Abstract

In this paper I propose an amendment to Chisholm's definition of individual essence. I then argue that a thing has more than one individual essence and that there is no reason to believe no one grasps anyone else's essence. The remainder of the paper is devoted to a refutation of existentialism, the view that the essence of an object X (along with propositions and states of affairs directly about x) is ontologically dependent upon x in the sense that it could not have existed if x had not existed.