Entity

An entity is something that exists as itself. It does not need to be of material existence. In particular, abstractions and legal fictions are usually regarded as entities. In general, there is also no presumption that an entity is animate, or present. The verb tense of this form is to 'entitize' - meaning to convert into an entity; to perceive as tangible or alive.[1]

The term is broad in scope and may refer to animals; natural features such as mountains; inanimate objects such as tables; numbers or sets as symbols written on a paper; human contrivances such as laws, corporations and academic disciplines; or supernatural beings such as gods and spirits.

The adjectival form is entitative.

## Contents

* 1 Etymology
* 2 In philosophy
* 3 In law, politics, economics, accounting
* 4 In medicine
* 5 In computer science
* 6 See also
* 7 References
* 8 External links

## Etymology

The word entity is derived from the Latin entitas, which in turn derives from the Latin ens meaning "being" or "existing" (compare English essence). Entity may hence literally be taken to mean "thing which exists".

## In philosophy

Ontology is the study of concepts of existence, and of recognition of entities. The words ontic and entity are derived respectively from the ancient Greek and Latin present participles that mean "being".

> In an ontic inquiry... one asks about the properties or the physical relations and structures peculiar to some entity – in the pen's case, for example, we might make the following ontic observations about it: it is black, full of blue ink, and sitting on top of my desk.[2]

## In law, politics, economics, accounting

In law, a legal entity is an entity that is capable of bearing legal rights and obligations, such as a natural person or an artificial person (e.g. business entity or a corporate entity).

In politics, entity is used as term for territorial divisions of some countries (e.g. Bosnia and Herzegovina).

In economics, economic entity is one of the assumptions made in generally accepted accounting principles. Almost any type of organization or unit in society can be an economic entity.

In accounting, the entity concept is the concept that a business or an organization and its owners are treated as two separate parties.

## In medicine

In medicine, a disease entity is an illness due to a particular definite cause or to a specific pathological process. While a disease entity is not defined by a syndrome, it may or may not be manifest in one or more particular syndromes.

## In computer science

Further information: Entity–relationship model and Entity–control–boundary

In computer science, an entity is an object that has an identity, which is independent of the changes of its attributes. It represents long-lived information relevant for the users and is usually stored in a database.

## See also

* Digital identity
* Elementary entity
* Entity–relationship model
* Entity–control–boundary
* Entity realism, a form of scientific realism
* Entitativity
* Everything
* Html entity
* Non-physical entity
* Object
* Circular reference

## References

1. ↑ Entitize on Wiktionary
2. ↑ Hubert L. Dreyfus, Mark A. Wrathall, eds., A Companion to Heidegger (2008), p. 3.

## External links

* v
* t
* e

Metaphysics

Metaphysicians|

* Parmenides
* Plato
* Aristotle
* Plotinus
* Duns Scotus
* Thomas Aquinas
* Francisco Suárez
* Nicolas Malebranche
* René Descartes
* John Locke
* David Hume
* Thomas Reid
* Immanuel Kant
* Isaac Newton
* Arthur Schopenhauer
* Baruch Spinoza
* Georg W. F. Hegel
* George Berkeley
* Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
* Henri Bergson
* Friedrich Nietzsche
* Charles Sanders Peirce
* Joseph Maréchal
* Ludwig Wittgenstein
* Martin Heidegger
* Alfred N. Whitehead
* Bertrand Russell
* Dorothy Emmet
* G. E. Moore
* Jean-Paul Sartre
* Gilbert Ryle
* Hilary Putnam
* P. F. Strawson
* R. G. Collingwood
* Adolph Stöhr
* Rudolf Carnap
* Saul Kripke
* Willard V. O. Quine
* G. E. M. Anscombe
* Donald Davidson
* Michael Dummett
* David Malet Armstrong
* David Lewis
* Alvin Plantinga
* Peter van Inwagen
* Derek Parfit
* more ...

