Traditional metaphysical thought focuses on either the being (the universe – be it incipient or fully realized - of stable forms or structures that are relatively exterior to the human) or, less frequently, on the becoming (change in the universe of forms and structures). Modern metaphysics deals mostly with the problem of subjectivity (“pure” thought, thought thinking itself), and a part of post-Kantian metaphysics is mainly concerned with the concept of inter-subjectivity (language). The author believes that a more appropriate attitude would be to place all these concepts in a co-original relation and investigate how being and becoming leave their specific traces upon thought and language, on the one hand, and how the latter recreates the former and re-configure them from their own perspective, on the other hand.
The work has received the “Vasile Conta” Prize of the Romanian Academy, the highest Romanian distinction in the field of philosophy. It represents one of the books of high interest for students in philosophy, being accessible to a larger readership as well.
Vasile Frăteanu, Ph.D. was Professor of Ontology and Metaphysics at “Babeş-Bolyai” University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. He was Director of the Department of Philosophy (2000–2002) and Head of the Systematic Philosophy Department (1999–2004) at the aforesaid University. In recent years he has been Professor Emeritus at the same university.
His most important books are: The Critique of Mythical Thinking (1980), An Essay on Subjectivity (1987, 1994, 1999), Being, Becoming, Thought and Language (1999), Treatise on Metaphysics (2002, 2006, 2014). An Essay on Subjectivity, the English version of which was published in Romania, was favorably commented upon by outstanding philosophers such as Paul Ricoeur and P.F. Strawson.
Professor Vasile Frăteanu also received the Outstanding Professional Award of the American Biographical Institute for Dedicated Achievements in the Field of Philosophy. He is listed in Leading Intellectuals of the World, third edition, the section “Genius Elite”, for Remarkable Achievements in the Field of Philosophy, American Biographical Institute, 2004.
Summary
I. “What is the Being?”; II. “Being and Becoming”; III. “Being and Nothing”; IV. “Being, Becoming, Thought, Language”; V. “The Truth, the Good, the Beautiful”; VI. “About God”; VII. “Metaphysical Knowledge”; “Instead of Conclusions”.
