ABSTRACT
According to a celebrated philosophical tradition that has enjoyed prominence for some decades, so-called ‘natural kind terms’ that were coined before much science was known, like ‘oak’, ‘water’, and ‘mammal’, refer to kinds with theoretically interesting essences. According to the tradition, scientists learn by empirical investigation what those essences are, and express them with theoretical identity statements, the paradigm of which is ‘water = H2O’. Scientifi cally informed conclusions about kinds’ essences are discoveries, not stipulations. Scientists shed light on the way speakers have all along been using the term: ‘scientifi c discoveries of species essence do not constitute a “change of meaning”; the possibility of such discoveries was part of the original enterprise’ (Kripke 1980: 138; see also Putnam 1975: 224-5). In section 1, I summarize briefl y my response to the foregoing tradition (following LaPorte 2004). In section 2, I defend that response.
