On Non-Existence
E359021
On Non-Existence is a lost sophistic treatise, attributed to the ancient Greek philosopher Gorgias, that famously argues in paradoxical fashion that nothing exists, that if anything did exist it would be unknowable, and that if it were knowable it could not be communicated.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| On Non-Being | 1 |
| On Non-Existence canonical | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T3464045 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: On Non-Existence Context triple: [Gorgias, notableWork, On Non-Existence]
-
A.
A Paradox of Existence
"A Paradox of Existence" is a philosophical work by Stephen Yablo that explores self-reference, existence, and paradoxes in metaphysics and logic.
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B.
Nihil Sine Deo
Nihil Sine Deo is a Latin motto meaning “Nothing without God,” historically associated with the House of Hohenzollern and later adopted as Romania’s national motto.
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C.
“On What There Is”
“On What There Is” is a seminal philosophical essay by W.V.O. Quine that challenges traditional notions of ontology and argues for a criterion of ontological commitment based on the quantificational structure of our best scientific theories.
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D.
An Inquiry into Modes of Existence
An Inquiry into Modes of Existence is a philosophical work by Bruno Latour that proposes a pluralistic ontology to account for the diverse ways beings exist and gain legitimacy in modern societies.
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E.
On Contradiction
"On Contradiction" is a 1937 philosophical essay by Mao Zedong that systematically applies and develops Marxist dialectical materialism to analyze the nature and role of contradictions in social and historical processes.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: On Non-Existence Target entity description: On Non-Existence is a lost sophistic treatise, attributed to the ancient Greek philosopher Gorgias, that famously argues in paradoxical fashion that nothing exists, that if anything did exist it would be unknowable, and that if it were knowable it could not be communicated.
-
A.
A Paradox of Existence
"A Paradox of Existence" is a philosophical work by Stephen Yablo that explores self-reference, existence, and paradoxes in metaphysics and logic.
-
B.
Nihil Sine Deo
Nihil Sine Deo is a Latin motto meaning “Nothing without God,” historically associated with the House of Hohenzollern and later adopted as Romania’s national motto.
-
C.
“On What There Is”
“On What There Is” is a seminal philosophical essay by W.V.O. Quine that challenges traditional notions of ontology and argues for a criterion of ontological commitment based on the quantificational structure of our best scientific theories.
-
D.
An Inquiry into Modes of Existence
An Inquiry into Modes of Existence is a philosophical work by Bruno Latour that proposes a pluralistic ontology to account for the diverse ways beings exist and gain legitimacy in modern societies.
-
E.
On Contradiction
"On Contradiction" is a 1937 philosophical essay by Mao Zedong that systematically applies and develops Marxist dialectical materialism to analyze the nature and role of contradictions in social and historical processes.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (44)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
ancient Greek work
ⓘ
lost philosophical treatise ⓘ sophistic treatise ⓘ |
| aimsAt |
demonstrating the power of rhetoric
ⓘ
undermining common assumptions about being ⓘ |
| argumentStyle |
eristic
ⓘ
paradoxical ⓘ rhetorical ⓘ |
| associatedWithCity | Leontini ⓘ |
| attributedDate | classical period of ancient Greece ⓘ |
| authorAttributedTo |
Gorgias
ⓘ
Gorgias of Leontini ⓘ
linked to:
Gorgias
|
| circulation | ancient Greek intellectual circles ⓘ |
| contrastsWith | Parmenidean ontology ⓘ |
| culturalContext | classical Greek sophistic movement ⓘ |
| genre | philosophical prose ⓘ |
| historicalPeriod | 5th century BCE ⓘ |
| influenceOn |
ancient skepticism
ⓘ
later discussions of nihilism ⓘ |
| knownThrough |
later doxographical accounts
ⓘ
secondary reports ⓘ testimonia in ancient authors ⓘ |
| logicalForm | trilemma about being, knowing, and saying ⓘ |
| mainClaim |
if anything did exist it would be unknowable
ⓘ
if anything were knowable it could not be communicated ⓘ nothing exists ⓘ |
| originalLanguage | Ancient Greek ⓘ |
| philosophicalIssue |
communication
ⓘ
existence ⓘ knowledge ⓘ |
| philosophicalPositionType |
radical skepticism about existence
ⓘ
skepticism about communication ⓘ skepticism about knowledge ⓘ |
| philosophicalTradition |
Sophism
ⓘ
ancient Greek philosophy ⓘ |
| relatedTo |
Gorgias
ⓘ
Parmenides ⓘ Sophists ⓘ |
| subjectMatter |
epistemology
ⓘ
metaphysics ⓘ philosophy of language ⓘ skepticism ⓘ |
| textualState | survives only in fragments and reports ⓘ |
| workStatus | lost ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: On Non-Existence Description of subject: On Non-Existence is a lost sophistic treatise, attributed to the ancient Greek philosopher Gorgias, that famously argues in paradoxical fashion that nothing exists, that if anything did exist it would be unknowable, and that if it were knowable it could not be communicated.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
linked to: On Non-Existence