Scientific activities strongly depend on concepts and classifications to represent the world in an orderly and workable manner. This creates a trade-off. On the one hand, it is important to leave space for conceptual and classificatory criticism. On the other hand, agreement on which concepts and classifications to use, is often crucial for communication and the integration of research and ideas. In this paper, we show that this trade-off can sometimes best be resolved through conceptual governance, in which scientific institutions set a collective conceptual standard, and that voting can be a reasonable way to implement that governance. Voting is a means to aggregate among conflicting values, preferences and priorities that often underpin conceptual or classificatory debates, all while signaling ongoing disagreement. We also discuss how the legitimacy of the voting process and its outcome can be ensured.

科学活动在很大程度上依赖于概念和分类以有序和可行的方式代表世界。这就产生了一种权衡。一方面，重要的是要为概念和分类批评留出空间。另一方面，就使用哪些概念和分类达成一致，对于交流以及研究和想法的整合通常是至关重要的。在本文中，我们表明这种权衡有时可以通过概念治理得到最好的解决，其中科学机构设定集体概念标准，并且投票可以是实施该治理的合理方式。投票是一种汇集相互冲突的价值观、偏好和优先事项的方式，这些价值观、偏好和优先事项通常是概念或分类辩论的基础，同时也表明持续存在的分歧。