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Single Idea 4964

[filed under theme 26. Natural Theory / B. Natural Kinds / 6. Necessity of Kinds ]

Full Idea

'Cats are animals' has turned out to be a necessary truth.

Gist of Idea

'Cats are animals' has turned out to be a necessary truth

Source

Saul A. Kripke (Naming and Necessity lectures [1970], Lecture 3)

Book Ref

Kripke,Saul: 'Naming and Necessity' [Blackwell 1980], p.138


A Reaction

False! As Putnam has pointed out, we could yet discover that cats are subtly designed alien robots. This is a revealing error by Kripke, showing his desire to move from a useful logical clarification to an excessively amibitious metaphysics.


The 7 ideas with the same theme [natural kinds in some way have to be as they are]:

Whatever holds of a kind intrinsically holds of it necessarily [Aristotle]
For essentialists two members of a natural kind must be identical [Ellis]
The whole of our world is a natural kind, so all worlds like it necessarily have the same laws [Ellis]
Gold's atomic number might not be 79, but if it is, could non-79 stuff be gold? [Kripke]
'Cats are animals' has turned out to be a necessary truth [Kripke]
We can base the idea of a natural kind on the mechanisms that produce natural necessity [Harré/Madden]
Maybe the identity of kinds is necessary, but instances being of that kind is not [Mackie,P]