Entity

This article is about the broad concept of an entity. For other uses, see Entity (disambiguation).

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.

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.

Definition

An entity is something that exists, such as a material object or living being. Entities are often regarded as having separate or independent existence, each with its own identity and distinct from other entities. In its broadest sense, the concept encompasses all identifiable items. This can include inanimate everyday objects, people, events, places, ideas, relations, facts, universal entities such as the color red, abstract objects such as the number 7, and collective entities such as sets. Accordingly, the concept entity is often treated as the broadest category of being, covering everything that is or could be. Some definitions provide narrower characterizations that require additional conditions, for example, that entities are stable, have clear boundaries, are indivisible, or serve as distinct objects that can be counted.

Entities contrast with nonentities, although it is controversial to what this concept applies. Suggested examples of nonentities include voids, emptiness, nothingness, and absences, such as holes or shadows. Similarly, philosophers debate whether nonexistent objects, such as the winged horse Pegasus, should be regarded as entities. Another set of challenges comes from parts or aspects of reality that are not clearly identifiable, for example because they lack exact boundaries or cannot be precisely distinguished from other entities. The terms reification and hypostatization can denote the practice of treating a nonentity as if it were an entity.

The English word entity has its roots in the Latin term ens, meaning 'being'. It gave rise to the Latin word entitas and was subsequently adopted into French as the term entité. The French word was borrowed into English in the 16th century, with the earliest known use in 1596 in a work by Thomas Bell.

Related concepts

The terms object, thing, and being are commonly used as synonyms of entity. However, they carry distinct connotations and are sometimes used differently.

An object is something toward which thought, perception, or intention is directed. In a broad sense, objects encompass all items apprehended, imagined, or referred to, including not only physical objects but also fictional ones without real counterparts, such as unicorns. In a narrower sense, the term is sometimes limited to material entities that can be perceived by the senses. A common distinction contrasts objects with subjects. It holds that while objects are grasped in consciousness, they do not possess it: an object is an it that can appear in someone's consciousness, whereas a subject is a self that acts as a center of consciousness.

Understood broadly, a thing is any item whose existence is acknowledged, including but not limited to material bodies. In this regard, the word thing is the broadest countable noun, reflecting the slogan "everything is a thing". However, the term is also used in more restricted ways to denote an individual entity in contrast to the properties it has or the relations it bears to other things. In this sense, a car is a thing, whereas its shape, color, and weight are features or aspects rather than things in their own right. In everyday discourse, the term thing is often used for inanimate objects, such as rocks or chairs, contrasting with living creatures, such as humans and other animals.

When used as a countable noun, the expression a being overlaps with that of an entity, denoting something that exists. However, being is also used as an uncountable noun, referring to the fact that something is, to existence as such, or to the totality of reality. The distinction between being and beings played a central role in the philosophy of Martin Heidegger, who termed it the ontological difference. He argued that being constitutes the background context that makes all individual beings intelligible, insisting that being is not itself an individual being. Traditionally, being is contrasted with becoming. In this sense, being denotes stable or permanent aspects of reality, whereas becoming covers changes and processes.

In philosophy

Main article: Ontology

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.

In law, politics, economics, accounting

Main articles: Legal person and Polity

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

Main article: 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 (philosophy)
• Circular reference

References

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External links

• Media related to Entities at Wikimedia Commons
• Quotations related to Entity at Wikiquote