But it does. Existence is genus, existents are species.
Leaving your construction aside for the moment, existence does not itself have a genus of which it is a species.
Leaving your construction aside for the moment, existence does not itself have a genus of which it is a species.
Not according to Ayn Rand.
“A definition is a statement that identifies the nature of the units subsumed under a concept…Just as a concept becomes a unit when integrated with others into a wider concept, so a genus becomes a single unit, a species, when integrated with others into a wider genus. For instance, “table” is a species of the genus “furniture,” which is a species of the genus “household goods,” which is a species of the genus “man-made objects.” “Man” is a species of the genus “animal,” which is a species of the genus “organism,” which is a species of the genus “entity.””
(“Definitions,” Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 42)
Definition of existence is “every entity, attribute, action, event or phenomenon (including consciousness) that exists, has ever existed or will ever exist.” ( ITOE 56)
Existence therefore is a widest abstraction, a genus which designates as its species every single entity and concept The nature of the units which this genus identifies is that they all existents.
Every concept has an open ended number of referents, including “existent”. Every concept refers to the known and the unknown, the present, past and future instances, the perceived and the not-yet-perceived and never-to-be-perceived. That open-endedness is part of what it means to be a concept. “Existent” is not formed by a method that differs from the method used in forming first level concepts such as “table” or “dog”. That some of the referents of “table” are remote in distance or time and so never-to-be-perceived does not make “table” a high level concept. Furthermore, the way in which the concept “existent” refers to other concepts as mental existents is not the same logical relationship that obtains between a concept and a lower level concept it abstracts from such as “furniture” and “table”.
There is some ambiguity in interpreting the meaning of “highly abstract” concepts. The same two percepts can be the basis for forming the first level concept of “dog” or “existent” but “existent” is the more abstract concept because more is omitted in the measurement-omission process. It is also the case that an abstraction from an abstraction such as “justice” or “mother-in-law” is necessarily more abstract than its constituents, or in other words higher level concepts are more abstract than the lower level concepts and percepts that constitute their referents. These two senses of the word abstract are distinct so the danger of committing equivocation exists. “Existence” is highly abstract, yet it remains first level and not abstract at all.
I add that existent is an axiomatic concept.
Existence and existent are both irreducible primaries, both necessarily implicit in any attempt to deny them, and both ostensively defined. Rand is very insistent that “existence” is an axiomatic concept, and if existence collectively exists then it must be true that at least one existent exists.
Basically I agree with your position. However there is a difference between concept of “existent” and " existence". “Existent” designates a certain unit of existence- one may refer to dog or to mother-in law as " existent" Existence, however designates all these units.
Not according to Ayn Rand.
“A definition is a statement that identifies the nature of the units subsumed under a concept…Just as a concept becomes a unit when integrated with others into a wider concept, so a genus becomes a single unit, a species, when integrated with others into a wider genus. For instance, “table” is a species of the genus “furniture,” which is a species of the genus “household goods,” which is a species of the genus “man-made objects.” “Man” is a species of the genus “animal,” which is a species of the genus “organism,” which is a species of the genus “entity.””
(“Definitions,” Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 42)
Definition of existence is “every entity, attribute, action, event or phenomenon (including consciousness) that exists, has ever existed or will ever exist.” ( ITOE 56)
Existence therefore is a widest abstraction, a genus which designates as its species every single entity and concept The nature of the units which this genus identifies is that they all existents.
Do you realize you just restated that existence has species? I’m saying existence is NOT a species of any genus because it is the widest abstraction. And the above in your post is not a definition as such as you can only ostensivley define it .
Actually the last line of his quote asserts that existence is a genus. The implication is that it cannot be a species of some higher-order genus, which is what you have been saying all along. In other words, his quote undermines his argument.
In any sort of hierarchy, be it conceptual or not, there is an uppermost element, with other elements below it branching out, like an upside down tree. (That uppermost element is sometimes called the “root” of the tree even though it’s drawn at the top, because the hierarchy looks like an upside-down tree.) Talking about genus and species is simply a specific way (specific to the hierarchy of concepts) of stating that every element in the tree has an element immediately higher than it. Which isn’t actually true; unless the tree is of infinite extent there will be at least one exception, the root or topmost element.
