  Although the Stranger admits that he is wandering from the topic and should put off discussion of method until another occasion, he tarries a little longer to give a lecture on the difference between mere parts of a kind and parts that are themselves genuine kinds (Statesman 263b). Apparently, real kinds include only members with some positive feature in common, while other parts allow members sharing only a negative feature. Scholars have taken the Stranger’s lecture very seriously as indicating Plato’s views about proper procedure and the metaphysics on which division relies, and they appeal especially to Plato’s Phaedrus, where the elder Socrates announces that someone engaging in correct procedure should divide kinds at their natural joints, not hack off bits like a bad butcher (Phaedrus 265e) (see Moravcsik 1973, Cohen 1973, and Wedin 1987). Before we assess Young Socrates’ mistake and the Stranger’s lecture, we ought to consider the second stage of the division, since it purports to demonstrate correct procedure.