self-existent

American  

[self-ig-zis-tuhnt, self-] / ˈsɛlf ɪgˈzɪs tənt, ˌsɛlf- /

adjective

1. existing independently of any cause, as God.

2. having an independent existence.

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self-existent British  

adjective

1. philosophy existing independently of any other being or cause

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Other Word Forms

• self-existence
  noun

Etymology

Origin of self-existent

First recorded in 1695–1705

Example Sentences

Lewis dismissed the philosophy that mind results from nature: "If any thought is valid, an eternal, self-existent Reason must exist and must be the source of my own imperfect and intermittent rationality."

From Time Magazine Archive

For one thing, every proof seems to have a plausible refutation; for another, only a committed Thomist is likely to be spiritually moved by the realization that there is a self-existent Prime Mover.

From Time Magazine Archive

Such absurdities as these we must assent to, or subscribe to the doctrine of a self-existent and providential being.

From Reason, The Only Oracle of Man Or a Compendius System of Natural Religion by Allen, Ethan

Thus religion might appear as first purified only through philosophy,—through pure self-existent thought: but the form pervading this underlying principle—the form which philosophy attacked—was that creative imagination.

From Hegel's Philosophy of Mind by Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich

The mind of every thoughtful man is forced to one of these two conclusions, either that the universe is self-existent or that it was created by a self-existent being.

From Ingersollia Gems of Thought from the Lectures, Speeches, and Conversations of Col. Robert G. Ingersoll, Representative of His Opinions and Beliefs by Ingersoll, Robert Green