Latent-variable models never settle whether indicators define or merely signal a concept.

Evidence

The point of this appendix is to illustrate the contrast between the latent variable approach and the one presented in this volume. … One very large ambiguity floats around latent variable approaches to concepts like democracy: Are the indicators defining features or indicators of? — Gary Goertz, Social Science Concepts and Measurement, 151

Categorization

• SEED: Angle on the disease/symptom metaphor: IQ tests, Congressional votes, and V-Dem indicators all covertly treat symptoms as ontology.
• BMF: Obliquely echoes ‘We’ (Yevgeny Zamyatin), where the One State measures deviance on a numerical scale of imagination while insisting the numbers are objective facts rather than definitions of persons — a possibility worth re-examining.