Abstract

Recent work on essence describes essence as assimilated to definition. It also posits a plurality of kinds of essence.Howdoes assimilation relate to pluralism? According to one view, a kind of essence is adequate only if it is definitional: something is essential to an item, in the relevant sense, only if it is part of what it is to be that item. In this paper, I argue that assimilation and pluralism are in tension with respect to consequentialist essence. This is problematic given that, as a methodological prescription, some philosophers advise us to work with consequentialist essence. In this paper, I develop a theory of constitutive essence and use it to resolve the problem by defining an adequate notion of consequentialist essence that preserves the methodological prescription.