Abstract

It is often noted, by philosophers concerned with being, that problems arise for the articulation of being in English from the fact that the infinitive “to be” often cannot—without enormous awkwardness—be used to translate such counterpart infinitives as the Greek einai, the Latin esse, and the German Sein. Hence, to translate two distinct terms from those other languages—einai and to on, esse and ens, Sein and Seiende—English must often make do with the single term “being.” The term “being” is indeed ambiguous. As a first step toward disambiguating it—and a first step in my rearticulation of being—I introduce the technical term “be-er.” This term is comparable to such terms as “runner,” “swimmer,” “writer,” and “philosopher.” According to the structural-systematic philosophy (SSP), systematic philosophies require theories of be-ers—the SSP calls such theories “ontologies”—but they also require theories of being. Virtually throughout the history of philosophy, the status of theories of be-ers is far clearer than the status of theories of being. Philosophers disagree about which theory of be-ers is best, but it is at least relatively clear what they are disagreeing about. With theories of being, on the other hand, there is so little clarity about what a theory of being that is not a theory of be-ers could or should be that the majority of philosophers—including virtually all analytic philosophers—do not recognize developing theories of being as a genuine task for philosophy.