I still think there are wider use cases for named arguments. For example, even disambiguating between which argument is the "string" and which is the "substring

I still think there are wider use cases for named arguments. For example, even disambiguating between which argument is the "string" and which is the "substring to be found", or the classic "x, y, width, height" list in graphics programming. But your point is well taken that, like many tools, you shouldn't abandon one set of good practices for another. There are certainly cases where a builder pattern or enum values are a better fit, which could be obscured as an option because keyword arguments "sorta kinda but don't really" address the same thing.