Be

We explain what being is for philosophy and linguistics. Furthermore, the univocal concept and the analogical concept of being.

What is it to be?

What makes entities be is called “being”. That is, entities “are” because they participate in being just as, for example, the sleeper participates in “sleeping.” An entity is everything that “is”, for example: a bank, a bear, a car, a clown or a unicorn.

Being is one of the most general and, therefore, fundamental concepts of philosophy. This means that it is one of the most complex to define. Generally, With the word “being” we refer to everything that exists that is, the ontological reality of things. By “ontological reality” we must understand everything that is. Ontology is a philosophical discipline that studies being as an entity.

According to the philosophical tradition, there are two concepts of being:

• Univocal concept of “being”. It is the most general characteristic of all entities or things, that is, that which remains and is common to all without distinction, once all their particular and individual characteristics have been removed. It is the opposite of the essence.
• Analog concept of “being”. It is that which all things possess, but in a different way; so that in this everything coincides and everything is different. The only thing that can be outside of being, in this sense, is nothingness.

Continue with: Existence

Discussions around the concept

Often, to understand the concept of being, it must be contrasted with the concept of being or entity. Martin Heidegger, a 20th century German philosopher, maintains that “being is always the being of an entity,” since all beings are necessarily entities. For grammar, “ser” must be distinguished, an infinitive that expresses the act of being, from “entity” as a present participle that names that which is.

Many philosophers tried to come up with a definition of “being.” One of the first was Parmenides, who defined being as that which exists in contrast to “nothing”. Plato associated being with the idea or form, while Aristotle maintained that being should be understood as substance, an indissoluble compound of matter and form.

For Aristotle, being could be said in many ways, whether as categories (time, place, suffering), accident, act, power, truth and falsehood. This suggests that, before asking “what is being?”, the meaning in which it is asked must be specified.

In 1927 Martin Heidegger published Being and timeone of the most important philosophical works of the 20th century. There he returned to the problem of being, accusing philosophy, and especially metaphysics, of “forgetting being.” For Heidegger, being is what makes beings qua beings: if beings are the thing or “what (is)”, being is what makes it possible for everything “that” to be. In other words, being is the form or meaning of the entity, what determines it as such, which, on the other hand and according to Heidegger, is its temporality: being is as a temporal horizon.

“Being” in linguistics

In linguistics, being is everything that is expressed through a verbal infinitive. There are four uses of “ser” as a predicative verb:

1. As part of made expressions.
2. As a synonym for “happen”, happen, “take place”.
3. As an impersonal verb.
4. As a synonym for “exist”.

Continue with: Existence

References

• Rivera, JE, & Heidegger, M. (1998). Being and time. Santiago de Chile, University Publishing House.
• Berti, E. (2011). Being and time in Aristotle. Buenos Aires: Byblos.
• Aristotle, & Yebra, VG (1970). Metaphysics. Gredos.
• Carpio, A. (1974). philosophy principle. Eudeba.
• “Be” in Wikipedia.
• “Being (philosophy)” in Enciclopedia.us.