Question
A study by Rhodes et al. involved statements of this type about fictional people called “zarpies.” For 10 points each:
[10h] Name these statements exemplified by the sentence “Mosquitoes carry the West Nile virus,” which is true even though 99 percent of mosquitoes do not carry the West Nile virus.
ANSWER: generics [or base plural generics; or generic generalizations; prompt on generalizations or gnomic statements]
[10e] The “zarpies” study showed that generic statements can promote this attitude. This attitude is the belief that categories like gender are defined in terms of fixed, intrinsic qualities.
ANSWER: essentialism [or being essentialist]
[10m] Rachel Sterken argues that Gen (“jen”), an unpronounced operator used in generics, is one of these expressions. These expressions, such as “you” and “here,” have references that change based on their context of utterance.
ANSWER: indexicals [or deictics; accept indexes or indices]
<Philosophy>