Being

For Aristotle, “being” is whatever is anything whatever. Whenever Aristotle explains the meaning of being, he does so by explaining the sense of the Greek verb to be. Being contains whatever items can be the subjects of true propositions containing the word is, whether…

In order to develop and articulate his philosophical system, Dewey first needed to expose what he regarded as the flaws of the existing tradition. He believed that the distinguishing feature of Western philosophy was its assumption that true being—that which is…

” Whereas God inherently possesses being, creatures do not possess being but receive it derivatively. Outside God, there is pure nothingness. “The being (of things) is God.” The “noble man” moves among things in detachment, knowing that they are nothing in themselves and yet aware that they are full of…

…mystical and theological theory of Being. Fichte was prompted to change his original position because he came to appreciate that religious faith surpasses moral reason. He was also influenced by the general trend that the development of thought took toward Romanticism.

…think the notion of pure Being (the most abstract category of all), one finds that it is simply emptiness—i.e., Nothing. Yet Nothing is. The notion of pure Being and the notion of Nothing are opposites; and yet each, as one tries to think it, passes over into the other. But…

…Seinsfrage, or the “question of Being.” In an essay first published in 1963, “My Way to Phenomenology,” Heidegger put the Seinsfrage as follows: “If Being is predicated in manifold meanings, then what is its leading fundamental meaning? What does Being mean?” If, in other words, there are many kinds of…

…the nature of existence, or being.

…be a subjective interpretation of Being, which—although prophetically inspired—attempted to postulate norms of value and principles of life as universally valid. As Jaspers’ understanding of philosophy deepened, he gradually discarded his belief in the role of a prophetic vision in philosophy. He bent all his energies toward the development of…

…a single eternal reality (“Being”), thus giving rise to the Parmenidean principle that “all is one.” From this concept of Being, he went on to say that all claims of change or of non-Being are illogical. Because he introduced the method of basing claims about appearances on a logical…

“Being” in this context does not mean existence, but something specific—a human, a lion, or a house—being recognizable by its quality or shape.

…recognized two primary modes of being: consciousness, which he called the “For-itself,” and the world of inert matter or things, which he called the “In-itself,” or “facticity.” For Sartre, the In-itself is first and foremost an obstacle to the For-itself’s drive toward self-actualization—as indeed are all other selves, which he…

Sartre too was concerned with Being and with the dread experienced before the threat of Nothingness. But he found the essence of this Being in liberty—in freedom of choice and the duty of self-determination. He therefore devoted much effort to describing the human tendency toward “bad faith,” reflected in perverse…

…of Parmenides of Elea that Being is one (Greek: hen) and unique and that it is continuous, indivisible, and all that there is or ever will be.

, of its mode of being); it is, therefore, also the investigation of the meaning of Being. (3) That investigation is continually faced with diverse possibilities, from among which the existent (i.e., the human individual) must make a selection, to which he must then commit himself. (4) Because those possibilities…

…inquiry into the question of being, in which he distinguished between essence and existence. He argued that the fact of existence cannot be inferred from or accounted for by the essence of existing things and that form and matter by themselves cannot interact and originate the movement of the universe…

…Intelligences (divine names) that are Being’s first, highest, and purest actualization or activity. This “extension” unites everything other than the Creator into a single continuum. The human body–soul complex and the heavenly body–soul complex are not moved externally by the Intelligences. Their movement is an extension of the process of…

…a plurality of levels of being, arranged in hierarchical descending order, the last and lowest comprising the physical universe, which exists in time and space and is perceptible to the senses.

…the relationship between consciousness and Being, and in doing so, he must realize that from the standpoint of epistemology, Being is accessible to him only as a correlate of conscious acts. He must thus pay careful attention to what occurs in these acts. This can be done only by a…