Meontology is the
philosophical
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Som ...
study of non-being.
History
The word comes from the
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic p ...
μή, ''me'' "non" and ὄν, ''on'' "being" (confer
ontology
In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality.
Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities ...
). It refers not exactly to the study of what does not exist, but an attempt to cover what may remain outside of ontology. ''Meontology'' has a slim tradition in the West (see
Parmenides
Parmenides of Elea (; grc-gre, Παρμενίδης ὁ Ἐλεάτης; ) was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher from Elea in Magna Graecia.
Parmenides was born in the Greek colony
Greek colonization was an organised Colonies in antiquity ...
,
Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institutio ...
's ''
Sophist
A sophist ( el, σοφιστής, sophistes) was a teacher in ancient Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Sophists specialized in one or more subject areas, such as philosophy, rhetoric, music, athletics, and mathematics. They taught ...
'', and
apophatic theology
Apophatic theology, also known as negative theology, is a form of theological thinking and religious practice which attempts to approach God, the Divine, by negation, to speak only in terms of what may not be said about the perfect goodness tha ...
), but has always been central to the Eastern philosophies of
Taoism
Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Ta ...
and the later
Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
.
Nishida was the first to thoroughly expand the Eastern notion of nothingness in the Continental paradigm and is thus responsible for bringing to the West a clearer understanding of the Buddhist notion of non-being.
It can also be associated more recently, with the emphasis placed upon absence or deferral by both
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger (; ; 26 September 188926 May 1976) was a German philosopher who is best known for contributions to phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. He is among the most important and influential philosophers of the 20th centu ...
and
Jacques Derrida.
French philosopher
Jean-Luc Nancy
Jean-Luc Nancy ( , ; 26 July 1940 – 23 August 2021) was a French philosopher. Nancy's first book, published in 1973, was ''Le titre de la lettre'' (''The Title of the Letter'', 1992), a reading of the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Laca ...
distinguishes nothingness from nothing. He writes, “Nothingness is not nothing
'rien''...There is no ontology without the dialectic or the paradox of a meontology....Nothing is the thing tending toward its pure and simple being of a thing.” Nothing is “the vanishing, momentary quality of the smallest amount of beingness (''étantité'').”
Levinas on meontology
Meontology is evident in
Emmanuel Levinas
Emmanuel Levinas (; ; 12 January 1906 – 25 December 1995) was a French philosopher of Lithuanian Jews, Lithuanian Jewish ancestry who is known for his work within Jewish philosophy, existentialism, and Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomenology, ...
' rejection of
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (; ; 27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a German philosopher. He is one of the most important figures in German idealism and one of the founding figures of modern Western philosophy. His influence extends ...
's notion of dialectical meontology,
which proposed the principle of oppositionality as the driving force of history. Levinas' skepticism, which according to Martin Kavka "breaks the line of progressive accounts of history", supported the notion of a continual reinterpretation of history and also the idea that the end of history is unpredictable.
This forms part of Levinas' heterocentricity, which seeks to inoculate the transhistorical against history. It holds that the traditional history - that which reduces singular persons to members of classes or tribes - cannot be used to narrate the coming-to-pass of the Infinite in the ethical relation. Levinas' conceptualization is encapsulated in a principle for existence or for humanity that states, "Do not go inside, go outside!". It implies that the authenticity of human existence is ensured not by looking inwards (egocentrism) because one does not see oneself without the aid of others but through heterocentricity or dialogue of ''excentric'' agents.
According to Levinas, meontology refers not to another being but to an inability to be, the privation of being.
Such privation leads to transcendence, which is described as a realm "other than being".
For Levinas, what was meontological was what had meaning beyond being, beyond ontology; for him this was the ethical, the primary demand of the other in the
face-to-face encounter. In this sense he sought to clarify or take further some of the issues raised by Heidegger and explicitly give ontology a secondary role to ethics rather than continue to parallel them in saying that the
Being
In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality.
Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities ...
means
care
Care may refer to:
Organizations and projects
* CARE (New Zealand), Citizens Association for Racial Equality, a former New Zealand organisation
* CARE (relief agency), "Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere", an international aid and ...
(
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
: ''Sorge''). Levinas, however, agreed with Hegel in his notion that meontology is the mirror image of
ontology
In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality.
Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities ...
, suggesting that they occupy the same logical space, which is the space of the Same.
See also
*
Cura (mythology) Cura or Aera Cura is the name of a Roman goddess who created the first human (homo) and whose name means "Care" or "Concern".
In Latin. Hyginus seems to have created both the personification and story for his ''Fabulae'', poem 220.
Story of Cura
W ...
*
Meonism
Nikolai Minsky and Nikolai Maksimovich Minsky (russian: Никола́й Макси́мович Ми́нский) are pseudonyms of Nikolai Maksimovich Vilenkin (Виле́нкин; 1855–1937), a mystical writer and poet of the Silver Age of Ru ...
*
Nothingness
Nothing, the complete absence of anything, has been a matter of philosophical debate since at least the 5th century BC. Early Greek philosophers argued that it was impossible for ''nothing'' to exist. The atomists allowed ''nothing'' but only ...
References
Martin Heidegger
Metaphysics
Buddhist philosophy
Taoist philosophy
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