Aristotle’s Essentialism and Brian Ellis’s Scientific Essentialism

Subject Areas : Philosophy

مریم  معیرزاده ¹ (ندارد)

Received: 2011-05-10 Accepted : 2011-10-25 Published : 2011-09-23

Keywords: Aristotle's Essentialism, Dispositional Properties, Natural&#x0D, &#x0D, Kinds, Natural kind in Biology,

Abstract :

Essentialism like many philosophical subjects is rooted in the ideas ofGreek philosophers. This theory is related to the stability, motion andchange. In fact, a reasonable explanation of the motion and change wasinterest of philosophers. Aristotle's theory is in this field. This theorythat concerns to laws of nature was the most notable philosophicalachievements and metaphysical foundation for the science of that time.Aristotle was able to study species of plants and animals as a naturalkind because of variety and apparent difference between them. In hisview, any natural kind acts in goal-oriented. From this perspective,Aristotle’s essentialism has been criticism, so was not a serious activityon this topic till 20 century. Brian Ellis is formulated his scientificessentialism with offers to natural kinds and dispositional properties.He offers a variety of criteria for natural kind but he does not acceptbiological kind because it does not satisfy some of the criteria. Heclaims that his scientific essentialism is realistic. The natural kinds ofthis theory are in transition and interact to each other. What appearsdepends on a variety of roles of natural kinds that participating in theprocess. The paper presents two ideas of Aristotle and Ellis'essentialism and pays to new essentialism functionality. This studypresents why Ellis does not accept natural kind in biology even geneticstructure and unlike the traditional view, according to close relationshipbetween the definition and explanation, there is no such connection inEllis’s essentialism.