Essentialism: The Basics

The Essence of Real Essentialism (and Why It’s Essential!)

I talk a lot about essentialism but just realized I don’t have an introduction to the topic on my Substack or YouTube channel (I do, of course, defend it in The Best Argument for God). Let’s fix that.

Essentialism, broadly, is the idea that things have essences or natures. An essence or nature is what makes something—say, you, me, a tree, or a cat—what it is. A tree is a tree because it has a tree essence or nature; I’m a human being because I have a human nature. Simple, right?

As usual, however, there’s more to it. So, let’s expand.

More precisely, the essence of an object, x, is just what it is to be x. In other words, if we have the real definition of something, we have its essence. This is the real essentialist view, as opposed to the modal essentialist view, which claims that the essence of an object x is simply the necessary features of x.¹

For what it’s worth, one significant problem with the modal essentialist view—which I reject—is that it gets things backward: a thing has certain necessary features because it has a particular essence; it doesn’t have its particular essence because it has certain necessary features. Essences are metaphysically prior to and explanatory of necessary features. Moreover, there can be necessary features of things that aren’t part of their essence. For example, it’s a necessary feature of mine that I’m numerically distinct from the Empire State Building, but that’s not my essence—or even part of it.

So, the essence of a thing is what fundamentally constitutes it as the kind of thing that it is. As Michael Gorman explains:

“Think back… to the foundational theory of essence. According to this theory, each substance has a special feature that constitutes it at the most basic level. Felinity is not merely bundled up with Mickey’s other features; if it were, it could not be more foundational than they are. Nor, on the Thomistic way of thinking, is it added to a bare substrate. Mickey’s felinity is not borne by anything. At Mickey’s most basic level—if it even makes sense to talk that way—there is no bare substrate on which felinity can be layered.

The most basic layer of Mickey, if we can call it that, is the cat Mickey himself. Mickey, not some component of his, is what’s most basic. He is himself a basic being. He, a cat—a full-blown substance of the feline sort—is what you start with. He is not some substrate to which felinity can be added; he is, in and of himself, something that’s feline. Felinity makes him the type of thing he is at the most basic level. Nothing about him is more basic.”

So, that, in a nutshell, is what essentialism—real essentialism—is. Why believe it?

Probably the most basic reason for being a real essentialist is simply the law of identity—that seemingly trivial property of self-identity. What’s the connection? Well, it’s something like this: the moment we affirm the law of identity, we are committed to the definitely non-trivial truth that everything is something or other (which is to say, falls into some category or kind)—everything is what it is and not something else, to use a famous phrase. Which, in turn, just means that everything has its own essence or nature. And to deny this, as David Oderberg points out, is ultimately to commit oneself to an amorphous or formless reality—which is equivalent to rejecting the law of identity.² Not good!

Now, apart from the fact that we’ve never discovered any actually amorphous or formless reality (inductively, essentialism is as well-supported as anything: however far out or down we go, we just keep encountering things that fall into various kinds—particles, fields, dimensions, etc.), there are definite a priori reasons to reject the idea. After all, the law of identity is necessary and foundational to all demonstration, scientific or otherwise.

As Oderberg puts it:

“In seeking to show, for instance, that copper conducts electricity, or to explain why it does so, we proceed by means of the proposition that copper is a metal… If I want to know why paper burns, I need to know what paper is. The examples are simple, but the principle is not. Knowledge of the material world proceeds by way of definition, and the law of identity can also be formulated as: Everything is definable.”³

To approach the matter from another angle, we could say that one affirms real essentialism—or essence realism—because of the necessity of essences to ground the identity of entities. And this is the case not just ontologically, but epistemically as well. As Joshua Sijuwade explains,

“Any epistemic grounds without essences would result in one not being able to talk or think comprehendingly about any entities at all. If one does not know what a thing is, then one could ask how one could talk or think in a comprehending manner at all.

For example, suppose there is a particular dog called Max. One could then ask how one can think and talk comprehendingly about Max if one does not know what dogs are and, specifically, which dog Max is. One does not need to know everything about dogs or Max to be able to talk or think comprehendingly about this particular animal. However, one must know enough to distinguish the kind of thing Max is from other kinds of things, and to be able to distinguish Max in particular from other individual things of Max’s kind.

