Theory and History of Ontology (ontology.co)by Raul Corazzon | e-mail: rc@ontology.co

Selected bibliography in English on the definition of "Being"

Contents of this Section

Theory

  1. Benardete, José A. 1954. "On Being and Nothing." The Review of Metaphysics no. 7:363 - 367.

    "We are launching in this essay an inquiry into first principles, in an endeavor to answer, if only in part, the presiding question of all metaphysics: What is it to be? Metaphysics is here projected as a demonstrative science, demonstrative in the strictest of senses, quite as Aristotle and Spinoza, to name but two philosophers, envisaged the discipline." (p. 363)

    (...)

    "For us the decisive question is not, Why is there Being at all? Why not far rather Nothing? Our question is: Since some (but not all) possibles must be enacted, why this possible and not that one? The answer to our question cannot be found in the schedule of possibles itself where all the entries are equally indifferent to enactment. The agency of coercion must be sought outside of the mere possibles, in a necessary ground of all being and of all non-being." (p. 367)

  2. Berti, Enrico. 2002. "Being and Essence in Contemporary Interpretations of Aristotle." In Individuals, Essences and Identity. Themes of Analytic Metaphysics , edited by Bottani, Andrea, Carrara, Massimiliano and Giaretta, Pierdaniele, 79-107. Dordrecht: Springer Science+Business Media.

  3. Blanchette, Oliva. 2003. Philosophy of Being: A Reconstructive Essay in Metaphysics. Washington, D. C.: The Catholic University Press of America.

  4. Cann, Ronnie. 2008. "Towards a Dynamic Account of BE in English." In Existence: Semantics and Syntax , edited by Comorovski, Ileana and von Heuseinger, Klaus, 13-48. Berlin: Springer Science.

    Abstract: "This paper presents an analysis of the there be construction in English in which these words are taken to project a radically underspecified propositional structure which is updated by postcopular material. The analysis takes as its point of departure the hypothesis that the copular verb itself projects a semantically underspecified one-place predicate and shows how this hypothesis can be used to provides traightforward analyses of elliptical, predicative and existential focus constructions involving be, using the framework of Dynamic Syntax. It is argued that different interpretations of there be constructions depends on the interaction of pragmatic and syntactic processes mediated by the properties of the expressions with which the string is collocated."

  5. Charles, David. 2002. "Some Comments on Prof. Enrico Berti's Paper "Being and Essence in Contemporary Interpretations of Aristotle"." In Individuals, Essences and Identity. Themes of Analytic Metaphysics , edited by Bottani, Andrea, Carrara, Massimiliano and Giaretta, Pierdaniele, 109-126. Dordrecht: Springer Science+Business Media.

  6. Chisholm, Roderick M. 1972. "Beyond Being and Nonbeing." In Jenseits von Sein und Nichtsein , edited by Haller, Rudolf, 25-33. Graz: Akademische Druck u. Verlagsanstalt.

    Reprinted in R. M. CHisholm, Brentano and Meinong studies , Amsterdam: Rodopi 1982, pp. 53-67.

  7. Clarke, W. Norris. 2001. The One and the Many: A Contemporary Thomistic Metaphysics. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press.

  8. Cobb-Stevens, Richard. 1990. "Being and Categorial Intuition." The Review of Metaphysics no. 44:43-66.

  9. Francis, Diana-Abasi Ibanga. 2016. "Being And Non-Being: Implication For Conflict Resolution." IOSR Journal of Humanities And Social Science no. 21:1-6.

    Abstract: "Traditional philosophical problem arises from the distinction between being and non-being, something and nothing, what is and what is not. The objective of this paper is about proving that the distinction can be a framework for conflict resolution, by showing the problem to be a result of misunderstanding of the logical relations of the units. Two study questions are developed to guide the research: (i) what is the nature/structure of the logical relation between being and non-being, and (ii) how does an understanding of that relation feed into conflict and peace discourse. The two research questions are contextualized or articulated under the following conceptual frameworks: (i) Parmenidian disjunctive ontology, and (ii) Heideggerian conjunctive ontology. In conclusion, the paper proves Hedeggerian conjunctive ontology to be adequate framework for negotiation of conflict, by showing conflict to be a result of the Parmenidian error of misunderstanding the logical relation of being and non-being as disjunctive rather than conjunctive."

  10. Gochet, Paul. 2002. "Quantifiers, Being, and Canonical Notation." In A Companion to Philosophical Logic , edited by Jacquette, Dale, 265-280. Malden: Blackwell.

  11. Graham, Angus Charles. 1959. "Being in Western Philosophy Compared with shih/fei and yu/wu in Chinese Philosophy." Asia Major no. 7:79-112.

    Reprinted in: A. C. Graham, Studies in Chinese Philosophy and Philosophical Literature , Albany: State University of New York Press, 1990, pp. 322-359.

  12. ———. 1965. "'Being' in Linguistics and Philosophy: a Preliminary Inquiry." Foundations of Language no. 1:223-231.

    "Although the first language of Western philosophy was Greek, its main stream passed through Semitic languages (Syriac, Arabic, Hebrew) before returning to Indo-European languages (scholastic Latin, French,

    English, German). It was in Arabic, which sharply separates the existential and copulative functions, that the distinction between existence and essence emerged.(4)

    An adequate account of the development of theWestern concept of Being in its linguistic context would require the co-operation of specialists in many disciplines. But it may be useful to offer a preliminary sketch, as a focus for future criticism and inquiry. I shall therefore cover much ground in a little space, and intrude into several fields within which I am not an authority." (p. 223)

    (...)

    "A philosopher therefore cannot adapt his use of 'Being' to the functions of 'to be' in English grammar; he must either stick bravely to the conviction that there is a single concept of Being behind the different functions of einai, which is hidden by the grammars of non-Indo-European languages, and which even among the languages of Western philosophy is perfectly displayed only in Greek and Latin, or he must discard the verbal noun 'being' as incurably ambiguous. However difficult he may find it to choose the second alternative while he is thinking in the living language with its deep roots in the past, the artificial language of symbolic logic enables him to make the choice without even noticing what he is doing. In symbolic logic the verb 'to be' dissolves into the sign of existence (∃), which is not a predicate but a quantifier, and

    three separate copulae, the signs of identity (=), class membership (∈) and class inclusion (⊆)." (p. 231)

    (4) Cf. E. Gilson, Le Thomisme , Paris 1948, p. 55; M.-D. Roland-Gosselin, Le 'De ente et essentia' de S. Thomas d'Aquin , Paris 1948, pp. xix, xx, 150-56; Soheil M. Afnan, Avicenna , London 1958, pp. 115-21.

  13. Grondin, Jean. 2005. "Why Reawaken the Question of Being?" In Heidegger’s Being and Time. Critical Essays , edited by Polt, Richard, 15-31. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

  14. Haaparanta, Leila, and Koskinen, Heikki J., eds. 2012. Categories of Being: Essays on Metaphysics and Logic. New York: Oxford University Press.

  15. Kahn, Charles H. 1973. The Verb 'Be' and its Synonyms. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies. Vol. 6: The Verb 'Be' in Ancient Greek . Dordrecht: Reidel.

    Reprinterd with a new Introductory Essay, Indianapolis: Hackett 2003.

    Table of Contents of the reprint: Introduction VII; Editorial Preface VII; Preface XLV; Analytic Table of Contents LI-LXVII; Chapter I. The problem of the verb 'Be' 1; Chapter II. Subject, predicate, copula 38; Chapter III. Application of the transformational analysis to Greek 60; Chapter IV. Description of the copula uses 85; Chapter V. The theory of the copula 184; Chapter VI. The verb of existence 228; Chapter VII. The veridical use 331; Chapter VIII. The unity of the system of 'Be' in Greek 371; Appendix A. On the accent of esti and its position in the Sentence 420; Appendix B. On the theory of nominal sentence 435; Appendix C. The nominalized forms of the verb: to ón and ousía 453; Bibliography 463; Index of Passages Cited 468; Index of Proper Names 479; Subject Index 481-486.

  16. Kerr, Gaven. 2015. "Thomist Esse and Analytical Philosophy." International Philosophical Quarterly no. 55:25-48.

    Abstract: "In this paper I seek to consider the project of analytical Thomism with particular regard to Aquinas’s metaphysics of esse. My overall conclusion is that Thomas’s thought on esse is part and parcel of a way of philosophizing that is alien to analytical philosophy and is such that analytical philosophy is constitutionally unable to come to terms with it. In order to argue for such a conclusion, I begin with a presentation of Aquinas’s metaphysics of esse. I then respond to the objection that arguably some analytical philosophers have already arrived at the same thought at which Aquinas arrived, thereby blocking the way to my denial of the possibility of an encounter between analytical philosophy and Thomist ess e. Having removed that obstacle, I argue that analytical philosophy is constitutionally unable to come to terms with Thomist esse ."

  17. Knasas, John. 2003. BEING and Some Twentieth-Century Thomists. New York: Fordham University Press.

  18. Li Vecchi, Joseph P., Scalambrino, Frank, and Kovacs, David K. 2020. The Philosophy of Being in the Analytic, Continental, and Thomistic Traditions: Divergence and Tradition. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

  19. Maritain, Jacques. 1939. A Preface to Metaphysics: Seven Lectures on Being. New York: Sheed & Ward.

  20. McDaniel, Kris. 2009. "Ways of Bering." In Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology edited by Chalmers, David, Manley, David and Wasserman, Ryan, 290-319. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

  21. ———. 2010. "Being and Almost Nothingness." Noûs no. 44:628-649.

  22. ———. 2013. "Degrees of Being." Phiosopher's Imprint no. 13:1-18.

  23. ———. 2017. The Fragmentation of Being. New York: Oxford Unviersity Press.

  24. McInerny, Ralph M. 1986. Being and Predication: Thomistic Interpretations. Washington, D. C.: The Catholic University of America Press.