Theories|

* Abstract object theory
* Action theory
* Anti-realism
* Determinism
* Dualism
* Enactivism
* Essentialism
* Existentialism
* Free will
* Idealism
* Libertarianism
* Liberty
* Materialism
* Meaning of life
* Monism
* Naturalism
* Nihilism
* Phenomenalism
* Realism
* Physicalism
* Pirsig's Metaphysics of Quality
* Platonic idealism
* Relativism
* Scientific realism
* Solipsism
* Subjectivism
* Substance theory
* Truthmaker theory
* Type theory

Concepts|

* Abstract object
* Anima mundi
* Being
* Category of being
* Causality
* Causal closure
* Choice
* Cogito, ergo sum
* Concept
* Embodied cognition
* Essence
* Existence
* Experience
* Hypostatic abstraction
* Idea
* Identity
* Information
* Insight
* Intelligence
* Intention
* Linguistic modality
* Matter
* Meaning
* Memetics
* Mental representation
* Mind
* Motion
* Nature
* Necessity
* Notion
* Object
* Pattern
* Perception
* Physical object
* Principle
* Property
* Qualia
* Quality
* Reality
* Soul
* Subject
* Substantial form
* Thought
* Time
* Truth
* Type–token distinction
* Universal
* Unobservable
* Value
* more ...

Related topics|

* Axiology
* Cosmology
* Epistemology
* Feminist metaphysics
* Interpretations of quantum mechanics
* Mereology
* Meta-
* Ontology
* Philosophy of mind
* Philosophy of psychology
* Philosophy of self
* Philosophy of space and time
* Teleology
* Theoretical physics

* Category

* v
* t
* e

Philosophy of language

Index of language articles

Philosophers|

* Plato (Cratylus)
* Gorgias
* Confucius
* Xunzi
* Aristotle
* Stoics
* Pyrrhonists
* Scholasticism
* Ibn Rushd
* Ibn Khaldun
* Thomas Hobbes
* Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
* Johann Herder
* Ludwig Noiré
* Wilhelm von Humboldt
* Fritz Mauthner
* Paul Ricœur
* Ferdinand de Saussure
* Gottlob Frege
* Franz Boas
* Paul Tillich
* Edward Sapir
* Leonard Bloomfield
* Zhuangzi
* Henri Bergson
* Lev Vygotsky
* Ludwig Wittgenstein
* Philosophical Investigations
* Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
* Bertrand Russell
* Rudolf Carnap
* Jacques Derrida
* Of Grammatology
* Limited Inc
* Benjamin Lee Whorf
* Gustav Bergmann
* J. L. Austin
* Noam Chomsky
* Hans-Georg Gadamer
* Saul Kripke
* A. J. Ayer
* G. E. M. Anscombe
* Jaakko Hintikka
* Michael Dummett
* Donald Davidson
* Roger Gibson
* Paul Grice
* Gilbert Ryle
* P. F. Strawson
* Willard Van Orman Quine
* Hilary Putnam
* David Lewis
* John Searle
* Joxe Azurmendi
* Scott Soames
* Stephen Yablo
* John Hawthorne
* Stephen Neale
* Paul Watzlawick

Theories|

* Causal theory of reference
* Contrast theory of meaning
* Contrastivism
* Conventionalism
* Cratylism
* Deconstruction
* Descriptivism
* Direct reference theory
* Dramatism
* Expressivism
* Linguistic determinism
* Mediated reference theory
* Nominalism
* Non-cognitivism
* Phallogocentrism
* Relevance theory
* Semantic externalism
* Semantic holism
* Structuralism
* Supposition theory
* Symbiosism
* Theological noncognitivism
* Theory of descriptions (Definite description)
* Unilalianism
* Verification theory

Concepts|

* Ambiguity
* Cant
* Linguistic relativity
* Meaning
* Language
* Truth-bearer
* Proposition
* Use–mention distinction
* Concept
* Categories
* Set
* Class
* Family resemblance
* Intension
* Logical form
* Metalanguage
* Mental representation
* Presupposition
* Principle of compositionality
* Property
* Sign
* Sense and reference
* Speech act
* Symbol
* Entity
* Sentence
* Statement
* more...

Related articles|

* Analytic philosophy
* Philosophy of information
* Philosophical logic
* Linguistics
* Pragmatics
* Rhetoric
* Semantics
* Formal semantics
* Semiotics

* Category
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* Discussion

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