AbstractsPhilosophy & Theology

In this thesis, I attempt to provide a characterisation of the kind woman, by determining what the essential property of the kind is (or whether there even is one), and with what kind of necessity it attaches to the kind members. I begin by outlining different ways essential properties have been approached in the current philosophical literature. A common feature of these views is that they focus on physical structure as essential to kinds and kind members. But, I argue, the kind woman cannot be so defined. Instead, the essential property of the kind woman should be given in terms of a social (or at least a non-biological) property.