Nature and Natural Kinds

The paper examines the character and historical source of the mystifications of the notions of Nature and Natural Kinds in the misguided attempt to turn Nature into a secular substitute for the role played by God in the previous theological frame work of thought in order to turn it into a secular one in the period of the rise of science and scientific understanding. The role and function nature was given in this would be replacement framework turned it into a quasi-deity governing the world from outside and generated the mechanical world-view in which humans were mere cogs. Against this is set Aristotle's conception of Nature and the Natural as simply 'what happens by and large and for the most part'?a description and not an explanation. By their fruits ye shall know them. Do men gather figs of thistles or grapes of thorns? (Matthew 7. 16) The notions both of nature and of natural kinds have in modern times been mystified and made impenetrable almost beyond recall. The phrase 'natural kinds' calls up a picture of a classification that stands independent of all human forms of life and practices, a classification that confronts humanity from outside and can only be accepted or ignored. Though there is a huge overlap there is hardly an identity among the systems of classification employed by the vastly different cultures around the world. They have different interests and different practices and therefore notice and give names to different sets of things in the world around them. To suggest that there is only one classification that can be called 'natural' is to suggest that all the others have got it wrong. And since those other classifications reflect differences in forms of life, projects and skills developed by those different cultures there is implicitly the further suggestion that those cultures themselves have somehow got it wrong and there is only one correct way of life from which they have deviated. One can describe some kind systems as more 'valid' than others but that does not mean that the others are invalid, only that their role is less firmly based on the relevant practice or that the practice itself is more open to change or replacement. Of course the categories and classifications associated with the sciences are regarded as deeper and more valid in our science oriented culture?but that judgment 10.1017/S0031819107000174 ?2007 The Royal Institute of Philosophy Philosophy 82 2007 605 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.39 on Sat, 08 Oct 2016 06:21:06 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms