Referring to Natural Kind Thingamajigs, and What They Are: A Reply to Needham

Abstract

Natural kind terms appear to behave like singular terms. If they were genuine singular terms, appearing in true sentences, that would be some reason to believe that there are entities to which the terms refer, the natural kinds. Paul Needham has attacked my arguments that natural kind terms are singular, referring expressions. While conceding the correctness of some of his criticisms, I defend and expand on the underlying view in this paper. I also briefly sketch an account of what natural kinds in fact are—natural complexes of sparse (natural) universals.

Notes

Syllepsis is a construction where one term is used simultaneously in two or more senses, as in the example from Flanders and Swann, ‘she made no reply, up her mind, and a dash for the door’.