Social construction, social kinds and exportation

Brian Epstein has argued (in The Ant Trap and 'Anchoring versus grounding') that social kinds 'export' across worlds. Although the conditions for war criminality are not 'fixed' in the Empire, for instance, Darth Vader is a war criminal there. And, according to Epstein, an account of social construction should imply that he is. Ultimately, he argues that 'grounding-only' accounts of social construction - like those proposed by Jonathan Schaffer and Aaron Griffith - imply that social kinds do not export across worlds. As a result, he argues that we need more than grounding; in particular, we need both grounding and what he calls 'anchoring' to account for it. In this paper, I argue that, once we draw a distinction between what I call 'thick' and 'thin' social kinds, Epstein's argument is either invalid or irrelevant.

Automated summary

According to Brian Epstein, social kinds can exist across different worlds. He argues that a social construction theory should acknowledge that Darth Vader is a war criminal in the Empire. In contrast, the "grounding-only" theory proposed by Jonathan Schaffer and Aaron Griffith suggests that social kinds cannot transcend different worlds. Therefore, Epstein proposes the concept of "anchoring" in addition to grounding to explain this phenomenon.