Dual character concepts have two independent dimensions for classification: descriptive and normative. For example, someone is descriptively an “artist” if they earn a living by painting. Normatively, someone is an “artist” only if they live up to ideals, e.g., a commitment to creating truly meaningful aesthetic work. Because these dimensions are independent, one can satisfy the descriptive criteria without fulfilling the normative ones, and vice versa. Such concepts were first explored by
Joshua Knobe,
Sandeep Prasada and
George E Newman in 2013.
To date, the largest body of research on dual character concepts has examined social‑role concepts like “artist”, “scientist”, “colleague”, and “philosopher”.
Other studies, however, indicate that even some of philosophy’s most basic concepts may exhibit a dual character structure: “art”,
“gender”,
“happiness”, and “human‑being”.
References
Related concepts
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Thick concept
In philosophy, a thick concept (sometimes: ''thick normative concept'', or ''thick evaluative concept'') is a kind of concept that both has a significant degree of descriptive content and is evaluatively loaded. Paradigmatic examples are various vi ...
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Concept
A concept is an abstract idea that serves as a foundation for more concrete principles, thoughts, and beliefs.
Concepts play an important role in all aspects of cognition. As such, concepts are studied within such disciplines as linguistics, ...
Concepts in aesthetics
Concepts in social philosophy
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