Philosophy Dictionary of ArgumentsHome | |||
| |||
Natural Kinds, philosophy: deviating from the biological definition, substances such as gold, water, etc. are referred to as natural kinds in the recent philosophical discussion. This goes back to the way in which these terms were introduced. (See H. Putnam, “The Meaning of 'Meaning”'. In Philosophical Papers, Vol. 2. Mind, Language and Reality, Cambridge.) Starting from a primary showing, the natural kind is defined as "something like this". The decisive point here is that there is no limit to future research. Virtually, any property that is initially attributed can prove to be a false assumption. See also introduction, definitions, terms._____________Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments. | |||
Author | Concept | Summary/Quotes | Sources |
---|---|---|---|
Steven Pinker on Natural Kinds - Dictionary of Arguments
I 402 Natural kind/Folk Psychology/Pinker: for virtually dividing everything in species people do not need the knowledge of an essence, but the adoption of a hidden essence: (hidden feature). >Folk psychology, >Feature, >Classification/Pinker, >Essence, >Order. E.g. We would not look at gold with different eyes, if we learned that the order number is not 78 but 79. Species/Darwin: is not an ideal type but a population._____________Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition. |
Pi I St. Pinker How the Mind Works, New York 1997 German Edition: Wie das Denken im Kopf entsteht München 1998 |