  25. Owens, Joseph. 1963. An Elementary Christian Metaphysics. Milwaukee: The Bruce Publishing Company.

    Reprinted Houston, Center for Thomistic Studies, 1985.

  26. Puntel, Lorenz B. 2008. Structure and Being: A Theoretical Framework for a Systematic Philosophy. University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press.

    Translated from German by and in collaboration with Alan White.

  27. Rosen, Stanley. 1991. "Is Metaphysics Possible?" The Review of Metaphysics no. 45:235-257.

  28. ———. 1993. The Question of Being: A Reversal of Heidegger. New Haven: Yale University Press.

  29. Sadler, Ted. 1996. Heidegger and Aristotle: The Question of Being. London: The Athlone Press.

  30. Sørensen, Holger Steen. 1959. "A Analysis of 'To Be' and 'To Be True': A Linguist's Approach to the Problem." Analysis no. 19:121-131.

  31. Ventimiglia, Giovanni. 2020. Aquinas after Frege. Cham (Switzerland): Palgrave Macmillan.

  32. Verhaar, John W.M., ed. 1967. The Verb 'Be' and its Synonyms. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies. Dordrecht: Reidel.

    "The present volume is the first of a series of studies analysing the verb 'to be' and/or synonyms in a number of languages. It is expected that these studies will provide some of the necessary foundational material for research in logic, the theory of knowledge, and ontology; and possibly in other philosophical disciplines. The concluding volume of the series will attempt to assess the linguistic and philosophical impact of all the contributions.

    There is no definite principle of arrangement of the contributions, which are published in the order in which they reached the editor's desk." (FEditorial Preface by John W. M. Verhaar)

    Two projected volumes were never published in this series: a study on 'to be' in biblical Hebrew and biblical Greek by James Barr (*) and a concluding volume with an attempt to asses the linguistic and philosophical impact of all the contributions).

    (*) On the subject see: James Barr, The Semantics of Biblical Language , Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961, Chapter 4. Verbs, action and time - (d) - The Verb 'To Be' , pp. 58-71.

  33. ———, ed. 1967. The Verb 'Be' and its Synonyms. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies. Vol. 1: Classical Chinese. Athapaskan. Mundari . Dordrecht: Reidel.

  34. ———, ed. 1968. The Verb 'Be' and its Synonyms. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies. Vol. 2: Eskimo. Hindi. Zuni. Modern Greek. Malayalam. Kurukh. Dordrecht: Reidel.

  35. ———, ed. 1968. The Verb 'Be' and its Synonyms. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies. Vol. 3: Japanese. Kashmiri. Armenian. Hungarian. Sumerian. Shona. Dordrecht: Reidel.

  36. ———, ed. 1969. The Verb 'Be' and its Synonyms. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies. Vol. 4: Twi. Modern Chinese. Arabic. Dordrecht: Reidel.

  37. ———, ed. 1972. The Verb 'Be' and its Synonyms. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies. Vol. 5: Urdu / Turkish / Bengali / Amharic /Indonesian / Telugu / Estonian. Dordrecht: Reidel.

  38. Williams, Christopher J. F. 1992. Being, Identity, and Truth. Oxford University Press.

  39. Woodward, Richard. 2013. "Towards Being." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research no. 86 (1):183-193.

  40. Yuasa, Yasuo. 2005. "Image-Thinking and the Understanding of "Being": The Psychological Basis of Linguistic Expression." Philosophy East and West no. 55:179-208.

  41. Żełaniec, Wojciech. 1998. "Is "Being" Predicated in Only One Sense, After All?" Logic and Logical Philosophy no. 6:241-258.

    Abstract: "In this essay, I argue that for sentences of form “A is B” there is a distinction between identity and “mere” predication to be made, and that Leśniewski’s Ontology puts us in a better position to make this distinction than first-order predicate logic. I also gesture at how Ontology could help us to decide questions of identity. The nub of the matter seems to be a “primordial” sense of the copula that Ontology has at its basis."

History

  1. Adamson, Peter. 2002. "Before Essence and Existence: al-Kindī's Conception of Being." Journal of History of Philosophy no. 40:297-312.

    "It would appear that al-Kindī considered the study of metaphysics to be primary in his endeavor to reconstruct Greek thought. His most significant remaining work, On First Philosophy, assimilates metaphysics or “first philosophy” to theology, the study of “the First Truth Who is the Cause of every truth.” His survey of the works of Aristotle likewise confirms that the Metaphysics studies God, His names and His status as the First Cause.

    (...)

    We might suspect, then, that al-Kindī took Aristotle’s aim in the Metaphysics of studying “being qua being” as central to his own undertaking, and indeed as central to an adequate philosophical understanding of God.

    In this paper I shall try to confirm this suspicion through a study of al-Kindī’s corpus, focusing specifically on his conception of being, or, rather, on his conceptions of being; for as we shall see there are two competing treatments of being in al-Kindi. First, in common with the Arabic Plotinus and the Liber de Causis, he has a conception that emphasizes the simplicity of being, and opposes being to predication.

    Second, he has a complex conception of being indebted to Aristotle. These two conceptions can be reconciled: simple being, I will argue, is prior to and underlies complex being. Finally, I will suggest that al-Kindī’s simple conception of being anticipates Avicenna’s distinction between existence and essence, but only to a limited extent." (pp. 298-299 Notes omitted)

  2. Aertsen, Jan A. 1985. "The Convertibility of Being and Good in St. Thomas Aquinas." The New Scholasticism no. 59:449-470.

    "In many medieval thinkers, e.g. Alexander of Hales, Bonaventure, Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, the statement can be found: " being and good are convertible " (ens et Comm convertuntur).(1) That is to say, " being " and " good " are interchangeable terms in predication (converti enim est conversim praedicari).(2) Wherever " being " is predicated of something, the predicate " good " is involved as well.

    That must imply that " good " is here not a concept that adds a real content or a new quality to " being ", as a result of which " being " is restricted. For in that case there would be no question of convertibility.(3) " Good " is an attribute which pertains to every being, it is a property of being as such, a "mode that is common, and consequent upon every being." In other words, " good " is coextensive with " being ", it is one of the so-called transcendentie which, since Suarez, are usually referred to as " transcendentals ".

    (1) Alexander of Hales, Summa I, Inq. 1, Tract. 3, q. 3, membrum 1, c. 1, a. 1, "An idem sit bonum et ens "; Bonaventure, In II Sent., d. 1, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, fundam. 5, "Ens et bonum eonvertuntur, sicut volt Dionysius ", d. 34, a. 2, q. 3, fundam. 4; Albert the Great, De Bono q. 1, a. 6; Summa Theol. tract. 6, q. 28; Thom. Aquinas, In I Sent. 8, 1, 3; De Ver. XXI, 2; In De Hebdomadibus, lect. 3; Summa Theol. I, 18, 3.

    (2) Thomas Aquinas, De Ver. I, 2 obj. 2.

    (3) De Pot. IX, 7 ad 5: Bonum quod est in genre qualitatis, non est bonum quod convertitur cum ante, quod nullam rem supra ens addit.

    (4) De Ver. I, 1: modus generaliter consequens omne ens.

    (5) Comp. Albert the Great, Summa Theologiae tract. 6, q. 27, c. 3: Bonum dicit intentionem communem et est de transcendentibus omne genus sicut et ens.

  3. ———. 1998. "Being and One: The Doctrine of the Convertible Transcendentals in Duns Scotus." In John Duns Scotus (1265/6-1308). Renewal of Philosophy. Acts of the Third Symposium organized by the Dutch Society for Medieval Philosophy Medium Aevum (May 23 and 24, 1996), edited by Bos, Egbert Peter, 13-26. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

    "In the prologue of his commentary on the Metaphysics, Duns Scotus explains the name 'metaphysics' as transcendens scientia, that is, the science that is concerned with the transcendentia.(1) This explanation is indicative of the prominent place Scotus ascribes to the doctrine of the transcendentals, which was formulated for the first time in the Summa de bono of Philip the Chancellor that is datable about 1225. The connection between the object of first philosophy and the transcendentals is not in itself new, although the identity posed by Scotus is more radical than in his predecessors.(2) Yet it is no exaggeration to say that Scotus's philosophy marks a new phase in the history of the doctrine of the transcendentia.

    Scotus understands the concept 'transcendental' differently than his predecessors did. To thinkers of the thirteenth century, transcendental properties are communissima. 'Being, 'one,'true' and 'good' 'transcend' the Aristotelian categories because they are not limited to one of them but are common to all things. According to Scotus, however, it is not necessary that a transcendental as transcendental be predicated of every being; it is not essential to the concept transcendens that it has many inferiors. In his Ordinatio he determines the concept negatively: 'what is not contained under any genus' or 'what remains indifferent to finite and infinite'. (3) This definition makes possible a vast extension of the transcendental domain; the most important innovation is formed by the so-called disjunctive transcendentals, which are convertible with being, not separately but as pairs.

    The fact that the transcendental properties are not necessarily identical with the communissima is, I suspect, the reason why the expression transcendentia, which occurs only sporadically in thinkers like Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas and Henry of Ghent, gains the upperhand in Scotism and becomes the usual term.

    About Scotus's doctrine of the transcendentals, in contrast to that of other medieval thinkers, we are well informed by Allan B. Wolter's pioneering study, The Transcendentals and Their Function in the Metaphysics of Duns Scotus (1946). Yet there are aspects of his doctrine that have thus far received little attention in scholarly literature. One of them is Scotus's treatment of the transcendentals 'one, 'true' and 'good,' which as such are convertible with being. In my contribution I want to show that with respect to the traditional transcendentals, too, Scotus breaks new ground and approaches critically the views of his thirteenth-century predecessors. Because he discusses most extensively the relation between being and one, I foals on this discussion." (pp. 13-14)

    * The original version of this study will appear in T. Noone and G. A. Wilson (eds.), Essays in Honor Girard Etzkorn: Franciscan Texts and Traditions, Franciscan Studies 56 (1998) [pp. 47-64].

