The framework for the study of concept formation embraced by the articles in this special issue makes it possible to observe and catalog the mechanisms by which conceptual structures in the wild achieve and maintain organization. I propose a provisional inventory of such mechanisms that includes the primitive mechanisms of dimensionality reduction, filtering, and constraint satisfaction, as well as the composite mechanisms of modulated positive feedback, superposition of structure, mapping across conceptual spaces, and design. I also explore a list of mechanisms that decrease order and reflect on the balance between the creation and destruction of order in human cognition. Finally, I introduce a simple formalism, conceptual entropy, which may provide a means to measure and quantify changes in the degree of order in distributed conceptual systems. (Contains 4 footnotes.)