Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The state or quality of having existence: synonym: existence.
- noun The totality of all things that exist.
- noun A person.
- noun An individual form of life; an organism.
- noun An imaginary, conjectural, or supernatural creature.
- noun All the qualities constituting one that exists; the essence.
- noun One's basic or essential nature.
- conjunction Because; since. Often used with as or that.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A living; livelihood; means of subsistence; home.
- noun Existence in its most comprehensive sense, as opposed to non-existence; existence, whether real or only in thought.
- noun In metaphysics, subsistence in a state not necessarily amounting to actual existence; rudimentary existence.
- noun That which exists; anything that is: as, inanimate beings.
- noun Life; conscious existence.
- noun Lifetime; mortal existence.
- noun That which has life; a living existence, in contradistinction to what is without life; a creature.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- Existing.
- adverb Obs. or Colloq. Since; inasmuch as.
- noun Existence, as opposed to nonexistence; state or sphere of existence.
- noun That which exists in any form, whether it be material or spiritual, actual or ideal; living existence, as distinguished from a thing without life.
- noun obsolete Lifetime; mortal existence.
- noun Prov. Eng. An abode; a cottage.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb Present participle of
be . - noun A living
creature . - noun The state or fact of
existence ,consciousness , orlife , or something in such a state. - noun philosophy That which has
actuality (materially or inconcept ). - noun philosophy One's basic nature, or the qualities thereof;
essence orpersonality . - conjunction obsolete Given that;
since .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a living thing that has (or can develop) the ability to act or function independently
- noun the state or fact of existing
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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On the one hand, the word does not seem to be straightforwardly equivocal, in the sense of being subordinated to more than one concept, for we at least have the illusion of being able to grasp ˜being™ as a general term.
Medieval Theories of Analogy Ashworth, E. Jennifer 2009
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I loved the idea in the pilot where it just shows the effects of him being a badass except for the last fight, rather than him _being_ a badass.
Ephemera 2009 (2) Rogers 2009
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They use the notation [λx Ox & x 5] as the name of the concept being an object x such that x is odd and x is greater than 5 (or, more naturally, ˜being odd and greater than 5™).
Frege's Logic, Theorem, and Foundations for Arithmetic Zalta, Edward N. 2009
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I loved the idea in the pilot where it just shows the effects of him being a badass except for the last fight, rather than him _being_ a badass.
Ephemera 2009 (2) Rogers 2009
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Here Malebranche underscores another feature of God: the divine substance is not any particular being but ˜all being™ or what he elsewhere calls ˜being in general.™
Malebranche's Theory of Ideas and Vision in God Nolan, Lawrence 2008
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So the universal science of being qua being appears to founder on an equivocation: how can there be a single science of being when the very term ˜being™ is ambiguous?
Aristotle's Metaphysics Cohen, S. Marc 2008
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If you're a "stranger" to the world until being part of it and in lot's of MMO's you are - which is good because you then _feel_ like _being_ in an alternate world, then your family should be built _in_ the world.
Us Being Human 2007
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In the order of reality, however, being is not contracted to any of the ten genera, because ˜being™ does not have the same meaning when applied to every category.
Medieval Theories of the Categories Gracia, Jorge 2006
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-- A _Verb_ is a word that asserts action, being, or state of being+.
Graded Lessons in English an Elementary English Grammar Consisting of One Hundred Practical Lessons, Carefully Graded and Adapted to the Class-Room Brainerd Kellogg
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-- +A _Verb_ is a word that asserts action, being -, or state of being+.
Higher Lessons in English A work on english grammar and composition Brainerd Kellogg
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