So what? Is this really a problem? I don’t think so.
Ayn Rand realized that “existence” is a special case because it is at the top of the tree, that’s why existence is an axiomatic concept; you can’t define it as being a species of some higher genus. She was far more interested in making the point about every single OTHER concept that they were a species of a genus, and were oftentimes (but not always) a genus to some other concepts’ species.
Steve said:
“So what? Is this really a problem? I don’t think so.”
Neither do I. I was pointing at the similarity of earlier postings with the criticism that it is a problem.
Do you realize you just restated that existence has species? I’m saying existence is NOT a species of any genus because it is the widest abstraction. And the above in your post is not a definition as such as you can only ostensivley define it .
You said “existence does not itself have a genus of which it is a species.” and it is true. Existence itself is a final genus which species are all possible existents. Existence is a genus-stopper preventing infinite regress of existences which would be contradiction in terms. But that doesn’t mean existence is undefinable. It could be defined in terms of its existents, but it couldn’t be reduced to them.Since Existence is a broadest concept, it also couldn’t be defined ostensibly because it includes all other concepts. What I quoted is the only possible definition of existence.
it also couldn’t be defined ostensibly because it includes all other concepts. .
Are you suggesting that a proper definition (ostensibly or otherwise) must be exhaustive?
Basically I agree with your position. However there is a difference between concept of “existent” and " existence". “Existent” designates a certain unit of existence- one may refer to dog or to mother-in law as " existent" Existence, however designates all these units.
I agree with that.
I wondered why it is that Rand used the collective noun existence as the axiomatic concept instead of the singular existent. At my first thought it was mere stylistic flourish, the semi-poetic form of “Existence exists” and “A is A” being justification enough for Rand as a writer with style but this is not correct. Concept formation according to her theory requires at least two units, so the existence of multiple units is a prerequisite for conceptual consciousness to exist. So we have both “a consciousness conscious of nothing is not consciousness” and “a consciousness conscious of only one thing is not a conceptual consciousness”. The fact of existence as a state or condition is axiomatic, but so equally is the plurality of existents.
Multiplicity is ontologically necessary to me.
I agree with that.
I wondered why it is that Rand used the collective noun existence as the axiomatic concept instead of the singular existent. At my first thought it was mere stylistic flourish, the semi-poetic form of “Existence exists” and “A is A” being justification enough for Rand as a writer with style but this is not correct. Concept formation according to her theory requires at least two units, so the existence of multiple units is a prerequisite for conceptual consciousness to exist. So we have both “a consciousness conscious of nothing is not consciousness” and “a consciousness conscious of only one thing is not a conceptual consciousness”. The fact of existence as a state or condition is axiomatic, but so equally is the plurality of existents.
The singular noun designates the singular unit “existent”, the collective noun “existence” designates all possible existents. Concept of existence is formed by integration of two or more units of " existent" and omission of their measurement, that is-their numbers. Consciousness is a faculty of the certain living entities. The concept of consciousness is formed by the same way. The premise of primacy of existence you refer to is based on the very nature of consciousness which is a faculty of perceiving that which exists. Therefore the concept of consciousness divorced from the concept of existence is meaningless, floating abstraction.. Without existence what one should be conscious of ? Some people would response-of itself. Ayn Rand would argue that this is quite impossible-consciousness which conscious primary of itself is contradiction in terms. The concepts of existence and consciousness are axiomatic, the concept of existent, as a singular unit is self-evident, which is not the same. Axiomatic is a term of logic and means an irreducible proposition which cannot be proved by means of analysis because all means of proof depend on this proposition. For example the proposition of validity of senses is axiomatic-in order to refute it one has to accept it. As a result of this axiomatic status all percepts are self-evident. Existence implied in every percept-one can perceive only that what exists, therefore the concept of existent could be proved by reduction to percepts. The concept of existence is irreducible since it pertains to everything which exist, including mental content, all other concepts, entities which never been and maybe never will be directly observable -like electrons, principles, high abstractions etc…