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In "Putnam's Doctrine of Natural Kind Terms and Frege's Doctrine of Sense, Reference and Extension: Can They Cohere?" David Wiggins proposes placing Putnam's suggestions about natural kind terms into a Fregean framework of sense and reference, adjusting both Putnam and Frege in interesting ways in the process.¹ A consideration of these adjustments suggests to me, in turn, a way of defending an aspect of the kind of view about natural kind terms that Putnam and Wiggins are at one in rejecting. Let me make it clear that I am not defending the kind of view they reject: only one aspect of it, but a central one, having to do with the place of epistemic constraints on mastery of expressions in a language. If the relevant aspect of that view can be defended, it makes an important difference to the question of what conception of sense we can award ourselves if we agree, as we surely should, with those like Wiggins who argue that natural kind terms have sense.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-011-0411-1_6

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