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7. Skalska D.M. Philosophy: lectures. – Ivano-Frankivsk: IFNTUOG. – 2013. –
52 p.
8. Will Buckingham. The philosophy book. Big ideas simply explained. –
Dorling Kindersley Limited, 2011.– 354 p. Access mode: http://gimnazija-osma-

tbrezovackog-zg.skole.hr/upload/gimnazija-osma-tbrezovackog-
zg/newsattach/872/The_Philosophy_Book_(gnv64).pdf

Modul 2. Philosophical understanding of the world

Seminar № 8. The problem of being in philosophy
1. Features of understanding the existence in the historical and philosophical
context. Being, substance, matter.

2. Forms of the existence of matter.
3. Theories of the origin of man. The meaning of human life.
4. Structure of consciousness. Consciousness and language.

Key concepts: Ontology, Metaphysics, Being, Existence, Matter, Space-time

Basic concepts
Ontology – derived from the Greek word for being, but a 17th-century coinage
for the branch of metaphysics that concerns itself with what exists. Apart from the
ontological argument itself there have existed many a priori arguments that the world

must Page 270 contain things of one kind or another: simple things, unextended
things, eternal substances, necessary beings, and so on.
Metaphysics – originally a title for those books of Aristotle that came after the

Physics, the term is now applied to any enquiry that raises questions about reality that
lie beyond or behind those capable of being tackled by the methods of science. The
traditional examples will include questions of mind and body, substance and accident,

events, causation, and the categories of things that exist (see ontology).
Being – everything real and nothing unreal belongs to the domain of Being. But
there is little useful that can be said about everything that is real, especially from

within the philosopher's study, so it is not apparent that there can be such a subject as
Being by itself. Nevertheless the concept has a central place in philosophy from
Parmenides to Heidegger. The central question of 'why is there something and not
nothing?' prompts logical reflection on what it is for a universal to have an instance,

and a long history of attempts to explain contingent existence by reference to a
necessary ground.

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