 Gelman (2003,2013) and others have provided evidence suggesting a mode of cognition of an essentialist character already operative in children. Specific categories of object and stuff (such as those represented by mass terms and sortals for natural and social kinds, as well as for artifacts) are here assumed to possess an underlying reality that cannot be observed directly. This assumption explains and grounds children’s inductive inferences based on the categories in question. It also explains children’s implicit assignment of causal and other non-obvious properties, as well as sharp and immutable boundaries to such categories. Children view some of these properties as innate. Research results (Caccione et al. 2016; Mendes et al.2018, 2011; and Santos et al.2002) highlight the possibility that essentialist cognition might develop in humans at a pre-linguistic stage, in the form of sortal object individuation. This might apply to certain primates as well (Phillips et al.2010). 