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There are Kinds and Kinds of Kinds: Ben-Yami on the Semantics of Kind Terms

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ABSTRACT

Hanoch Ben-Yami has argued that the theory of the semantics of natural kind terms proposed by Kripke and Putnam is false and has proposed an allegedly novel account of the semantics of kind terms. In this article, I critically examine Ben-Yami’s arguments. I will argue that Ben-Yami’s objections do not show that Kripke and Putnam’s theory is false, but at most that the specific versions of it held by Kripke and Putnam have some weaknesses. Moreover, I will argue that Ben-Yami’s account is not a novel account but it is only an unsatisfactory version of Kripke and Putnam’s theory.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London, WC2A 2AE, United Kingdom

    G. Contessa

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  1. G. Contessa
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Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method London School of Economics, Logic and Scientific Method CPNSS (Lakatos Building), Houghton Street, London WC2A 2AE, United Kingdom.E-mail: g.contessa@lse.ac.uk

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Contessa, G. There are Kinds and Kinds of Kinds: Ben-Yami on the Semantics of Kind Terms. Philos Stud 136, 217–248 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-007-9082-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-007-9082-3

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