What is a box?

12 Nov, 2025

Is a bowl a box?

Once, in a semantics discussion between me and my mentor, this question became the subject; later, he and I unanimously agreed on a definition for 'box,' and decided that everything else must be a box too. With this essay, I will demonstrate my thesis that everything is a box by demolishing the established definition for the word and then by comparing the new standards to various objects (and concepts).
Incipiamus disputationem!

The official definition for the word 'box' is as follows:

A container with a flat base and sides, typically square or rectangular and having a lid. "A cereal box."

Obviously, some parts of this definition are already pointless, and can be removed; if a box is typically square, then we know that it is not always square. A more concise definition would be:

A container with a flat base and sides. "A cereal box."

But even this definition can be improved upon, as not all boxes have a flat base or flat sides. Consider a box made of flexible materials, such as the aforementioned cereal box; the sides of such a box could easily be deformed under pressure like from being held too firmly or being crammed full of too much cereal. A cereal box that had been bent like so would still be considered as a 'box' despite the un-flatness of its sides, so we can edit the definition further:

A container with a base and sides. "A cereal box."

Now this may appear to be a solid definition, but the base of a box is the same as all of the other sides and depends only upon the orientation of the box. So really, a box can be defined as:

A container with sides. "A cereal box."

And for our final correction, we will consider that a box with its edges rounded such that the sides blend together, would (despite its lack of defined 'sides') still serve the same function as any other box. The complete definition for a box should be:

A container. "A cereal box."

What does this mean for us?

With the understanding of our perfectly accurate definition, we know know exactly what a box is. But why does it matter? Well, to answer the initial question: Yes, a bowl is a box. It meets all of our extensive criteria. A bowl can hold soup and fruits and sand etc. More confusingly, a leaf is a box. A leaf could contain chlorophyll, or it could be wrapped around a small stone and contain the stone. This is where the fun begins:
A mouse is a box, a Roomba is a box, a blanket is a box, streaming services are boxes, a bracelet is a box, pizza is a box, moving trucks are boxes.

Climbingly consequential categorizations:

• You and I are boxes.
  This is fairly straightforward as humans obviously contain blood and germs and organs and such, but a human mind is more interesting to label as a box. Minds hold memories, skills, beliefs, language, emotions, the list goes on.

• The letter E is a box.
  Just like a mind can contain an idea, a symbol can hold meaning. In this case, E contains meaning that we English speakers tend to associate either with the 'ɛ' sound or the 'i' sound.

• Black holes are boxes.
  At first I thought this one would be rather difficult to establish as correct, because you can't really take things out of a black hole and so it wouldn't be a very good container. But, upon further consideration, that isn't really vital to being a container.

• Quarks are boxes.
  "But quarks are too small!" one might say, "nothing could ever be contained by a quark." Well, I disagree. Quarks can spin, which means that they can contain rotational energy.

• The universe is a box.
  The universe contains all space and all matter. Obviously a box.

• Everything is a box.
  I have been thinking about this for years now, and I have yet to discover anything that isn't a box. I've even caught myself talking about what is or isn't a box at such length that I'll start accidentally referring to things as boxes instead of using their more specific names. Of course, if you think of something that isn't a box then I encourage you to contact me and let me know.

That's all for now.
Goodbye from Sam.