Negative natural properties, categories, and mistakes

Abstract I develop a theory of naturalness according to which properties are natural relative to categories of objects. This new theory avoids a problem that, I argue, afflicts standard theories: whereas standard theories allow for only one ordering of properties, considerations of the similarity and dissimilarity made by some negative properties—like having no parts , having no members , having no determinate mass , reflecting no visible light —require admitting more than one. Additionally, I argue that my view accounts for genuine categories, category mistakes, and negation as privation, and that it accounts for a distinction between characterizing and non-characterizing fundamentality.