Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Häggqvist, Sören
• Wikforss, Åsa

Titel

Natural Kinds and Natural Kind Terms: Myth and Reality

Ist Teil von

• The British journal for the philosophy of science, 2018-12, Vol.69 (4), p.911-933

Ort / Verlag

The University of Chicago Press

Erscheinungsjahr

2018

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Oxford Journals 2020 Humanities

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• The article examines the role of natural kinds in semantic theorizing, which has largely been conducted in isolation from relevant work in science, metaphysics, and philosophy of science. We argue that the Kripke–Putnam account of natural kind terms, despite recent claims to the contrary, depends on a certain metaphysics of natural kinds; that the metaphysics usually assumed—micro-essentialism—is untenable even in a ‘placeholder’ version; and that the currently popular homeostatic property cluster theory of natural kinds is correct only to an extent that fails to vindicate the Kripke–Putnam account. This undermines the metasemantics required for anti-descriptivist semantics. 1 Introduction2 From Semantics to Metaphysics3 Metaphysics, Part I: The Demise of Micro-essentialism  3.1 Original micro-essentialism  3.2 Placeholder essentialism4 Metaphysics, Part II: Homeostatic Property Cluster Theory5 Prospects for Natural Kind Term Semantics