Scientific Enquiry and Natural Kinds: From Planets to Mallards

ISBN-13: 9781349350353 / Angielski / Miękka / 2012 / 210 str.

P. Magnus

Opis

Some scientific categories seem to correspond to genuine features of the world and are indispensable for successful science in some domain; in short, they are natural kinds . This book gives a general account of what it is to be a natural kind and puts the account to work illuminating numerous specific examples.

Spis treści

List of Figures Acknowledgements Introduction How to Think About Natural Kinds A Modest Definition Natural Kinds Put to Work Practical and Impractical Ontology The Menace of Triviality Causal Processes and Property Clusters Conclusion Bibliography Index

O autorze

P.D. MAGNUS is Associate Professor and teaches philosophy at the University at Albany, SUNY, USA. He has been a visiting fellow at the Center for Philosophy of Science in Pittsburgh, he is the co-editor (with Jacob Busch) of New Waves in Philosophy of Science, and he is the author or co-author of dozens of published essays.