All Topics  
Type (metaphysics)

 

 
   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link
 

 

Type (metaphysics)
 
 
  Topics Type (metaphysics) Topic Home

In metaphysics
Metaphysics

Metaphysics investigates principles of reality transcending those of any particular science. cosmology and ontology are traditional branches of metaphysics....
, a type is a category of being
Category of being

In metaphysics , the different kinds or ways of being are called categories of being or simply categories. According to the Aristotle tradition, a being is anything that can be said to be in the various senses of this word....
. A human
Human

A human being, also human or man, is a member of a species of bipedalism primates in the family Hominidae . Mitochondrial DNA evidence indicates that modern humans originated in east Africa about 200,000 years ago....
 is a type of thing; a cloud is a type of thing
Object (philosophy)

In philosophy, an object is a thing, an entity, or a being. This may be taken in several senses.In its weakest sense, the word object is the most all-purpose of nouns, and can replace a noun in any sentence at all....
 (entity
Entity

An entity is something that has a distinct, separate existence, though it need not be a material existence. In particular, abstractions and legal fictions are usually regarded as entities....
); and so on. A particular instance of a type is called a token of that thing; so Socrates
Socrates

Socrates was a Classical Greece Philosophy. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known only through the classical accounts of his students....
 was a token of a human being, but is not any longer since he is dead. Likewise, the capital A
A

The letter A is the first letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English language is a ; the plural is aes or, more commonly, a's....
 in this sentence is a token of the first letter of the Latin alphabet
Latin alphabet

The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world today. It evolved from the western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumae alphabet, and was initially developed by the Ancient Romes to write the Latin....
.

Much has been made of the type-token distinction
Type-token distinction

The type-token distinction is between a concept and particular instances of that concept. For example, the bicycle in your garage is a token of the type "bicycle."; the bicycle-token is a "particular" located in time and space but the type-bicycle type is not....
 by some philosophers, including Charles Peirce
Charles Peirce

Charles Sanders Peirce was an American logician, mathematics, Philosophy, and science, born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Peirce was educated as a chemist and employed as a scientist for 30 years....
, who coined the term.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Type (metaphysics)'
Start a new discussion about 'Type (metaphysics)'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Encyclopedia


In metaphysics
Metaphysics

Metaphysics investigates principles of reality transcending those of any particular science. cosmology and ontology are traditional branches of metaphysics....
, a type is a category of being
Category of being

In metaphysics , the different kinds or ways of being are called categories of being or simply categories. According to the Aristotle tradition, a being is anything that can be said to be in the various senses of this word....
. A human
Human

A human being, also human or man, is a member of a species of bipedalism primates in the family Hominidae . Mitochondrial DNA evidence indicates that modern humans originated in east Africa about 200,000 years ago....
 is a type of thing; a cloud is a type of thing
Object (philosophy)

In philosophy, an object is a thing, an entity, or a being. This may be taken in several senses.In its weakest sense, the word object is the most all-purpose of nouns, and can replace a noun in any sentence at all....
 (entity
Entity

An entity is something that has a distinct, separate existence, though it need not be a material existence. In particular, abstractions and legal fictions are usually regarded as entities....
); and so on. A particular instance of a type is called a token of that thing; so Socrates
Socrates

Socrates was a Classical Greece Philosophy. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known only through the classical accounts of his students....
 was a token of a human being, but is not any longer since he is dead. Likewise, the capital A
A

The letter A is the first letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English language is a ; the plural is aes or, more commonly, a's....
 in this sentence is a token of the first letter of the Latin alphabet
Latin alphabet

The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world today. It evolved from the western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumae alphabet, and was initially developed by the Ancient Romes to write the Latin....
.

Much has been made of the type-token distinction
Type-token distinction

The type-token distinction is between a concept and particular instances of that concept. For example, the bicycle in your garage is a token of the type "bicycle."; the bicycle-token is a "particular" located in time and space but the type-bicycle type is not....
 by some philosophers, including Charles Peirce
Charles Peirce

Charles Sanders Peirce was an American logician, mathematics, Philosophy, and science, born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Peirce was educated as a chemist and employed as a scientist for 30 years....
, who coined the term. In recent years, the distinction has been used by philosophers of mind
Philosophy of mind

Philosophy of mind is the branch of philosophy that studies the nature of the mind, mental events, mental functions, mental property, consciousness and their relationship to the physical body, particularly the brain....
 such as Donald Davidson
Donald Davidson

Donald Davidson is the name of:*Donald Davidson , American poet*Donald Davidson , American philosopher*Donald Davidson , historian of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway...
 to clarify various ideas about identity theory and other physicalist
Physicalism

Physicalism is a philosophical position holding that everything which exists is no more extensive than its physical properties; that is, that there are no kinds of things other than physical things....
 theories of consciousness.

See also

  • Class
    Class (philosophy)

    Philosophers sometimes distinguish classes from type and natural kind. We can talk about the class of human beings, just as we can talk about the type , human being, or humanity....
  • Bertrand Russell
    Bertrand Russell

    Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, Order of Merit , Fellow of the Royal Society , was a British people philosopher, mathematical logic, mathematician, historian, advocate for social reform, and pacifism....
    's Theory of types.