Real observers, Kant concluded, must live in a world of whatness, whereness, whenness, and becauseness, imposed by the way that a mind such as ours can grasp reality.
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Quiddity describes properties that a particular substance (e.g. a person) shares with others of its kind. The question "what (quid) is it?" asks for a general description by way of commonality. This is quiddity or "whatness" (i.e.
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In scholastic philosophy, "quiddity" (; Latin: quidditas)Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, London: Blackfriars, 1964–1976: i, quaest. 84, art. 7: "quidditas sive natura in materia corporali". was another term for the essence of an object, literally its "whatness" or "what it is".
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Aristotle was the first to use the terms hyle and morphe. According to his explanation, all entities have two aspects: "matter" and "form". It is the particular form imposed that gives some matter its identity—its quiddity or "whatness" (i.e., its "what it is").
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Even the focus of traditional ontology on the 'whatness' or quidditas of beings in their substantial, standing presence can be shifted to pose the question of the 'whoness' of human being itself.Eldred, Michael. 2008. Social Ontology: Recasting Political Philosophy Through a Phenomenology of Whoness. Frankfurt. . pp. xiv, 688.
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In the Posterior Analytics,Posterior Analytics Bk 2 c. 7 he says that the meaning of a made-up name can be known (he gives the example "goat stag") without knowing what he calls the "essential nature" of the thing that the name would denote (if there were such a thing). This led medieval logicians to distinguish between what they called the quid nominis, or the "whatness of the name", and the underlying nature common to all the things it names, which they called the quid rei, or the "whatness of the thing".. Early modern philosophers like Locke used the corresponding English terms "nominal essence" and "real essence". The name "hobbit", for example, is perfectly meaningful.
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Possibly the clearest definition for this philosophy was offered by gay/lesbian rights advocate Diana Fuss, who wrote: "Essentialism is most commonly understood as a belief in the real, true essence of things, the invariable and fixed properties which define the 'whatness' of a given entity." Metaphysical essentialism stands diametrically opposed to existential realism in that finite existence is only differentiated appearance, whereas "ultimate reality" is held to be absolute essence.
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Jesus in Contemporary Scholarship by Marcus J. Borg, Trinity Press 1994 p. 187 Bultmann argued that all that matters is the "thatness", not the "whatness" in that only that Jesus existed, preached and died by crucifixion matters, not what happened throughout his life. Bultmann was also a supporter of the study of the oral traditions that transmitted the gospels.Jesus and the Oral Gospel Tradition by Henry Wansborough, Bloomsbury T&T; Clark 2004 p.
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Bultmann is known for his belief that the historical analysis of the New Testament is both futile and unnecessary, given that the earliest Christian literature showed little interest in specific locations. Bultmann argued that all that matters is the "thatness", not the "whatness" of Jesus, i.e. only that Jesus existed, preached, and died by crucifixion matters, not what happened throughout his life. Bultmann relied on demythologization, an approach interpreting the mythological elements in the New Testament existentially.
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When "God" is predicated by active verbs, if the language were "ordinary language", the word "God" would refer to a causal agent. But, for Ramsey, the disclosure model "First Cause" does not mean that God is a causal agent. Rather, if one traces the empirical whatness of a "causal chain", the permanent mystery that such causation exists might dawn on a person, or in an image Ramsey used, "the penny drops".Anthony C. Thiselton, The Hermeneutics of Doctrine (Eerdmans, 2007). 381.
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In Thomist philosophy, the definition of a being is "that which is," which is composed of two parts: "which" refers to its quiddity (literally "whatness"), and "is" refers to its esse (the Latin infinitive verb "to be").De Ente et Essentia, 83. "And this is why substances of this sort are said by some to be composed of "that by which it is" and "that which is," or as Boethius says, of "that which is" and "existence."" "Quiddity" is synonymous with essence, form and nature; whereas "esse" refers to the principle of the being's existence.
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Haecceity may be defined in some dictionaries as simply the "essence" of a thing, or as a simple synonym for quiddity or hypokeimenon. However, the term is sometimes used differently in philosophy. Whereas haecceity refers to aspects of a thing that make it a particular thing, quiddity refers to the universal qualities of a thing, its "whatness", or the aspects of a thing it may share with other things and by which it may form part of a genus of things.Hicks, P., The Journey So Far (2003), p.
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