    (1) Quaestiones subtilissimae super libros Metaphysicorum Aristotelis, prol., n. 18: Et hanc scientiam vocamus metaphysicam, quae dicitur a 'meta', quod est 'trans', et 'ycos', 'scientia', quasi transcendens scientia, quia est de transcendentibus.

    (2) Albert the Great, Metaphysica I, tract. 1, ch. 2 (Opera omnia XVI, 1, ed. B. Geyer, 5, 13-14), who uses the phrase prima et transcendentia in his analysis of the subject matter of metaphysics. For Thomas Aquinas's doctrine, see J.A. Aertsen, Medieval Philosophy and the Transcendentals. The Case of Thomas Aquinas, Leiden, Brill 1996, 113-158.

    (3) Ordinatio I, dist. 8, part t, q. 3, nn. 113-114 (ed. Vaticana IV, 206).

  4. al-Kutubi, Eiyad S. 2015. Mulla Sadra and Eschatology: Evolution of Being. New York: Routledge.

  5. Allen, Elliott B. 1960. "Hervaeus Natalis: An Early "Thomist" on the Notion of Being." Mediaeval Studies:1-14.

  6. Anderson, James F. 1965. St. Augustine and Being: A Metaphysical Essay. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

  7. Bechtle, Gerald. 2000. "The Question of Being and the Dating of the Anonymous Parmenides Commentary." Ancient Philosophy no. 20:393-414.

    "This article was originally intended to precede the publication of my book (Bechtle 1999a) devoted to the extant fragments of the anonymous commentary on Plato's Parmenides, also known as Anonymus Taurinensis.' The aim of this article was then-and it still is now-to make the scholarly world acquainted with some of the main reasons, i.e., my view of `the question of being', for my novel thesis of a pre-Plotinian date for this Commentary which has almost unanimously been ascribed to Porphyry. Since the thesis of the Porphyrian authorship goes back to the great French scholar P. Hadot (see in particular Hadot 1961, 1965, 1968a, and 1968b), one can say that his thesis has been generally accepted for some thirty years or, at least, it has not been seriously challenged. This fact is easily explained since neither before nor after Hadot has there been a thorough and critical examination of the evidence. Hadot's thesis concerning the identity of the author being the only serious one in more than a century since research on the Commentary first started, my idea was that probably a lot of questions had not been answered. Reconsidering all of Hadot's evidence and adding some new elements, I determined that the Commentary is very likely of pre-Plotinian date. Additional work on lamblichus and post-Plotinian Platonism negatively confirms this thesis since one can virtually exclude Iamblichus and any of the major Platonists following him as possible authors of the Commentary." (p. 393)

  8. Benardete, Seth. 1977. "The Grammar of Being." The Review of Metaphysics no. 30:486-496.

    Critical study of Charles H. Kahn, The Verb "Be" in Ancient Greek (Reidel: 1973).

  9. Bernasconi, Robert. 1987. "Descartes in the History of Being: Another Bad Novel?" Research in Phenomenology no. 17:75-102.

  10. Berti, Enrico. 2001. "Multiplicity and Unity of Being in Aristotle." Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society no. 101:185-207.

    Abstract: "I. In analytic philosophy, so-called 'univocalism' is the prevailing interpretation of the meaning of terms such as 'being' or 'existence', i.e. the thesis that these terms have only one meaning (see Russell, White, Quine, van Inwagen). But some analytical philosophers, inspired by Aristotle, maintain that 'being' has many senses (Austin, Ryle). II. Aristotle develops an argument in favour of this last thesis, observing that 'being' and 'one' cannot be a single genus, because they are predicated of their differences (Metaph. B 3). III. But 'being' for Aristotle has also a unity, i.e. 'focal meaning', which coincides with substance (Metaph. F 2), and substance has not only an ontological priority, but also a logical priority, in respect to the other beings, as was shown by G. E. L. Owen. IV. This 'focal meaning' cannot be identified with primary substance, i.e. with the unmovable mover, as some interpreters pretend, because this latter has only an ontological, not a logical, priority in respect to the world. V. The impossibility of this interpretation results from Aristotle's rejection of an essence and a substance of being (Metaph. B 4), i.e. the rejection of what the Christian philosophers called esse ipsum subsistens."

  11. Bobik, Joseph. 1965. Aquinas on Being and Essence: A Translation and Interpretation. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press.

  12. Bolton, Robert. 1975. "Plato's Distinction between Being and Becoming." The Review of Metaphysics no. 29:66-95.

  13. Boman, Thorleif. 1960. Hebrew Thought Compared with Greek. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.

    Translated by Jules L. Moreau from the German Das hebräische Denken im Vergleich mit den Griechischen (second edition; first edition 1952), Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 1954, with the author's revisions to January 1960.

  14. Bos, Egbert Peter. 2000. "Nature and Number of the Categories and the Division of Being According to Domingo de Soto." In Medieval and Renaissance Logic in Spain, edited by Angelelli, Ignacio and Pérez-Ilzarbe, Paloma, 327-353. Hildesheim: Georg Olms.

  15. Bos, Egbert Peter, and van der Helm, A.C. 1998. "The Division of Being Over the Categories According to Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus." In John Duns Scotus (1265/6-1308): Renewal of Philosophy, edited by Bos, Egbert Peter, 183-196. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

    Acts of the Third Symposium organized by the Dutch Society for Medieval Philosophy Medium Aevum (May 23 and 24, 1996).

  16. Bradshaw, David. 1999. "Neoplatonic Origins of the Act of Being." The Review of Metaphysics no. 53:383-401.

  17. Braine, David. 2006. "Aquinas, God and Being." In Analytical Thomism: Traditions in Dialogue, edited by Paterson, Craig and Pugh, Matthew S., 1-24. Aldershot: Ashgate.

  18. Brentano, Franz. 1975. On the Several Senses of Being in Aristotle. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Edited and translated by Rolf George.

    Contents: Editor's Preface XI; Preface XV; Introduction 1; I. The Fourfold Distinction of Being 3; II. Accidental Being 6; III. Being in the Sense of Being True 15; IV. Potential and Actual Being 27; V. Being According to the Figures of the Categories 49; Notes 149-197.

  19. Brock, Stephen L. 2006. "On Whether Aquinas's "Ipsum Esse" Is "Platonism"." The Review of Metaphysics no. 60:269-303.

  20. ———. 2007. "Thomas Aquinas and “What Actually exists”." In Wisdom's Apprentice. Thomistic Essays in Honor o/ L. Dewan O. P., edited by Kwasniewski, Peter A., 13-39. Washington, D. C.: The Catholic University of America Press.

  21. ———. 2007. "Harmonizing Plato and Aristotle on Esse. Thomas Aquinas and the De hebdomadibus." Nova et Vetera (English edition) no. 4:465-494.

  22. Brown, Lesley. 1986. "Being in the Sophist: a Ssyntactical Enquiry." Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy no. 4:49-70.

    "Plato's Sophist presents a tantalizing challenge to the modern student of philosophy. In its central section we find a Plato whose interests and methods seem at once close to and yet remote from our own. John Ackrill's seminal papers on the Sophist, (1) published in the fifties, emphasized the closeness, and in optimistic vein credited Plato with several successes in conceptual analysis. These articles combine boldness of 'argument with exceptional clarity and economy of expression, and though subsequent writers have cast doubt on some of Ackrill's claims for the Sophist the articles remain essential reading for all students of the dialogue. I am happy to contribute an essay on the Sophist to this volume dedicated to John Ackrill.

    Among the most disputed questions in the interpretation of the Sophist is that of whether Plato therein marks off different uses of the verb einai , 'to be'. This paper addresses one issue under that heading, that of the distinction between the 'complete' and 'incomplete' uses of `to be', which has usually been associated with the distinction between the 'is' that means 'exists' and the 'is' of predication, that is, the copula."

    (1) Symploke Eidon (1955) and Plato and the Copula: Sophist 251-59 (1957), both reprinted in Plato I, ed G. Vlastos (New York, 1971), 201-9 and 210-22.

  23. ———. 1994. "The Verb 'To Be' in Greek Philosophy: Some Remarks." In Companions to Ancient Thought: Language, edited by Everson, Stephen, 212-236. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    "The existence of at least these three distinct uses of 'is' was taken for granted by commentators and assumed to apply, by and large, to ancient Greek, though with some salient differences. These include the fact that Greek can and regularly does omit esti in the present tense, though not in other tenses, and that the complete 'is' is still very much a going concern, though more or less defunct in modern English. The fact that the esti of the copula can be omitted means that a predicative use of esti can convey a nuance over and above that of the mere copula (for instance connoting what really is F rather than merely appearing F, or what is enduringly F).

    And the fact that current English has more or less abandoned the use of the complete 'is' to mean 'exist' (as in Hamlet's 'To be or not to be), while in Greek it is very much a going concern, may lead us to question whether the complete esti really shares the features of the 'is' which means (or used to mean) 'exist'." (p. 215)

    (...)

    "I cannot offer here a full account of what I take to be the results of the Sophist, far less a defence of such an account, but confine myself to a few points. To the question whether the dialogue distinguishes an 'is' of identity from an 'is' of predication, I have indicated my answer: that it does not, but it does draw an important distinction between identity-sentences and predications (see section I and n. 2 above). Here I focus on the question whether and if so how it distinguishes complete from incomplete uses. I shall suggest that Plato developed a better theory about the negative 'is not' than his argumentation in the Republic suggests, while continuing to treat the relation between the complete use (X is) and the incomplete (X is F) in the way I have described in section IV, that is, by analogy with the relation between 'X teaches' and 'X teaches singing'." (p. 229)

    (...)

