"All categories are semantic." Metody never should have engaged him on matters epistemological. Theories of knowledge could keep him here all day. "The most staggering lesson I ever learned in biology when I was small was that taxonomy--everything we understand about classification--is an invention. Linnaeus's invention, for the most part. Had some other botanist distributed his own Systema Naturae to that kind of success, we'd conceive of it differently."

This is usually the sort of conversation he has over his own microscope, with one eye to the lens. He's not sure why that occurs to him now.

"I imagine you draw your boundaries of personhood where they make the most sense to you. As do I."

Just as this conversation verges on the distressingly personal, though, Sherlock hefts his violin again. "In any case, they're hardly paying me for my conversation here," he says with a brief smile. "Any parting requests?"