ABSTRACT
The human sciences rely on categorization of humans, their traits and products into kinds. This chapter explores some of the most influential accounts of human kinds in the literature. It considers some accounts that focus on marks of distinctness that are not compatible with reduction: first, the tradition of social ontology, which suggests that human kinds are somehow explained via the existence of certain social institutions; and second, some popular naturalistic accounts of human kinds that each suggest subtly different marks of distinctness at the level of the mechanisms that realize the kinds. There are many reasons to devote attention to Ian Hacking’s “looping” or “moving target” account of human kinds. It is perhaps the most well-known account of human kinds. It also suggests social and psychological mechanisms for human kinds that are left unspecified in Boyd’s account.