    "Conclusion

    In our attempts to understand and evaluate the claims and arguments of ancient philosophers we have to use conceptual tools, including ones not available to the philosophers themselves. Indisputably the analytical investigations in this century of the metaphysics of, say, Parmenides, Plato and Aristotle have yielded invaluable insights. But where these have involved enquiries concerning the verb 'to be' they have tended to use what may be an inappropriate framework - that of certain modern distinctions in the verb 'to be'. In particular, commentators have been misled by the English word 'exist', which now has the role of the more-or less defunct complete 'is' (as in 'To be or not to be'); they have assumed that Greek esti, when complete, like 'exist', does not allow a completion, and has a role sharply distinct from the esti in a predication. I have argued that a different picture emerges from Plato and Aristotle, both from their usage of esti and from their explicit discussions. Even where they do draw attention to the two syntactic uses (complete and incomplete), as Plato perhaps does at Sophist 2 5 5c12-d 7, and Aristotle in the passages cited in section V, they should not be described as elucidating a difference between the 'is' of existence and that of predication, or indeed as noting a difference of any great philosophical importance. When we try to understand the arguments which seem to depend crucially on the verb 'to be' we should beware of

    seeking to impose or to discern our currently favoured distinctions, for in ancient Greek the conceptual web was woven differently, and in the case ofthe verb 'to be' it was, comparatively speaking, a seamless one." (p. 236)

  24. Brown, Stephen. 1965. "Avicenna and the Unity of the Concept of Being. The Interpretations of Henry of Ghent, Duns Scotus, Gerard of Bologna and Peter Aureoli." Franciscan Studies no. 25:117-150.

  25. Buchanan, Emerson. 1962. Aristotle's Theory of Being. Cambridge (MA): University, Mississippi.

  26. Calvo, Tomás. 2014. "The Verb 'Be' (εἰμί) and Aristotelian Ontology." Teorema: Revista Internacional de Filosofía no. 33:45-55.

  27. Caster, Kevin Joseph. 1996. "The Real Distinction Between Being and Essence according to William of Auvergne." Traditio no. 51:201-223.

  28. ———. 1996. "The Distinction between Being and Essence according to Boethius, Avicenna, and William of Auvergne." The Modern Schoolman no. 73:309-332.

    "A close analysis of William of Auvergne’s metaphysics reveals a distinction between being and essence that more closely approximates the celebrated real distinction of St. Thomas than has generally been recognized. Like St. Thomas, William maintained both a real distinction and a real composition between being and essence in the metaphysical structure of the concrete thing. Since William’s position thus represented a marked development in the history of philosophy with respect to this topic, it is obviously valuable to look at William’s sources, namely, Boethius and Avicenna. Of course, I am in no sense suggesting that the study of Boethius and Avicenna is valuable only for the insights it might lend to one’s perspective of William’s position. On the contrary, such study is eminently valuable in itself.

    1. Boethius’s Contribution to the Doctrine of the Real Distinction

    In his Opuscula Sacra, Boethius distinguishes between being (esse) and that which is (id quod est). Because William, who borrowed Boethius’s terminology for his own position, was especially influenced by the De hebdomadibus, one needs to look at this work in order to reach a more complete understanding of William. While the scholarly opinion on Boethius’s distinction is quite divergent, Pierre Hadot’s work — in my opinion — represents the best of the scholarly interpretations regarding this topic. Hadot not only seems best to capture Boethius’s doctrine, but his perspective of Boethius also highlights what William seemed to find in him.

    In “La distinction de l’être et de l’étant dans le De Hebdomadibus de Boèce,” Hadot summarizes the differences between being (esse) and that which is (id quod est) as they appear in the axioms found in the De hebdomadibus. The characteristics of being (esse) and that which is (id quod est) may be translated as follows. Being: 1) “is not yet,” 2) “in no way participates in anything,” and 3) “has nothing besides itself added on.” That which is: 1) “has received the form of being,” 2) “has received being,” 3) “participates in that which is being,” 4) “is and exists,” 5) “is able to participate in something,” and 6) “is able to have something besides the fact that it is.” (1)

    (1) See Pierre Hadot, “La distinction de l'être et de l’étant dans le De hebdomadibus de Boèce,” Die Metaphysik im Mittelalter, Miscellanea Mediavalia, 2 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1963), p. 147. The characteristics of esse: 1) “nondum est,” 2) “nullo modo aliquo participat,” and 3) “nihil aliud praeter se habet admixtum.” The characteristics of id quod est: 1) “accepit formam essendi,” 2) “suscipit esse,” 3) “participat eo quod est esse,” 4) “est atque consistit,” 5) “participare aliquo potest,” and 6) “potest habere aliquid praeterquam quod ipsum est.”

  29. ———. 2004. "William of Auvergne and St. Thomas Aquinas on the Real Distinction between Being and Essence." In Being and Thought in Aquinas, edited by Hackett, Jeremiah, Murnion, William E. and Still, Carl N., 75-108. New York: Stte University of New Yok Press.

  30. Cheng, Chung-ying. 2009. "Li and Qi in the Yijing: A Reconsideration of Being and Nonbeing in Chinese Philosophy." Journal of Chinese Philosophy no. Supplement to volume 36:73-100.

  31. Cunningham, F. A. 1970. "Richard of Middleton O.F.M. on 'Esse and Essence'." Franciscan Studies no. 30:49-76.

  32. D'Ancona, Cristina. 2011. "Platonic and Neoplatonic Terminology for Being in Arabic Translation." Studia graeco-arabica no. 1:23-45.

  33. De Haan, Daniel D. 2014. "A Mereological Construal of the Primary Notions Being and Thing in Avicenna and Aquinas." American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly no. 88:335-360.

    Abstract: "This study has two goals: first, to show that Avicenna’s account of being and thing significantly influenced Aquinas’s doctrine of the primary notions; second, to establish the value of adopting a mereological construal of these primary notions in the metaphysics of Avicenna and Aquinas. I begin with an explication of the mereological construal of the primary notions that casts these notions in terms of wholes and parts. Being and thing refer to the same entitative whole and have the same extension, but they are distinct in intension according to the different entitative parts they signify. Existence and essence constitute the two most fundamental entitative parts of every entitative whole. Being is taken to mean that which has existence, and thing signifies that which has essence. I then show how this mereological construal of the primary notions clarifies a number of texts in Avicenna and Aquinas. Finally, I address a few arguments against employing this mereological interpretation of the primary notions."

  34. ———. 2020. Necessary Existence and the Doctrine of Being in Avicenna’s Metaphysics of the Healing. Leiden: Brill.

  35. de Rijk, Lambertus Marie. 1952. The Place of the Categories of Being in Aristotle's Philosophy. Assen: Van Gorcum.

    Contents: Bibliography I-III; Introduction 1-7; Chapter I. Aristotle's doctrine of truth 8-35; Chapter II. The distinction of essential and accidental being pp. 31-43; Chapter III. Logical and ontological accident 44-52; Chapter IV. The nature of the categories in the Metaphysics 53-66; Chapter V. The doctrine of the categories in the first treatise of the Organon 67-75; Chapter VI. The use of the categories in the work of Aristotle 76-88; Appendix. The names of the categories 89-92; Index locorum 93-96.

    From the Introduction: "It seems to be the fatal mistake of philology that it always failed to get rid of Kantian influences as to the question of the relation of logic and ontology. Many modern mathematical logicians have shown that the logical and the ontological aspect not only are inseparable but also that in many cases it either lacks good sense or is even impossible to distinguish them. Accordingly, the distinction of logical and ontological truth (especially of propositional truth and term-truth), that of logical and ontological accident and that of logical and ontological categories, has not the same meaning for modem logic as it seems to have for 'traditional' logic (for instance the logic of most Schoolmen).

    I hope to show in this study that the distinction of a logical and an ontological aspect (especially that of logical and ontological categories) can be applied to the Aristotelian doctrine only with the greatest reserve. A sharp distinction carried through rigorously turns out to be unsuitable when being applied to Aristotelian logic. For both aspects are, for Aristotle, not only mutually connected but even interwoven, and this in such a way that the ontological aspect seems to prevail, the logical being only an aspect emerging more or less in Aristotle's generally ontological way of thinking." (pp. 6-7)

  36. ———. 1988. "On Boethius' Notion of Being. A Chapter of Boethian Semantics." In Meaning and Inference in Medieval Philosophy. Studies in Memory of Jan Pinborg, edited by Kretzmann, Norman, 1-29. Dordrecht: Kluwer.

    Reprinted as chapter I in: L. M. de Rijk, Through Language to Reality. Studies in Medieval Semantics and Metaphysics, edited by E. P. Bos, Northampton: Variourum Reprints, 1989.

    "From Parmenides onwards, ancient and medieval thought had a special liking for metaphysical speculation. No doubt, speculative thought was most influentially outlined by Plato and Aristotle. However, what the Christian thinkers achieved in metaphysics was definitely more than just applying and adapting what was handed down to them. No student of medieval speculative thought can help being struck by the peculiar fact that whenever fundamental progress was made, it was theological problems which initiated the development. This applies to St Augustine and Boethius, and to the great medieval masters as well (such as Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus). Their speculation was, time and again, focused on how the notion of being and the whole range of our linguistic tools can be applied to God's Nature (Being).

    It is no wonder, then, that an inquiry into Boethius's notion of being should be concerned, first and foremost, with his theological treatises, especially De hebdomadibus.

    (...)

    My final section aims at showing how Boethius's notion of being is clearly articulated in accordance with his semantic distinctions. This is most clearly seen in the main argument of De hebdomadibus where they may be actually seen at work.

    As is well known, the proper aim of De hebdomadibus is to point out the formal difference between esse and esse bonum, or in Boethius's words: 'the manner in which substances are good in virtue of their being, while not yet being substantially good' (38.2-4). Its method consists in a careful application of certain formal distinctions, viz.:

    (a) The distinction between an object 'when taken as a subsistent whole and id quod est = the constitutive element which causes the object's actually' being; it is made in Axiom II and used in Axiom IV.

    (b) The distinction (closely related to the preceding one) obtaining between the constitutive element effecting the object's actual being (forma essendi, or ipsum esse) and the object's actuality as such (id quod est or ipsum est); it is made in Axioms VII and VIII.

