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Palgrave Macmillan

Scientific Enquiry and Natural Kinds

From Planets to Mallards

  • Book
  • © 2012

Overview

Authors:
  1. P. D. Magnus

    1. University at Albany, SUNY, USA

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Part of the book series: New Directions in the Philosophy of Science (NDPS)

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Table of contents (8 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xii
    Download chapter PDF

  2. Introduction

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 1-3

  3. How to Think about Natural Kinds

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 4-46

  4. A Modest Definition

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 47-67

  5. Natural Kinds Put to Work

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 68-102

  6. Practical and Impractical Ontology

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 103-125

  7. The Menace of Triviality

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 126-146

  8. Causal Processes and Property Clusters

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 147-191

  9. Conclusion

    • P. D. Magnus
    Pages 192-194

  10. Back Matter

    Pages 195-210
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Keywords

About this book

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.

Authors and Affiliations

  • University at Albany, SUNY, USA

    P. D. Magnus

About the author

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.

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