The term inheritance refers to something, physical or otherwise, that one receives from another. Receivers have no say in whether an inheritance is given to them; but they do have choice in what they do with it. For example, one cannot choose to be born with blue or brown eyes, a small or a large nose, with parents who are rich or poor, criminals or lawyers, speaking English or Chinese. However, one can choose to make good use of one's inheritance or squander it. People can build on their inheritance, be constrained by it, or change it. Therefore, one should take responsibility for everything inherited, both good and bad.
According to The American Heritage Dictionary, "Inheritance" can mean
These various types of inheritance, and others, are studied within different fields:
Applying the concept of inheritance in computer science allows the reuse of existing code with little or no modification, by creating a new context which receives certain traits from one previously defined. For example, in some word processing applications, stylistic attributes such as font size, layout, or color, may be inherited from a template or from another document.
In addition to inheriting physical, social, and biological items or characteristics, there are also spiritual or religious aspects to inheritance. These involve passing on spiritual merit, karma, original sin, ancestral sin, etc. debt to one's descendants.
Sociologists have studied the legal inheritance of physical and monetary items from one's forebearers, namely the practice of passing on property, titles, debts, and obligations after death. Also of interest to sociologists is the third type of inheritance, the heritage we receive from our family, society, culture, nation, and world.
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