    (c) The distinction between esse as 'pure being' (= nihil aliud praeter se habens admixtum), which belongs to any form, whether substantial or incidental, and id quod est admitting of some admixture (lit. 'something besides what it is itself'); it is made in Axiom IV and in fact implies the distinction between esse simpliciter and esse aliquid.

    (d) The distinction between 'just being some thing', tantum esse aliquid, and 'being something qua mode of being'. It is made in Axiom V and used in Axiom VI and is in fact concerned with a further distinction made within the notion of id quod est. It points out the differences between the effect caused by some form as constitutive of being some thing and that caused by the main constituent (forma essendi) which causes an object's being simpliciter.

    (e) The distinction between two different modes of participation, one effecting an object's being subsistent, the other its being some thing, where the 'some thing' (aliquid) refers to some (non-subsistent) quality such as 'being white', 'being wise', 'being good', etc.

    The application of these distinctions enables Boethius to present a solution to the main problem: although the objects (ea quae sunt, plural of id quod est) are (are good) through their own constitutive element, being (being good), nevertheless they are not identical with their constitutive element nor (a fortiori) with the IPSUM ESSE (BONUM ESSE) of which their constituent is only a participation." (pp. 1 and 22-23).

  37. De Vio, Thomas, Cardinal Cajetan. 1953. The Analogy of Names and the Concept of Being. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press.

  38. Dillon, John. 2009. "The Question of Being." In Greek Thought. A Guide to Classical Knowledge, edited by Brunschwig, Jacques and Lloyd, Geoffrey E.R., 51-71. Harvard: Harvard University Press.

  39. Dumont, Stephen. 1987. "The Univocity of the Concept of Being in the Fourteenth Century: John Duns Scouts and William of Alnwick." Mediaeval Studies no. 49:1-75.

  40. ———. 1988. "The Univocity of the Concept of Being in the Fourteenth Century: II. The De ente of Peter Thomae." Mediaeval Studies no. 50:186-256.

  41. Elders, Leo. 1993. The Metaphysics of Being of St. Thomas Aquinas in a Historical Perspective. Leiden: Brill.

  42. Fitzpatrick, Noel A. 1971. "Walter Chatton on the Univocity of Being: A Reaction to Peter Aureoli and William Ockham." Franciscan Studies no. 31:88-177.

  43. Flower, Robert. 1980. "G. E. L. Owen, Plato and the Verb to be." Apeiron no. 14:87-95.

  44. Floyd, Juliet. 2006. "On the Use and Abuse of Logic in Philosophy: Kant, Frege and Hintikka on the Verb 'To Be'." In The Philosophy of Jaakko Hintikka, edited by Auxier, Randall E. and Hahn, Lewis E., 137-188. Chicago: Open Court.

    "Jaakko Hintikka is a radical and wildly ambitious philosopher. Over the course of more than forty years he has attempted to refashion the whole of logic and philosophy in his own image, urging the overthrow of most everything analytic philosophy inherited from Frege and Russell. He argues that the correct philosophical Logic (with a capital "L" to designate "the real Logic") is his "independence-friendly" logic, wedded to his construals of modal and epistemic logic in the context of game-theoretic semantics, and he calls for a reappraisal of every philosophical problem in light of this conception. Hintikka thereby rejects what became for philosophers (after Hilbert, Gōdel, and Quine) the standard answer to the question, What is Logic?, viz., first-order logic, unmoved by its commonly supposed advantages: topic-neutrality, wide curricular, mathematical, and philosophical acceptance, general (if not universal) applicability, recursively axiomatizable completeness with respect to deductive validity, and classical syntax and semantics for negation. He is not swayed either by the expressive power of second-order logic. He wants a system that is, expressively speaking, somewhere in between. To understand him as a philosopher is to be able to fathom why.

    It is not the aim of this essay to come fully to grips with Hintikka's persistent campaign to overthrow the present order of things. Instead, I shall try to characterize his self-conception in broad brushstrokes. Section 1 of the essay aims to situate Hintikka's thought within the context of recent analytic philosophy. Section 2 canvasses his criticisms of Frege's and Russell's fundamental logical notions. Section 3 assesses his treatment of the classical Ontological Argument for God's existence in light of these criticisms. First, I contrast his treatment of the argument with that of Michael Dummett. Next, I consider what Hintikka has left out of philosophical account in his particular reconstruction of the argument, suggesting that it is precisely this which is most telling with respect to his own philosophy. In section 4 I delve into a more detailed analysis of Hintikka's treatment of Kant's philosophy of logic, with the aim of showing how his own philosophical preconceptions shape his historical readings." (pp. 137-138)

  45. Frank, Richard M. 1956. "The Origin of the Arabic Philosophical Term Anniyya." Les Cahiers de Byrsa:181-201.

    Reprinted in R. M. Frank, Philosophy, Theology and Mysticism in Medieval Islam, Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005, Essay IV.

  46. ———. 1978. Beings and Their Attributes: The Teaching of the Basrian School of the Mutazila in the Classical Period Studies in Islamic Philosophy and Science. Albany: State University of New York Press.

  47. Gál, Gedeon. 1992. "Geraldus Odonis: On the Univocity of the Concept of Being." Franciscan Studies no. 52:23-51.

  48. Geach, Thomas Peter. 1955. "Form and Existence." Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society no. 55:251-272.

    Reprinted in P. T. Geach, God and the Soul, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul 1969, pp. 42-64.

  49. Gilson, Étienne. 1952. Being and Some Philosophers. Toronto: Pontifical Insitute of Mediaeval Studies.

    Second edition corrected and enlarged (First edition 1949).

    Contents: Preface VII-XI; I. On Being and the One 1; II. Being and Substance 41; III. Essence and Existence 74; V. Being and Existence 154; VI. Knowledge and Existence 190; Appendix - On Some Difficulties of Interpretation 216; Index 233-235.

  50. Gould, Josiah B. 1974. "Being, the World, and Appearance in Early Stoicism and Some other Greek Philosophies." The Review of Metaphysics no. 28:261-288.

  51. Haaparanta, Leila. 1985. Frege's Doctrine of Being. Helsinki: Acta Philosophica Fennica.

  52. Hankey, Wayne. 1980. "Aquinas' First Principle: Being or Unity?" Dionysius no. 4:133-172.

  53. Heiman, Ambrose. 1953. "Essence and Esse According to Jean Quidort." Mediaeval Studies no. 15:137-146.

  54. ———. 1959. "Two Questions Concerning the Esse of Creatures in the Doctrine of Jean Quidort." In An Etienne Gilson Tribute, edited by O'Neil, Charles J., 51-67. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press.

  55. Henninger, Mark. 2006. "Henry of Harclay on the Univocal Concept of Being." Mediaeval Studies:205-237.

  56. Hintikka, Jaakko. 1981. "The Unambiguity of Aristotelian Being." The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter no. 238:1-26.

  57. ———. 1986. "The Varieties of Being in Aristotle." In The Logic of Being, edited by Knuuttila, Simo and Hintikka, Jaakko, 81-114. Dordrecht: Reidel.

  58. Hughes, Christopher. 2015. Aquinas on Being, Goodness, and God. New York: Routledge.

  59. Husain, Martha. 1976. "The Question 'What is Being' and its Aristotelian Answer." The New Scholasticism no. 50:293-309.

    "This paper takes its point of departure from a recent article by Joseph Owens: "The content of existence," (*) which argues that being is unknowable in terms of concepts since it either has all cognitive (when contrasted with not-being) or none at all (when contrasted with beings). These dilemmas can be resolved by means of Aristotle's categories as the intrinsic formal structure of being, and as constituting the cognitive content of being "qua" being. In terms of this cognitive content, being is conceptualized, becomes knowable, and can be meaningfully contrasted with both not-being and beings. Beyond the resolution of Owens' dilemmas, the paper goes on to examine the need for meaningful contrasts in all knowledge as well as the adequacy and relevance of Aristotle's categories in relation to modern science."

    Joseph Owens, The Content of Existence, in: Milton K. Munitz (ed.), Logic and Ontology, New York: New York University Press 1973, pp. 21-36.

  60. Jacobi, Klaus. 1985. "Peter Abelard's Investigations into the Meaning and Functions of the Speech Sign Est." In The Logic of Being, edited by Knuuttila, Simo and Hintikka, Jaakko, 1-15. Dordrecht: Reidel.

    "Although Peter Abelard was the most distinguished teacher of logic of his time, a logic understood to be the science of argumentative discourse, he was not destined to found a new philosophical tradition. The historical situation offers at Least a partial explanation -- the pace of philosophical and theological research was so brisk in the twelfth century that many of the established schools enjoyed life spans of at most two or three generations of teachers. The restlessness of the times is embodied to a special degree in Abelard.(1) His writings include commentaries, in many cases several to a work, on the logical works of Aristotle and Porphyry then available, handed down in the form of Boethius' translations, and on Boethius' own logical works. Abelard has to take a number of positions into consideration here: several commentaries on Aristotle by ancient scholars, by Boethius, and by Abelard's own predecessors and teachers, and furthermore the grammatical theories of Priscian and those deriving from Abelard's contemporaries. He discovers with distinctive acumen that the tradition he is examining is disunited and full of tensions on basic questions. It is in the analysis and discussion of these tensions that he finds the field of his own philosophical research. He expects to reach solutions by intensifying the controversies, not by seeking harmony. Thus he traces argument and counter-argument in great thoroughness of detail and from a dizzying succession of points of view, abandoning theses and offering countertheses. What his students could learn from him was not so much a particular theory as his method of formulating and discussing problems.

