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Essay on What is Philosophy
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of ultimate reality. Metaphysics is customarily divided into ontology, which deals with the question of how many fundamentally distinct sorts of entities compose the universe, and metaphysics proper, which is concerned with describing the most general traits of reality. These general traits together define reality and would presumably characterize any universe whatever. Because these traits are not peculiar to this universe, but are common to all possible universes, metaphysics may be conducted at the highest level of abstraction. Ontology, by contrast, because it investigates the ultimate divisions within this universe, is more closely related to the physical world of human experience.
The term metaphysics is believed to have originated in Rome about 70 bc, with the Greek Peripatetic philosopher Andronicus of Rhodes (flourished 1st century bc) in his edition of the works of Aristotle. In the arrangement of Aristotle's works by
Andronicus, the treatise originally called First Philosophy, or Theology, followed the treatise Physics. Hence, the First Philosophy came to be known as meta (ta) physica, or “following (the) Physics,” later shortened to Metaphysics. The word took on the connotation, in popular usage, of matters transcending material reality. In the philosophic sense, however, particularly as opposed to the use of the word by occultists, metaphysics applies to all reality and is distinguished from other forms of inquiry by its generality.
The following are all metaphysical (or ontological) questions:
- What is reality?
- What do real things have that unreal things lack?
- Are some kinds of things (e.g., material things) more real than others (e.g., concepts)?
- Does a tree falling in the forest if no one is around make a real sound?
- Is God real?
- Is the mind a separate substance? If so, how does it relate to matter? What is matter?
- Does human freedom exist? If so, what is it?...........