If not, then one’s talk and thought cannot really fasten upon Max as opposed to some other entity.”

There are many other reasons to endorse real essentialism, though I won’t be able to get into them extensively here.

By way of a brief overview, however, the strategy typically involves real essentialists showing the untenability of rival views, from extreme nominalism to trope theory, etc., and then demonstrating how real essentialism can not only solve the specific problems inherent to those theories but also address a wide range of issues generally (“one theory to solve them all!” always a solid approach, to be sure)—problems concerning synchronic and diachronic identity, similarity and difference across levels of reality (the classic problem of the one and the many), laws of nature, dispositional and occurrent states, modality, morality, and more.⁴

In other words, real essentialism is incredibly fruitful, theoretically speaking. (It’s also just common sense: clearly, things belong to specific kinds—what philosophers call 'sortals'—and what makes them belong to those kinds is their essences or natures.)

Of course, someone might contend—as many do contend—that this whole essence business is just a projection of the human mind, suggesting a sort of conventionalism—i.e., that all essences are merely conventions, entirely dependent on the human mind. However, there are plenty of reasons to favor real essentialism (that essences are independent of human thought) over such a view.

For one thing, as Crawford Elder has pointed out, if one claims that all things are what they are because of the human mind (that is, dependent on our way of thinking), this would also have to apply to the human mind itself. But that is obviously nonsense.⁵ If something is dependent on the human mind, it must be posterior to it, yet obviously, the mind cannot be prior to itself!

So, the existence of at least one mind-independent essence cannot reasonably be denied. And, of course, once that is affirmed, there is no reason—none whatsoever—to deny the reality of other mind-independent essences. In other words, there’s no good reason to reject real essentialism. (Of course, many things we name are purely conventional, having no independent basis in reality—like “new century.” Other things are synthetic, grounded in some independent reality but also partly man-made and conventionally defined, like lawnmower blades. All of this is perfectly compatible with real essentialism, since being a real essentialist doesn’t mean one must think everything we name is entirely what it is because of some mind-independent essence. In other words, the fact that certain named things are conventional is not a good reason to think all named things are conventional!)

But again, one need only look further at the issues real essentialism resolves if additional support beyond common sense is required.

To tease out just a few of these...

Morality

One particularly attractive feature of real essentialism is its theoretical usefulness in the moral domain. Since (at least some) natures are partially normative, real essentialism offers a lot in this area—that is, with respect to both meta-ethics and ethical theory.

A lot of this, to be sure, is just good old-fashioned Aristotle: many things are, by their very nature, ordered (teleologically) toward a particular end, the attainment of which marks their excellence or flourishing. Dogs, for example, are the sort of thing that should have four legs. This normative aspect of their nature helps make sense of why a dog with only three legs still counts as a dog but is, nevertheless, defective in some way. Which, I suggest, is just the result we want.

Human beings are a certain kind as well—a rational kind, of course—capable of contingently self-determining through choices and actions that either contribute to or detract from their flourishing. (For the real essentialist, morality is a rational enterprise but itself not a radical departure from their general theory of goodness and flourishing, which admittedly takes on metaphysical positions beyond mere essentialism.) Human beings, by virtue of being able to grasp the space of reasons and deliberate upon various means of action to attain various ends, can judge either well or poorly concerning what will actually contribute to their flourishing (happiness). And, as it happens, since all humans, by nature, desire to flourish, real essentialism has the resources to close the so-called is-ought gap. Why should we follow the dictates of the natural (moral) law? Because that is how we flourish—and flourishing is something we all categorically desire. It’s not a conditional.⁶

Again, cool result!

Bonus: Human Dignity
Real essentialism also provides a grounding for something most of us care about—a basis for real equality (and thus a foundation for calls to justice) among human beings. In other words, it is by virtue of our human essence that we are—from womb to tomb—metaphysical peers.⁷

Modality

Real essentialism has much to offer in the realm of modal theory—that is, the branch of philosophy concerned with what could be, what must be, and what cannot be (possibility, necessity, and impossibility). That said, real essentialists are also usually mitigated modal skeptics, insofar as the essentialist is skeptical of moving from what seems conceivable to what is really metaphysically possible. Why? For the simple reason that, to know whether something really is conceivable—and not just a conceptual or cognitive illusion—we first have to know the essence of the thing in question.