    The situation is much the same for us. If we turn to Abelard in our inquiry into the logic and semantics of the speech sign 'est', we must discover anew the questions which concerned him. In the first Part of this Paper, I will sketch some of the discussions conducted by Abelard in order to make clear in what contexts he found himself confronting questions on the variations of meaning, function, or use of the expression 'est'. In the second part, I will group various theses which Abelard deals with appropriately. It is my intention to plot out the full range of the theories discussed and to mark points of conflict. In the third and final part, I will make some cautious comments on the deeper current of unity to be observed in Abelard's reflections, a current perhaps more easily discernible to the modern eye then it was to Abelard himself." (pp. 145-146)

    (1) Cf. Jolivet (1969), Chapter IV; de Rijk (1980). Also compare Häring (1975), who explains the meager transmission of Abelard's works as at least partially attributable to Abelard's style of thinking and writing. His philosophical "works" were not written as books intended to be recopied and handed down but as records of his own thinking to be used in teaching. A thesis which he adheres to with conviction at one point in his writings may reappear later or even in a reworking of the first source as being subject lo doubt or in need of revision.

  61. Jordan, Mark D. 1980. "The Grammar of Esse. Re-reading Thomas on the Transcendentals." The Thomist no. 44:1-26.

  62. Kahn, Charles H. 1966. "The Greek Verb 'To Be' and the Concept of Being." Foundations of Language no. 2:245-265.

    Reprinted in C. H. Kahn, Essays on Being, New York: Oxford University Press 2009, pp. 16-40.

  63. ———. 1973. The Verb 'Be' in Ancient Greek. Dordrecht: Reidel.

    Volume 6 of: John W. M. Verhhar (ed.), The Verb 'Be' and Its Synonims. Philosophical and Grammatical Studies, Dordrecht: Reidel.

    Reprinted by Hackett Publishing, 2003 with new introduction and discussion of relation between predicative and existential uses of the verb einai.

    "This book began unintentionally in 1964, when I tried to put together a brief description of the pre-philosophical uses of the Greek verb be in order to lay the groundwork for an interpretation of the more technical use of the verb by the philosophers beginning with Parmenides. But the task was harder and longer than I thought, and it gradually became clear that no adequate description of the Greek data could be given without confronting a number of major issues in linguistic theory and in the philosophy of language.

    As often happens in so-called empirical research, the terms in which the problem is posed and the recognition of what might count as a solution turn out to depend upon certain theoretical assumptions about the nature of the subject matter and the appropriate form for description, analysis, and explanation. In this case there was the preliminary question of an appropriate method for describing and classifying the different uses of the verb, and the closely connected question of the relationship between a syntactic or formal analysis of these uses and a semantic account in terms of difference of meaning. Similar questions would arise in the study of any verb. But the verb be poses specific philosophic problems of its own: how are we to define or clarify the concepts of subject, predicate, copula, and verb of existence? And there is the problem of the verb be itself: in what sense is this system of distinct uses a unity? Is the possession of a single verb be with such a diversity of uses only a historical accident of Indo-European? And does it follow that the concept of Being is only a philosophic illusion?" (Preface (1973), XLV)

    "Thus the argument of my book reaches two conclusions, one linguistic and one philosophical. The philosophical conclusion, my defense of Greek ontology, rests on my account of the system of einai but does not follow from it.

    Greek ontology might be defended on different grounds, and a reader might accept my account of the system of einai but doubt its value as a defense of ontology. Furthermore, I have not tried to demonstrate the fruitfulness of my linguistic analysis for the interpretation of Greek philosophy. That could be done only by a detailed analysis of Platonic and Aristotelian texts.(1) The current study remains, after all, essentially a grammatical prolegomenon to the history of Greek ontology." (Introduction (200), p. VIII)

    (1) For the application of my account of einai to Parmenides, see Kahn (2002) ["Parmenides and Plato," in V. Caston and D. W. Graham (eds.), Presocratic Philosophy: Essays in honour of Alexander Mourelatos. Burlington, Vermont: Ashgate, pp. 81-93] with references there to earlier publications.

    [In the Appendix to the Introduction (2003) Kahn replies to four important critical reviews of the first edition of his book:]

    Ernst Tugendhat, "Die Seinsfrage und ihre sprachliche Grundlage," Philosophische Rundschau 24 (1977), pp. 161-176: "Tugendhat's review contains a number of penetrating criticisms, some of which I am inclined to regard as justified." (p. XXXIII)

    Seth Benardete, "The Grammar of Being," Review of Metaphysics 30 (1977), pp. 486-496. "Seth Benardete has contributed a number of valuable corrections to my description of the Greek usage of einai." (p. XXXIV)

    Joachim Klowski, Review in Gnomon 47 (1975), pp. 737-746. "Klowski criticizes my exposition from the point of view of traditional philology and doubts the utility of introducing transformational grammar." (p. XXXV)

    Cornelis Jord Ruijgh, "A review of Ch. H. Kahn, The verb 'be' in Ancient Greek," in Lingua 48 (1979), pp. 43-83. [in French] "The most thorough and detailed discussion of my book is by C. J. Ruijgh, a linguist who is also a specialist in Greek. (Unfortunately, this 1979 publication came to my attention only quite recently, as the result of a citation in De Rijk [Aristotle: Semantics and Ontology. Leiden: Brill 2002, two volumes]. I recommend this review for a full, fair, and accurate report of the contents and claims of the book. I discuss here some points in which Ruijgh disagrees with me." (p. XXXVII)

  64. ———. 1973. "On the Theory of the Verb 'to be'." In Logic and Ontology, edited by Munitz, Miton, 1-20. New York: New York University Press.

  65. ———. 1978. "Linguistic Relativism and the Greek Project of Ontology." In The Question of Being, edited by Sprung, Mervyn, 31-44. University Park: University of Pennsylvania Press.

    Paper read at a symposium at Brock University, St. Catherines, Ontario.

    Published also in: Neue Hefte für Philosophie 15-16, 1979 pp. 20-33.

  66. ———. 1981. "Some philosophical uses of 'to be' in Plato." Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy no. 26:105-134.

    Reprinted in C. H. Kahn, Essays on Being, New York: Oxford University Press 2009, pp. 75-108.

  67. ———. 1986. "Retrospect on the Verb 'to be' and the Concept of Being." In The Logic of Being, edited by Knuttilla, Simo and Hintikka, Jaakko, 1-28. Reidel: Dordrecht.

  68. ———. 1988. "Being in Parmenides and Plato." La Parola del Passato no. 43:237-261.

    Reprinted in C. H. Kahn, Essays on Being, New York: Oxford University Press 2009, pp. 167-191.

  69. ———. 2004. "A Return to the Theory of the Verb be and the Concept of Being." Ancient Philosophy no. 24:381-405.

    Reprinted in C. H. Kahn, Essays on Being, New York: Oxford University Press 2009, pp. 109-142.

    "The recent reprinting of my book The Verb 'Be' in Ancient Greek by Hackett Publishing, thirty years after its appearance in 1973, gave me the opportunity to rethink and reformulate the theoretical framework for my description of the Greek verb. Since the audience for the reprinted book will inevitably be restricted, I present here a more accessible, slightly revised version of the new (2003) Introduction. In the original 1973 book, the theoretical discussion was far too long and not always consistent. What follows is a more concise and, I hope, more coherent version of my theoretical account of einai."

  70. ———. 2009. Essays on Being. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Contents: Introduction 1; 1. The Greek verb 'to be' and the concept of Being (1966) 16; 2. On the terminology for copula and existence (1972) 41; 3. Why existence does not emerge as a distinct concept in Greek philosophy (1976) 62; 4. Some philosophical uses of 'to be' in Plato (1981) 75; 5. A return to the verb 'to be' and the concept of Being (2004) 109; 6. The thesis of Parmenides (1969) 143; 7. Being in Parmenides and Plato (1988) 167; 8. Parmenides and Plato once more (2002) 192; Postscript on Parmenides (2008): Parmenides and physics. The direction of the chariot ride in the proem. The epistemic preference for Fire 207; Bibliography 219; Index of names 227.

    "The papers reprinted here, published over a stretch of forty years, reflect my continuing concern with two distinct but intimately related problems, one linguistic and one historical and philosophical. The linguistic problem concerns the theory of the Greek verb to be: how to replace the conventional but misleading distinction between copula and existential verb with a more adequate theoretical account. The philosophical problem is in principle quite distinct: to understand how the concept of Being became the central topic in Greek philosophy from Parmenides to Aristotle. But these two problems converge on what I have called the veridical use of einai. In my earlier papers I took that connection between the verb and the concept of truth to be the key to the central role of Being in Greek philosophy. I think that clue pointed in the right direction, but I would now interpret the veridical in terms of a more general function of the verb that I call 'semantic', which comprises the notions of existence and instantiation as well as truth."

  71. Kainz, Howard P. 1970. "The Suarezian Position on Being and the Real Distinction: An Analytic and Comparative Study." The Thomist no. 34:289-305.

  72. Kearney, Richard. 1992. "Between Kant and Heidegger. The Modern Question of Being." In At the Heart of the Real. Philosophical Essays in Honour of the Most Reverend Desmond Connell, Archbishop of Dublin, edited by O'Rourke, Fran, 271-283. Dublin: Irish Academic Press.

  73. Kemple, Bian A. 2017. Ens Primum Cognitum in Thomas Aquinas and the Tradition: The Philosophy of Being as First Known. Leiden: Brill Rodopi.

  74. Kenny, Anthony. 2002. Aquinas on Being. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

  75. Ketchum, Richard J. 1998. "Being and Existence in Greek Ontology." Archiv fur Geschichte der Philosophie no. 80:321-332.

  76. Klima, Gyula. 1996. "The Semantic Principles Underlying Saint Thomas Aquinas’s Metaphysics of Being." Medieval Philosophy and Theology no. 5:87-141.

  77. ———. 2002. "Aquinas’ Theory of the Copula and the Analogy of Being." History of Philosophy & Logical Analysis no. 5:159-176.

  78. ———. 2011. "Being." In Encyclopedia of Medieval Philosophy: Philosophy Between 500 and 1500, edited by Lagerlund, Henrik, 150-159. Dordrecht: Springer.

  79. ———. 2012. "Being." In The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Philosophy, edited by Marenbon, John, 403-420. New York: Oxford University Press.

