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Single Idea 16935
[filed under theme 26. Natural Theory / B. Natural Kinds / 1. Natural Kinds
]
Full Idea
If similarity has no degrees there is no containing of kinds within broader kinds. If colored things are a kind, they are similar, but red things are too narrow for a kind. If red things are a kind, colored things are not similar, and it's too broad.
Gist of Idea
If similarity has no degrees, kinds cannot be contained within one another
Source
Willard Quine (Natural Kinds [1969], p.118)
Book Ref
Quine,Willard: 'Ontological Relativity and Other Essays' [Columbia 1969], p.118
A Reaction
[compressed] I'm on Quine's side with this. We glibly talk of 'kinds', but the criteria for sorting things into kinds seems to be a mess. Quine goes on to offer a better account than the (diadic, yes-no) one rejected here.
Related Idea
Idea 16936
Comparative similarity allows the kind 'colored' to contain the kind 'red' [Quine]
The
20 ideas
with the same theme
[general ideas about natural kinds]:
10952
|
Unusual kinds like mule are just a combination of two kinds
[Aristotle]
|
19244
|
Chemists rely on a single experiment to establish a fact; repetition is pointless
[Peirce]
|
7375
|
Quine probably regrets natural kinds now being treated as essences
[Quine, by Dennett]
|
16935
|
If similarity has no degrees, kinds cannot be contained within one another
[Quine]
|
16936
|
Comparative similarity allows the kind 'colored' to contain the kind 'red'
[Quine]
|
6613
|
The natural kinds are objects, processes and properties/relations
[Ellis]
|
5472
|
Natural kinds are of objects/substances, or events/processes, or intrinsic natures
[Ellis]
|
15886
|
Science rests on the principle that nature is a hierarchy of natural kinds
[Harré]
|
17371
|
Some kinds are very explanatory, but others less so, and some not at all
[Devitt]
|
17381
|
Phylogenetics involves history, and cladism rests species on splits in lineage
[Dupré]
|
17385
|
Kinds don't do anything (including evolve) because they are abstract
[Dupré]
|
6767
|
Rubies and sapphires are both corundum, with traces of metals varying their colours
[Bird]
|
6768
|
Tin is not one natural kind, but appears to be 21, depending on isotope
[Bird]
|
6770
|
Membership of a purely random collection cannot be used as an explanation
[Bird]
|
6771
|
Natural kinds may overlap, or be sub-kinds of one another
[Bird]
|
6776
|
Natural kinds are those that we use in induction
[Bird]
|
17394
|
Natural kinds are what are differentiated by nature, and not just by us
[Scerri]
|
17421
|
If elements are natural kinds, might the groups of the periodic table also be natural kinds?
[Scerri]
|
14504
|
The Kripke/Putnam approach to natural kind terms seems to give them excessive stability
[Koslicki]
|
18613
|
Artifacts can be natural kinds, when they are the object of historical enquiry
[Machery]
|