We inquire into all sorts of things, from easy factual matters whether the keys are on the drawer, to complex normative ones whether abortion is morally permissible. Inquiry is a pervasive feature of our intellectual lives and one of the hallmarks of our ability to seek

information.

According to a prominent strand of thought which runs through the history of Western philosophy, inquiry is the activity whereby we move from a state of ignorance and suspension about a given question to a state of knowledge about its answer. This Knowledge-Suspension-Inquiry Link, however, captures only in part the nature and normative profile of inquiry. For one thing, it seems that some forms of inquiry, such as corroboration and double-checking, neither require total neutrality about the answer to the question at hand, nor do they always aim at knowledge, as one can double-check what one already knows. This suggests that different varieties of inquiry can aim at epistemic goals other than knowledge. For another, certain inquiries such as the ones in science have a complex structure involving different communities wherein the goal of getting to a true answer is to be weighed against practical research aspects. This suggests that norms of inquiry cannot be simply distilled from traditional epistemic norms about what to believe.

The main motivation behind The Nature and Normativity of Inquiry (NANORIN) is that while all activities of inquiry are unified by the fact that their function is epistemic, different types of inquiry can play that function differently. This pluralist thesis about the nature of inquiry grounds a novel investigation of the foundations and content of norms of inquiry. By so doing, NANORIN aims to capture the motivations behind the Knowledge-Inquiry-Suspension Link while, at the same time, acknowledging both that suspended judgement is not always needed when we inquire and that knowledge is not the only dimension of assessment of inquiries.

The strategy proposed by NANORIN will hinge on four central conjectures:

(C1) NANORIN will explore a novel activity-first approach to the nature of inquiry, thereby departing from traditional state-first approaches which look at inquiry solely through the lens of the doxastic attitudes.

(C2) NANORIN will assess the prospects for a pluralist account of inquiry, departing from the standard approach to the effect that the function of all types of inquiry is to be conceived in monist and knowledge-based terms.

(C3) NANORIN will investigate the foundations and content of norms of inquiry starting from the conjecture that the normativity of inquiry is teleological in kind.

(C4) NANORIN will apply the previous findings to thorny normative issues having to do with higher-order evidence, disagreement, epistemic autonomy and the structure of scientific communities.

On these grounds, NANORIN will articulate a comprehensive philosophical treatment of inquiry which will be deployed to pursue the following two main research aims:

(RA1) To illuminate the multifaceted nature of inquiry and its relation to the doxastic attitudes.

(RA2) To uncover the foundations, content and wide-ranging implications of the norms of inquiry.