2024-2026 I and Naomi Thompson (Bristol University) have funding from Vetenskapsrådet (the Swedish Research Council) to work on a project on something we call Inheritance (and ‘Inheritance Arguments’)(dnr. 2023-01289). Early days description of our project below. Get in touch if you want to know more!
It is not uncommon for philosophers to speak loosely of one thing ‘inheriting’ some feature or features from another. We might say, for example, that the truth of a conjunction is inherited from the truth of its conjuncts, or that justification for some questioned belief B is inherited from the beliefs offered in support of B. Though there has been plenty of research into what is happening in these specific examples, the notion of inheritance itself has received very little attention. We think this is both surprising and problematic. Not only do philosophers often talk of one thing ‘inheriting’ its features from another, inheritance-claims also feature prominently in what we may call ‘inheritance arguments’, i.e., arguments where inheritance claims function as a kind of ‘inference-ticket’: because b inherits (some of) its features from a, if Fa then Fb. Without a good understanding of the nature and function of inheritance we lack the resources to properly evaluate arguments of this kind. This project aims to remedy this situation by systematically investigating both the nature and function of inheritance. Our point of departure will be purported instances of inheritance-claims/inheritance arguments of central philosophical importance, including.
Reality inheritance: Among some (particularly neo-Aristotelian) metaphysicians, one finds claims to the effect that some things exist in virtue of some other (more fundamental) things, and that the former, derivative things ‘inherit’ their reality (and/or existence) from those more fundamental things (cf. e.g., Schaffer 2016 and Trogdon 2018a).
Justification inheritance: In epistemology one finds various different kinds of claims to the effect that non-foundational beliefs are justified in virtue of some other (foundational) beliefs, meaning that they ‘inherit’ their justification from those beliefs (for overviews cf. Koons 2021, Hasan & Fumerton 2018).
Truth inheritance: In the semantics of deductive arguments, one finds claims to the effect that a conclusion is true in virtue of the truth of the premises that support it, and from which it ‘inherits’ its truth.
Feature inheritance: (i) in mereology one finds claims to the effect that mereological wholes and ordinary objects have their features in virtue of the features of their parts and/or constituents, and that they ‘inherit’ those features from the features of those parts/constituents (cf. e.g., Sider 2007, Cameron 2014); (ii) more generally, sometimes features are said to be inherited in a non-mereological/non-constitutional context (a much-discussed example: claims to the effect that grounding (for an introduction to this notion, cf. Raven 2020) ‘inherits’ its properties from those of explanation (cf. e.g., Kovacs 2017, Thompson 2016, and Maurin 2019)).
The goal is an account of inheritance that offers insight into the phenomenon per se and that allows us to evaluate the use to which inheritance is put in argumentation. Our investigation will center around three research questions:
RQ1: What is the target notion of inheritance, and how are appeals to inheritance related to and distinguished from arguments from analogy?
Why is there so little discussion of inheritance and inheritance arguments in the literature? We hypothesize that inheritance arguments are easily mistaken for arguments from analogy (for a good overview cf. Bartha 2019). In very general terms, arguments from analogy move from the claim that two things resemble each other in some way to the conclusion that they also resemble one another in some further interesting respect. Whilst there are some similarities between inheritance arguments and arguments from analogy, inheritance (as we understand it) is a metaphysical phenomenon, whereas analogical arguments are merely a form of reasoning. These things have sometimes been run together in the literature. For example, regarding (4ii) we might claim that because grounding resembles explanation, we can expect various features of explanation also to be features of grounding. This is however easily conflated with the far stronger claim that grounding inherits its features from those features of explanation. Our first research task is therefore to distinguish inheritance proper—what we call metaphysical inheritance—from weaker and more metaphorical appeals to inheritance, and from appeals to analogy. We then intend to explain how, as a consequence, inheritance arguments differ from arguments from analogy.
RQ2: What is (are) the mechanism(s) for metaphysical inheritance?
Distinguishing inheritance arguments from arguments from analogy takes us one step closer to understanding the nature of metaphysical inheritance. The logical next step is to investigate the nature of the relation (between the source of inheritance and the inheritor) inheritance arguments presuppose: When b inherits some feature or features from a, there must be some kind of relation R between a and b such that inheritance can occur. The possible candidates for R we intend to investigate (while leaving it open that inheritance (and inheritance arguments) might pick out a plurality of different Rs) include:
Numerical identity: That R is identity is suggested by e.g., (4i) above. On this view, it is because the parts are identical to the whole that the whole inherits features from its parts.
(Partial) qualitative identity: That R is a kind of (partial) qualitative duplication is suggested by some examples cited by philosophers attempting to clarify what they mean by their talk of inheritance (cf. e.g., inheritance in the sense of the replication of DNA in the wom
Transfer of part: That what inheritance requires is that a part is literally transferred from source to inheritor is suggested by yet other examples of ‘everyday’ inheritance often cited by philosophers to illustrate what type of relation they have in mind (cf. e.g., inheritance in the sense of the actual receiving of money or other goods from a (now dead) relative)
Grounding: That R is grounding (a now much-discussed relation of metaphysical dependence between the more fundamental and what derives from it) is compatible with e.g., (1) (and, according to those less happy about regarding composition as identity, with (4i)). On this view, it is because the parts ground the whole that the whole inherits either its reality or its features (or both) from its parts.
Other options include regarding R as some sort of constitution or (mereological) composition (where neither is understood in terms of either identity or as grounding).
As well as spelling out potential candidates for R, we will also investigate precisely how it is that R plays the role it does (i.e. we might say that R facilitates or enables inheritance, that it or its instantiation backs or grounds inheritance, or that inheritance tracks instantiations of R in certain circumstances).
RQ3: What are the conditions under which inheritance arguments are successful? More specifically, how does how we view the nature of inheritance—and of R—affect how we ought to regard the examples listed as (1)-(4) above?
Once we have identified the proper target of metaphysical inheritance and have identified which relation or relations can fill the R-role, we are in a position to identify the conditions under which inheritance arguments are successful and can evaluate their use in particular contexts. We hypothesize that how we view the nature of inheritance will make a big difference to the validity of these types of arguments. Two putative examples: (i) if it is legitimate to appeal to inheritance in the mereological case (4i), but composition is not identity, then R is not identity; (ii) if R is grounding, taking seriously the inheritance in (2) might push us towards adopting a non-factive account of grounding such that beliefs (rather than merely true propositions) can act as the relata of the grounding relation. How we view the relevant R may also have other sorts of consequences. According to some of those in favor of (1), for example, if reality is something inherited, it must have a ‘source’, i.e., there must be some things whose existence is ‘ungrounded’ or fundamental. If R is not grounding, it is unclear if this is a consequence we must accept.
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