  80. Klubertanz, George P. 1946. "Esse and Existere in St. Bonaventure." Mediaeval Studies no. 8:169-199.

  81. Knasas, John F. 2003. Being and Some 20th Century Thomists. New York: Fordham University Press.

  82. Knuuttila, Simo, and Hintikka, Jaakko, eds. 1986. The Logic of Being. Historical Studies. Dordrecht: Reidel.

    Contents: Acknowledgements VII; Introduction IX; Charles H. Kahn: Retrospect on the Verb 'To Be' and the Concept of Being 1; Benson Mates: Identity and Predication in Plato 29; Russell M. Dancy: Aristotle and Existence 49; Jaakko Hintikka: The Varieties of Being in Aristotle 81; Sten Ebbesen: The Chimera's Diary 115; Klaus Jacobi: Peter Abelard's Investigations into the Meaning and Functions of the Speech sign 'Est' 145; Hermann Weidemann: The Logic of Being in Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus 201; Simo Knuuttila: Being qua Being in Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus 201; Lilli Alanen: On Descartes' Argument for Dualism and the Distinction Between Different Kinds of Beings 223; Jaakko Hintikka: Kant on Existence, Predication, and the Ontological Argument 249; Leila Haaparanta: On Frege's Concept of Being 269; Index of names: 291; Index of subjects: 297-300.

  83. Kosman, Aryeh. 2013. The Activity of Being: An Essay on Aristotle's Ontology. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

  84. Kuznetsov, Boris G. 1987. Reason and Being. Dordrecht: Reidel.

    Edited by Carolyn R. Fawcett and Robert S. Cohen.

  85. Langston, Douglas C. 1979. " Scotus and Ockham on the Univocal Concept of Being." Franciscan Studies no. 29:105-129.

  86. Lewis, Frank A. 2004. "Aristotle on the Homonymy of Being." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research no. 68:1-36.

  87. Li Vecchi, Joseph, Scalambrino, Frank, and Kovacs, David K. 2020. The Philosophy of Being in the Analytic, Continental, and Thomistic Traditions: Divergence and Dialogue. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

    "The philosophy of being is as old as philosophy itself; in fact, depending upon your understanding of philosophy, it may even be older. Thus, as long as there will be philosophy, there will always be the philosophy of being. However, books on the philosophy of being have tended to be written from the point of view of, or privileging, just one tradition from the history of Western philosophy.

    So, on the one hand, the three of us thought it would be a valuable contribution to the literature regarding the philosophy of being, if we were to write a book that would specifically speak from the different points of view of three major philosophical traditions.(1) On the other hand, we thought an initial introductory section regarding the philosophy of being in general would help orient readers to the context of our book.(2)"

    (1) It is our belief that readers will become familiar with different philosophical traditions by exploring how each tradition approaches the philosophy of being. On the one hand, we recognize that these traditions may be incommensurable. On the other hand, it is our hope that this project will contribute to a renewed sense of philosophical “pluralism” and “ecumenism.”

    (2) Whereas this section was constructed through a collaborative effort on our parts, the remaining portions of the book were constructed by each of us independently. That is to say, each of us bears the responsibility for representing our respective traditions: Joseph P. Li Vecchi for the Thomistic, Frank Scalambrino for the Continental, and David Kovacs for the Analytic.

  88. Llamzon, Benjamin. 1964. "The specification of 'Esse': a Study in Bañez." The Modern Schoolman no. 41:123-144.

  89. ———. 1965. "Supposital and Accidental Esse: A Study in Bañez." The New Scholasticism no. 39:170-188.

  90. Llano, Alejandro. 2001. "The Different Meanings of ‘Being’ According to Aristotle and Aquinas." Acta Philosophica no. 10:29-44.

  91. Lovejoy, Arthur O. 1936. The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

    Reprinted with a new introduction by Peter J. Stanlis New Brunswick, N.J. : Transaction Publishers 2009.

  92. MacIntyre, Alasdair. 2006. "Being." In Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Second Edition, edited by Borchert, Donald M., 527-532. New York: Thomson Gale.

  93. Maguire, Thomas. 1875. "The Permanent and Transitory Modes of Being, in Early Greek Philosophy." Hermathena no. 2:231-236.

  94. Marrone, Steven P. 1983. "The Notion of Univocity in Duns Scotus's Early Works." Franciscan Studies no. 43:347-395.

  95. ———. 1988. "Henry of Ghent and Duns Scotus on the Knowledge of Being." Speculum no. 63:22-57.

  96. Maurer, Armand. 1946. "Esse and Essentia in the Metaphysics of Siger of Brabant." Mediaeval Studies no. 8:68-85.

  97. ———. 1950. "Ens Diminutum: a Note on its Origin and Meaning." Mediaeval Studies no. 12:216-222.

  98. ———. 1954. "Henry of Harclay's Question on the Univocity of Being." Mediaeval Studies no. 16:18.

  99. ———. 1956. "The 'De Quidditatibus Entium' of Dietrich of Freiberg and its Criticism of Thomistic Metaphysics." Mediaeval Studies no. 18:173-203.

  100. ———. 1966. "Cajetan's Notion of Being in His Commentary on the Sentences." Mediaeval Studies no. 28:268-278.

  101. Menn, Stephen P. 2003. "Metaphysics: God and being." In The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Philosophy, edited by McGrade, A. S., 147-170. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

  102. Mensch, James R. 1981. The Question of Being in Husserl's Logical Investigations. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

  103. Montagnes, Bernard. 2004. The Doctrine of the Analogy of Being according to Thomas Aquinas. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press.

  104. Morgenstern, Amy. 2001. "Leaving the Verb 'to be' Behind: an Alternative Reading of Plato's Sophist." Dionysius no. 19:27-50.

    "In this paper, I critically assess readings of Plato's Sophist which, influenced by the Anglo-American philosophical tradition, have in the latter half of the twentieth century set the terms for discussions of this text's central issues. While aware that these readings are often at odds with each other and, therefore, do not form one coherent reading, I argue that the basic theoretical move unifying these readings -- equating the Greek terms esti, to on, and ta onta with the verb 'to be,' understood existentially, predicatively, or as an identity sign -- cannot serve as the basis of an illuminating approach to the Eleatic stranger's investigation."

  105. Moro, Andrea. 2018. A Brief History of the Verb To Be. Cambridge: The MIT Press.

    Translated from Italian by Bonnie McClellan-Broussard.

    Original edition: Breve storia del verb essere, Milano: Adelphi: 2010.

  106. Morrison, Donald. 1987. "The Evidence for Degrees of Being in Aristotle." Classical Quarterly no. 37:382-402.

  107. Nash, Peter W. 1950. "Giles of Rome on Boethius' "Diversum est esse et id quod est"." Mediaeval Studies no. 12:57-91.

  108. ———. 1952. "The Meaning of Est in the Sentences (1152-1160) of Robert of Melun." Mediaeval Studies no. 14:129-142.

  109. ———. 1957. "The Accidentality of Esse According to Giles of Rome." Gregorianum no. 38:103-115.

  110. Nasr, Seyyed Hossein. 1977. "Post-Avicennan Islamic Philosophy and the study of Being." International Philosophical Quarterly no. 17:265-271.

    "In this article, after a brief discussion of the position of Ibn Sina concerning the distinction between existence and essence, a survey is made of the views of later Islamic thinkers of various schools including "Kalam", "Ishraqi" theosophy and theoretical sufism of the school of Ibn Arabi concerning ontology. The study culminates with Mulla Sadra who brought the discussion of being among Muslim thinkers to full fruition. After this chronological survey, the distinction between the study of being in later Schools of Islamic thought and those of the West is made clear and it is shown how despite a similar background, Islamic and Western thought part ways on this basic issue. Later Islamic students of ontology emphasized that the subject of philosophy is the study of the act of existence, the "actus essendi", while Western thought became ever more concerned with the existent or "ens". In conclusion the relation between the theoretical study of being and practical and operative spiritual methods for the realization of being in the Islamic world is indicated." (p. 265)

  111. Nogales, Gómez Salvador. 1972. "The Meaning of Being in Aristotle." International Philosophical Quarterly no. 12:317-339.

    "In order to deal with the complex concept of being, Aristotle distinguished between synonyms and homonyms, and these two categories were further subdivided. Things with nothing in common possess being and in every being there is something identical. We recognize matter and being only by analogy. Accident is a dimension of being but is not an entity in itself."

  112. O'Farrell, Frank. 1982. "Aristotle's Categories of Being." Gregorianum no. 63:87-131.

  113. O'Meara, Dominic. 1976. "Being in Numenius and Plotinus: Some Points of Comparison." Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy no. 21:120-129.

    Reprinted in: D. O' Meara, The Structure of Being and the Search for the Good. Essays on Ancient and Early Medieval Platonism, Aldershot: Asgate Variorum, 1998, Essay V.

  114. Owens, Joseph. 1978. The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics: A Study in the Greek Background of Mediaeval Thought. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies.

    Third revised edition (First edition 1951).

  115. Paprzycka, Katarzyna. 1993. "Carnap and Leibniz on the Problem of Being." In Possible Ontologies, edited by Augustynek, Zdzislaw and Jadacki, Jacek Juliusz, 163-177. Rodopi: Amsterdam.

    "The title of the present paper appears provocative as it brings together one of the most prominent fighters of metaphysics, R. Carnap, a famous metaphysician and a very difficult metaphysical problem. In fact, Leibniz, whose stance on that very issue we have chosen to relate to that of Carnap's, has not written about the problem of being explicitly either. We will thus ask the reader for some patience as we will try to demonstrate that they both do so implicitly.

