The Importance of Life: Argument based on the Essence and Existence Conundrum

ESSENCE AND EXISTENCE: A METAPHYSICAL INQUIRY IN THE NATURE AND REALITY OF BEING

INTRODUCTION

The question of BEING is one of the most profound and oldest question that exists in the field of Philosophy. It asks what is it for something to be? metaphysics is the discipline that is involved in dealing with this question, Being is strongly associated with Aristotle, it is the study of that which is as long as it is (Being qua being).

In so doing the study of Being incorporates the essence and existence of that which is. Essence of a thing is what a thing is (what-ness) while the existence of a thing is that it is (essse) many philosophers have dealt with the concept of essence and existence some of who are St Thomas Aquinas, Ibn Sina, Jean-Paul Satre, and contemporary scholars continue with this study.

ESSENCE AND EXISTENCE

Essence is what a thing is. Those qualities which makes this thing different from that other thing. For example, the essence of human being is rationality while the essence of a triangle is three-sided.

Classical Greek philosophers dealt with the concept of essence, Plato argues that essence resides in the forms or the ideas and that changing things do not have essence. This is based on his theory of dualism about the word of ideas and the material world. Since for Plato ideas and forms constitutes the reality, he held essence to be eternal, universal, perfect and intelligible. On the contrary Aristotle had a very different approach to essence. Since he posited that essence resides within individual things and is not tied to forms or ideas as Plato puts it....