Existence has been variously defined by sources. In common usage, it is the world one is aware or conscious of through one's senses, and that persists independently in one's absence. Other definitions describe it as everything that 'is', or more simply, everything. Some define it to be everything that most people believe in. Aristotle relates the concept to causality.
Ontology is the philosophical study of the nature of being, existence or reality in general, as well as of the basic categories of being and their relations. Traditionally listed as a part of the major branch of philosophy known as metaphysics, ontology deals with questions concerning what entities exist or can be said to exist, and how such entities can be grouped, related within a hierarchy, and subdivided according to similarities and differences. A lively debate continues about the existence of God.
Epistemology studies criteria of truth, defining "primary truths" inherently accepted in the investigation of knowledge. The first is existence. It is inherent in every analysis. Its self-evident, a priori nature cannot be consistently doubted, since a person objecting to existence according to some standard of proof must implicitly accept the standard's existence as a premise.
Materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter, that all things are composed of material, and all phenomena (including consciousness) are the result of material interactions.
Life is a characteristic that distinguishes objects that have self-sustaining biological processes from those that do not – either because such functions have ceased (death), or else because they lack such functions and are classified as "inanimate".
Read more about Existence: Etymology, Historical Conceptions, Predicative Nature, Modern Approaches, Dharmic "middle Way" View
Other articles related to "existence":
... Proponents of the existence of the Brisbane Line proposal often refer to the existence of concrete tank traps near places such as Tenterfield, which were constructed ... However the existence of defences in New South Wales did not suggest any intention of abandoning other parts of Australia ...
... See also Reincarnation research Jain philosopher-monks postulated the existence of karma as subtle and microscopic particles that cannot be perceived by senses, some two ... is not yet proven, one only needs to recall that science found proof of the existence of molecules and atoms only the 19th and 20th century ... leptons only a hundred years ago may have been dismissed, though such theories were in existence ...
150 - 250 CE) largely advanced existence concepts and founded the Madhyamaka school of Mahāyāna Buddhism ... In eastern philosophy, Anicca (Sanskrit anitya) or "impermanence" describes existence ... While the appearance and relative existence of the leaf ceases, the components that formed the leaf become particulate material that goes on to form new plants ...
... thrownness (Geworfenheit) of individual existence, which is to say we are "thrown into the world." By this, he is not only referring to a brute fact, or the factuality of a ... is something that already informs and has been taken up in existence, even if it is unnoticed or left unattended ... The thrownness of human existence (or Dasein) is accordingly disclosed through moods ...
... A condition of similar form is necessary and sufficient for the existence of a measure supported on a given interval ... Thus the existence of the measure is equivalent to (1) ...
Famous quotes containing the word existence:
“A more simple and natural man it would be hard to find. Vice and disease, which cast such a sombre moral hue over the world, seemed to have hardly any existence for him.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“This seems to be advanced as the surest basis for our belief in the existence of gods, that there is no race so uncivilized, no one in the world so barbarous that his mind has no inkling of a belief in gods.”
—Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.)
“When I think of God, when I think of him as existent, and when I believe him to be existent, my idea of him neither increases nor diminishes. But as it is certain there is a great difference betwixt the simple conception of the existence of an object, and the belief of it, and as this difference lies not in the parts or composition of the idea which we conceive; it follows, that it must lie in the manner in which we conceive it.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)