> Existence :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existence
> "In common usage, existence is the world we are aware of through our senses, but
> in philosophy the word has a more specialized meaning, and is often contrasted
> with essence. Philosophers investigate questions such as "What exists?" "How do
> we know?" "To what extent are the senses a reliable guide to existence?" "What
> is the meaning, if any, of assertions of the existence of categories, ideas, and
> abstractions."
>
> The word "existence" comes from the Latin word 'existere', meaning to appear or
> emerge or stand out.
>
> The word 'exist' is certainly a grammatical predicate, but philosophers have
> long disputed whether it is also a logical predicate. Some philosophers claim
> that it predicates something, and has the same meaning as 'is real', 'has
> being', 'is found in reality', 'is in the real world' and so on. Other
> philosophers deny that existence is logically a predicate, and claim that it is
> merely what is asserted by the etymologically distinct verb 'is', and that all
> statements containing the predicate 'exists' can be reduced to statements that
> do not use this predicate. For example, 'A Four-leaved clover exists.' can be
> rephrased as 'There is a clover with four leaves.'
>
> This philosophical question is an old one, and has been discussed and argued
> over by philosophers from Aristotle, through Avicenna, Aquinas, Scotus, Hume,
> Kant, Kierkegaard and many others.
>
> In mathematical logic existence is a quantifier, the "existential quantifier",
> symbolized by ?, a backwards capital E. To symbolize "Four leaf clovers exist,"
> mathematicians would first define predicates, P(x) = "x is a clover" and Q(x) =
> "x has four leaves", and then form the well-formed formula (?x)(P(x) and Q(x))."
>
> More...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existence
> -----------------------------------------
>
> In any case : "Why there is something, rather than nothing.",
> is an interesting problem. A lot of people confabulate a lot of
> stories about that.
>
> The presence of existence is very poignant, though it seems
> to have fraudulent aspects.
>
> The place of humans in the situation is so based in hubris that
> clarity of point of view is not possible.
> --
> Frederick Martin McNeill
> Poway, California, United States of America
> mmcne...@fuzzysys.com
> ******************************************
> "I never cease being dumbfounded by the unbelievable things people believe."
> - Leo Rosten
> ******************************************