    Our task is perhaps even more complex with respect to Carnap for aside of being an extraordinarily consistent and systematic thinker, he has also been very self-conscious methodologically. It is remarkable that the system of Aufbau, to which we will restrict our attention, was supposed to be a mere illustration of some methodological principles developed in the so-called construction theory. Accordingly, almost none of the moves in his system lacks a justification. As a result, there are not too many degrees of interpreter's freedom." (p. 163)

  116. Pelletier, Francis. 1990. Parmenides, Plato and the Semantics of Not-Being. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

  117. Perl, Eric D. 2014. Thinking Being: Introduction to Metaphysics in the Classical Tradition. Vol. Brill: Leiden.

  118. Perreiah, Alan. 1968. "De Conceptu Entis: A Reconsideration." The Modern Schoolman no. 46:50-56.

  119. Pini, Giorgio. 2001. "Being and Creation in Giles of Rome." In Nach der Verurteilung von 1277 / After the Condemnation of 1277, edited by Aertsen, Jan A., Emery, Kent and Speer, Andreas. Berlin: de Gruyter.

    Philosophie und Theologie an der Universität von Paris im letzten Viertel des 13. Jahrhunderts. Studien und Texte / Philosophy and Theology at the University of Paris in the Last Quarter of the Thirteenth Century. Studies and Texts.

  120. ———. 2005. "Univocity in Scotus’s Quaestiones super Metaphysicam: The Solution to a Riddle." Medioevo. Rivista di storia della filosofia medioevale no. 30:69-110.

  121. Priest, Stephen. 1999. "Husserl's Concept of Being: From Phenomenology to Metaphysics." Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement no. 44:209-222.

  122. Principe, Walter H. 1967. Alexander of Hales' Theology of the Hypostatic Union. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies.

    Chapter I. The Philosophical Background (pp. 21-72), in particular § 2. Ens, Esse, and Existere (pp. 23-42).

  123. Prior, William. 1980. "Plato's Analysis of Being and Not-Being in the Sophist." Southern Journal of Philosophy no. 18:199-211.

    "In this paper I argue that Plato does not, as most scholars believe, distinguish different senses or uses of the verb 'to be' in the "Sophist". He succeeds in differentiating existential statements from statements of identity and predications, but with the aid of a verb 'to be' which he takes to be univocal and to be equivalent to 'to participate in'. I offer an analysis of "Sophist" 251a-257c, and focus in particular on 255e-256e. This passage displays numerous parallels with the middle dialogues, and it is misleading to treat it as indicative of a change in Plato's metaphysics."

  124. Przezdziecki, Joseph J. 1959. "Thomas of Sutton's Critique on the Doctrine of Univocity." In An Etienne Gilson Tribute, edited by O'Neil, Charles J., 189-208. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press.

  125. Reding, Jean-Paul. 2004. "'To Be' in Greece and China." In Comparative Essays in Early Greek and Chinese Rational Thinking, 167-194. Aldershot: Ashgate.

  126. Salis, Rita. 2012. "The Notion of Being as Act in Neoplatonism and its Transmission in the Translatio Studiorum." In Translatio Studiorum: Ancient, Medieval and Modern Bearers of Intellectual History, edited by Sgarbi, Marco, 51-63. Leiden: Brill.

  127. Schiappa, Edward. 1997. "Interpreting Gorgias's 'Being' in "On Not-Being or On Nature"." Philosophy & Rhetoric no. 30:13-30.

  128. Schmitt, Gerhard. 1977. The Concept of Being in Hegel and Heidegger. Bonn: Bouvier Verlag Herbert Grundmann.

  129. Schnädelbach, Herbert. 1984. "Being." In Philosophy in Germany 1831-1933, 192-218. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    "If, in what follows under the general title of 'Being', we are to give an outline of the rebirth of metaphysics as ontology, we cannot avoid giving an account in detail of the various ontological projects of that time. What is to be clarified can be described as a rehabilitation of the 'problem of being' as a genuinely philosophical problem. This 'problem of being' must obviously be posed in such a way that it cannot be solved by any of the procedures of the empirical sciences; otherwise, any philosophical theory of being would be superfluous. On the other hand, the 'problem of being' should also not be reducible to the problem of knowledge, as the whole of Criticism had taught, since then the attempt to break out of the epistemological ghetto would fail. A third general condition, accepted by all the new ontologists, is that modern ontology should not proceed in a dogmatic fashion in Kant's sense; this also rules out simple reference back to pre-Kantian traditions. The rehabilitation of philosophy as theory of knowledge also remains decisive for the new ontology, to the extent that it regards an epistemological self-justification as absolutely indispensable. The priority of the question of being over that of knowledge, which is the general characteristic of the new ontology, should itself he seen as the result of epistemological reflection: since the time of Lotze, the argument that the subject is him: self an existent and the knowledge-relation a relation of, being had played a central role in that connexion. In Hegel's words, the new ontology saw itself as an immanent critique of epistemology, not as its simple opposite. The success of this critique was then felt as the great liberation 'to things themselves'." (pp. 194-195)

  130. Seigfried, Hans. 1972. "Kant's Thesis about Being Anticipated by Suarez?" In Proceedings of the Third International Kant Congress, edited by Beck, Leslie, 510-520. Dordrecht: Reidel.

  131. Shien, Gi-Ming. 1951. "Being and Nothingness in Greek and Ancient Chinese Philosophy." Philosophy East and West no. 1:16-24.

  132. Sprung, Mervyn, ed. 1978. The Question of Being. East-West Perspectives. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.

    Each chapter in this book (except the first) originated at a symposium arranged by the philosophy department of Brock University, St. Catherines, Ontario.

    Contents: Mervyn Sprung: The Question of Being as comparative philosophy 1; Some Western Perspectives: Joseph Owens: Being in early Western tradition 17; Charles H. Kahn: Linguistic relativism and the Greek project of ontology 31; Hans Georg Gadamer: Plato and Heidegger 45; Zygmunt Adamczewski: Questions in Heidegger's thought about Being 55; Robert C. Schaff: Heidegger's path of thinking and the Way of Meditation in the early Upanisads 67; Some eastern perspectives: Wilhelm Halbfass: On Being and What There Is: Indian perspectives on the Question of Being 95; J. G. Arapura: Some special characteristics of Sat (Being) in Advaita Vedanta 111; Mervyn Sprung: Being and the Middle Way 127; Jitendra Nath Mohanty: Some aspects of Indian thinking on Being 141; Index 159-161.

  133. Studtmann, Paul. 2007. "Aristotle, Science and the Plenitude of Being." Apeiron no. 40:245-266.

  134. Theron, Stephen. 1979. "ESSE." The New Scholasticism no. 53:206-220.

  135. Thom, Paul. 2002. "The pervasiveness of Being." In Presocratic Philosophy. Essays in Honour of Alexander Mourelatos, edited by Caston, Victor and Graham, Daniel W., 293-302. Aldershot: Ashgate.

    "The pervasiveness of Being is the doctrine that everything is. This doctrine would he false if something was not. That being is pervasive is not a trivial claim. An ontology might he motivated by the desire to quantify over non-beings in such a way that we can say that something is a flying man without implying that some being is a flying man. If such a distinction is allowed, then it might be thought that something is not, even though no being is not. Pervasiveness then would be true for beings but not for 'somethings.'

    This chapter explores the different positions that philosophers from Parmenides to Aristotle take on the question of the pervasiveness of Being, and traces some of the relations linking those positions to one another." (p. 293)

  136. Tomarchio, John. 2001. "Aquinas's Division of Being According to Modes of Existing." The Review of Metaphysics no. 54:585-613.

  137. Twtten, David B. 2007. "Really Distinguishing Essence from Esse." In Wisdom's Apprentice. Thomistic Essays in Honor o/ L. Dewan O. P., edited by Kwasniewski, Peter A., 85-106. Washington, D. C.: The Catholic University of America Press.

  138. Ventimiglia, Giovanni. 2018. "Aguinas on Being: One, Two or Three Senses of Being?" Quaestio. Journal of the History of Metaphysics no. 18:509-538.

    Abstract: "In this article I point out that rather than two, as is commonly thought, or indeed one, which is an old idea recently revived by some scholars, Aquinas in fact presents three main senses of being: (A1) being as actus essendi or esse or ‘present actuality’; (A2) being as (real) form or essence; (B) being as the reply to the an sit? (is there...?) question or anitas or ‘there is’ sense. Regarding the relations among these three senses of being I show that: (i) the same logical treatment holds for the form (B) and (A2), since both can and need to be re-written in the form: something is so-and-so (whereas the same process cannot be applied to the A1 sense of being); (ii) the relation between the A1 and A2 senses of being is not a mere relation between distinct elements, but rather a relation among different stages of a single process, namely that between first and second actuality; (iii) the relation between the A (1 and 2) and B senses of being seems to be one of grounding, since the ‘there is’ sense seems to Aquinas to be grounded on the present actuality sense of being as an effect to its cause."

  139. Wilhelmsen, Frederick D. 2016. Being and Knowing: Reflections of a Thomist. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers.

  140. Wippel, John F. 2000. The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas: From Finite Being to Uncreated Being. Washington, D. C.: The Catholic University of America Press.

  141. ———. 2012. "Being." In The Oxford Handbook of Aquinas, edited by Davies, Brian and Stump, Eleonore, 77-84. New York: Oxford University Press.

    "According to Aquinas the word “being” ( ens ) signifies “that which is” or “that which exists.” This complexity within the notion of being implies that one does not grasp it by the process of abstraction alone—the intellect’s first operation whereby it understands what something is without affirming or denying anything of it. While he acknowledges that this intellectual operation suffices for one to grasp the quidditative aspect of being (“that which”), Aquinas appeals to the intellect’s second operation

    (whereby one affirms or denies by composing or dividing), often referred to as judgment, to account for one’s grasp of the existential aspect of being and thus to complete one’s understanding of being as that which is. As he explains, while the intellect’s first operation is directed to the nature (essence) of a thing, its second operation is directed to a thing’s existence ( esse )." (p. 77, notes omitted)

  142. Yu, Jiyuan. 1999. "The Language of Being: Between Aristotle and Chinese Philosophy." International Philosophical Quarterly no. 39:439-454.