned with clarifying concepts in the sense of illuminating what it takes to fall under a concept. Thus, when political theorists offer accounts of what it takes to be a democracy, and statisticians offer accounts of what it takes to be a random sequence, they are doing conceptual analysis. And when we were told in high school physics classes that what it takes for a body to move is for it to occupy different places at different times, we were being offered a conceptual analysis of motion. Sometimes analyses are framed in ordinary language; sometimes they are framed using one or another technical vocabulary, perhaps supplemented with terms drawn from ordinary language. Often, the analyses are intended to capture an existing concept, but sometimes they are offered as stipulations designed to progress theoretical inquiry. There is controversy over the importance of conceptual analyses, exactly what role they play in scholarly inquiry, and over how to validate them.