For example, while it might seem conceivable that I could exist apart from my body, the essentialist would say that whether that really is conceivable depends on whether we can independently show that some aspect of us—say, the intellect—is immaterial. Otherwise, we can’t know if what we’re imagining is actually possible. But if we already have independent arguments showing that something about us is immaterial, then we don’t even need the conceivability arguments in the first place. So, essentialists don’t tend to rely much on conceivability arguments, if ever.

Not only that, but natural entities have “hidden de re necessities,” meaning there are necessary constituents or conditions of things that “overflow” the usual linguistic meanings of our words. We call these necessities “hidden” because many of them were, in fact, hidden to us for large swaths of human history—and almost certainly, much remains hidden to us now and may always remain that way.

For example, James Ross points out that “‘made of corundum’ was not part of the ancient jewelers’ understanding of ‘emerald’ or ‘sapphire.’ This fact remained hidden in the depths of nature for millennia, and even today, only a handful of retail dealers likely know that corundum is aluminum oxide or what that actually entails. Yet it is a de re necessity for such stones—nothing can truly be a sapphire unless it is constituted in that way.”

This means that mere conceptual consistency is definitely not a reliable guide to real possibility (e.g., imagining ammonia-based water), and mere imagination is even worse.

Again, to know what really is conceivable—rather than just what seems to be conceivable—we have to know the actual essence of the thing in question. And this is made considerably more complicated by the fact of hidden de re necessities.

Anyway, all this obviously relates to certain classic examples, like thinking you can conceive of a turtle—or any contingent thing, for that matter—existing without a cause. Surely, this is just a conceptual illusion, especially since there are good arguments that it’s a de re necessity of such a being to be caused. In more traditional terms, it’s a necessary accident of such a being to be metaphysically caused.

Thus, this is an instance where what might seem conceivable really isn’t. (To be precise, what we have here is a defective concept, and because the concept is defective, it fails to allow the statement or proposition to bring any actual reality to thought.)

So, Humean skeptical arguments against cosmological causal principles meet their defeat against the splendid truth of real essentialism. But at the same time, arguments for theism based on conceivability suffer as well—which is fine by me, since I never thought those arguments were very good to begin with.

Nevertheless, there are other advantages to adopting a real essentialist view of modality. For one, it provides a principled grounding for real natural and metaphysical possibility. The range of what is possible is grounded in the actual powers of actual things, including (ultimately) God’s. This means there’s no need to effectively double reality by positing some radically unexplained realm of abstracta—including possible worlds—and then compounding the problem with utterly mysterious appeals to “exemplification” or “instantiation.”

What a mess all that is! Real essentialism, on the other hand, is trim and effective: actuality precedes possibility—the right result—and possibilities are grounded in the powers of already existing entities.

Moreover, because the real essentialist is a mitigated modal skeptic, they need not take seriously so many bizarre scenarios that many people—including many philosophers—entertain as real possibilities. This includes scenarios that would invite catastrophic skepticism overall, such as brain-in-a-vat scenarios.

Given the commitment to hidden de re necessities, there is not only no reason to think these scenarios are actually possible, but also good reasons for thinking they are not ( see Ross on these points, if interested in further development). In other words, the mitigated modal skepticism of the real essentialist helps to mitigate (I would argue) globally skeptical scenarios. Another enticing result!

Classical Theism.

Real essentialism provides the resources for powerful arguments for classical theism. For example, my Millerian cosmological argument (weird to call it mine, since it’s originally Miller’s, but yeah—mine now!) demonstrates how one can move from real essentialism to classical theism entirely without relying on the principle of sufficient reason. But there are other routes as well.

If one is a real essentialist, then one has the tools, as it were, to establish the real distinction between the essence of something and its act of existence—the what-ness and the is-ness of a thing. After all, not every essence or nature is automatically or always actual. Clearly, some further principle is required to account for the actual presence or being of essences or natures.

