A New Essay On The Status Of "to Exist" As A Predicate

The question of "existence" has been in the center of the ontology theory.It mainly involves two questions.The first one involves: what is "existence" ? Is it a predicate? Is it the nature of the individual? If it is the nature of the individual,do some individuals lack this nature? The other question involves: what exists? Is therea possible world? Dologically contradictory things exist? What things can we study?These questions are the contents of "existence" in the logical philosophy.The author wishesto elaborate on the first question,that is,"what is the existence?" and "Is existence a predicate?".The paper sorted out,summarized and analyzed domestic and foreign research results,found out the advantages and disadvantages of the three main thoughts,and tried to modify and complete the unsolved problems in order to put forward tentative solutions.The paper discussed and analyzed “existence” at great length in the background of analytical philosophy.On the question of "what is existence",the paper presented three views about "what isexistence? Is it a predicate? Is it the nature of the individual?" : based on the first-order logic of Frege and Russell,it denied the view point that "Existence is a predicate." and supported that Existenceis not a logical predicate,but a quantifier.In addition,with elaborate natural language analysis,D.F.Pears and P.F.Strawson suggested that "existence" expressed individual attributes in particular situations,thus a special predicate.Free logicians gave a positive answer from the viewpoint of free logic,and simply acknowledged that "existence" was a predicate.In the answer to the question of "what is existence",Quine's standard ontology commitment standard tactfully revealed the linguistic essence of the problem.If Frege resolved the former problem,Quine had succeeded in answering the latter question.From the viewpoint of "existence",this paper first elaborated on the theoretical origin,formation process,research status,conceptual substance and logical status of "existence".The second chapter mainly discussed the idea that "existence" is not a predicate,which mainly includes the analysis of Frege,Russell and Quineincluding Frege's theory of propositional function.It also discussed the formation,development classification,characteristics,theoretical advantages and existing problems of Russell's description theoryand tentatively put forward improvement schemes including Strawson's criticism on Russell's description theory;The ontological commitment theory of Quine's "existence" as the value of restricting the value of the item was described in great details.In the third chapter,the author organized and criticized the idea of "existence" as a predicate.In the first place,Moore and Ryle,proved that "existence" is not a predicate from the formal language.Then,the paper criticized the theory of "Existence as a Cross-border predicate" of Pears and the problems of this theory were described and analyzedStrawson's thought of "default class" in details.The author holds that Strawson's thought of "default class" is the natural language introduction of Russell's description theory,and did not confirm the idea that "existence" is a cross-border predicate.Meanwhile,the paper analyzed a famous domestic logic scholar DuoGuoping's idea that "existence" is a cross-border predicate,pointed out its debatable issues in the conclusion,and analyzed theproblems of "logical contradiction term ".At the end of this chapter,the author elaboratedon the theory of "existence" in the free logic,the core principle of the free logic,and the problems of the free logic.In the conclusion,this paper summed up the three main points of "existence",and concluded that "existence" is not a predicate but the conclusion of quantifiers.