Linda Wetzel

Focusing on the type/token distinction in linguistics, _realist_ philosopher Wetzel carefully refutes the _nominalist_ position that the notion of types can, in principle, be eliminated. Non-concrete, non-tangible, and non-spatiotemporally-specific though they are, then, the types must be regarded as "existing" or "real". The same will be true of other abstractions such as biological species, numbers such as pi, algorithms, and rainbows. Observing that there's nothing mystical or supernatural about these abstractions and that the argumentation would fail if there were, I see no inconsistency with the range of worldviews known as naturalism, physicalism, materialism, etc.… (mer)