Not only that, but the problem of the one and the many also calls for these two distinct principles. That is, we need to account for both the unity and diversity of things across various levels of being. All actual things, in some sense, share something in common—they exist; they are real! Yet, they are also really dissimilar—this sort of thing is not that sort of thing, and so on.⁸

Moreover, individual things are more than just their essence or nature; they are, to be precise, essence plus individuating and contingent features. However, the being or actuality of individuals applies to the whole (to use a technical term, the supposit), not just the essence. There is functional non-overlap. Thus, essence and existence are really (not just conceptually) distinct.

If that’s right, then we have strong reasons—based on the principle of sufficient reason—to trace back or “twist up” to something whose essence just is its existence. Such a being would be utterly simple (having no quantitative or constitutive parts) and non-composite; a being of pure actuality, which we call God.

This being would be uniquely unique because, for the essentialist, any form of multiplication necessarily requires composition, which would contradict the nature of God. Thus, real essentialism not only provides the resources to affirm philosophically the existence of God but also establishes a robust monotheism and traverses the so-called "gap problem."

All great results—assuming, of course, one is already attracted to these views.

Apart from these direct arguments for God (the being whose essence just is its existence), classical theism also neatly grounds real essentialism. (It would be hugely problematic if we had to leave all essences as bare brute facts!) Ultimately, we seek an explanation not just for the existence of all essences or forms but for the essences and forms themselves. This is where the divine ideas—or rather, the divine idea—comes in.

God, as the fullness of being and the unrestricted act of understanding itself, knows, in one utterly simple cognitional act, all the ways that being can participate in existence—whether in a horse-y mode, a human-y mode, or what have you. His free decree ultimately determines these modes of being to become actual and integrates them within a network of other real, operative natures.

Not only that, but it is God’s absolute power that allows us to speak meaningfully of a realm of metaphysical possibility—that is, over and above mere natural possibility. Of course, from our limited epistemic perspective, we cannot adequately determine what that range is.

Wrapping Up

If I had more time, I’d keep exploring just how fruitful real essentialism is—particularly for epistemology and the sciences, especially when it comes to making sense of laws of nature. (In short: the laws of nature are just the laws of the natures of things!)

But, as usual, other obligations demand my attention—most immediately, lunch—and this post has already gone far longer than I intended. (What can I say? I get easily excited about this stuff.)

For anyone wanting to dive deeper into real essentialism, I always recommend these two books:

• Real Essentialism by David Oderberg

• Thought and World by James Ross

(Obviously, I recommend all the books linked throughout this post, but I would at least start with these.)

1. So, Thumper the pet rabbit, for example, has the essence rabbit. Thumper’s essence, in other words, just is rabbit essence as individuated in Thumper. Importantly, essence is not synonymous with Aristotelian form; rather, for material beings, essence encompasses both form and (non-designated) matter.

For example, if we are considering a particular rabbit, what we have is a metaphysical composite of form and prime matter, which constitutes an actual instance of rabbit essence. Since essence provides the definitional content of something, it must make some reference to matter for material things—otherwise, we are not really being told what that something is.

The distinction between designated and non-designated matter is as follows:

· Designated matter refers to matter capable of ostensible recognition (e.g., Peter is made of this flesh and these bones) and serves as the principle of individuation. This type of matter cannot be included in the essence of a thing, because doing so would render the essence undefinable.

· Non-designated matter, on the other hand, refers to the type of matter out of which something is made. It is matter considered generically or apart from a determinate this or that, and thus it fits as the matter referred to in the definitional content of a type of thing.

2. Oderberg, David S. “How to Win Essence Back from Essentialists.” Philosophical Writings 17 (Autumn 2001): 27–45.

3. Ibid. Oderberg, of course, quickly clarifies that this should not be read epistemically, as no part of the law demands that we, as human beings, must be able to define everything.

4. If interested, Sijuwade defends essentialism through most of these points in Analytic Theism.

5. This point is also defended and expanded upon by Edward Feser.

6. I further defend and develop this account in The Best Argument for God.

7. For the real essentialist (at least when the theory is consistently worked out), it is a serious injustice to discriminate against people (at least with respect to basic human rights) based on contingent features such as height, sex, race, level of intelligence, or level of development.

8. Whereas form and matter help to make sense of similarity and diversity at another level of being—namely, individual instances of various kinds.