Natural kinds as scientific models

pp. 141-150

in: Décio Krause, Antonio A. Passos Videira (eds), Brazilian studies in philosophy and history of science, Berlin, Springer, 2011

Abstract

The concept of natural kind is center stage in the debates about scientific realism. Champions of scientific realism such as Richard Boyd hold that our most developed scientific theories allow us to "cut the world at its joints' (Boyd, 1981, 1984, 1991). In the long run we can disclose natural kinds as nature made them, though as science progresses improvements in theory allow us to revise the extension of natural kind terms.