The Nature Of Nothing In Heidegger's Phenomenological Ontology

ABSTRACT

The objective of this study is to expound and amplify the thesis that "Even Nothing is something". The thesis itself is one of the far-reaching consequences of Heidegger's phenomenological ontology. Ontology, for Heidegger, is the science of the Being of entities. The task proper to ontology is the exhibition of the general structures of the world. Phenomenology is the method of exhibiting entities as they are without preconceptions. The outstanding phenomenon of phenomenological thought for Heidegger is the Being of entities. Now if ontology is the inquiry into the general profiles of entities, and if phenomenology is the orientational habit of letting the Being of entities be seen, one can understand why Heidegger insists that "Only as phenomenology is ontology possible." But if ontology is possible only as phenomenology, are we to take it that all forms of ontology are phenomenological in character? If all forms of ontology are phenomenological in character, what is novel about Heidegger's Being-talk? Heidegger is called upon to speak for himself in a phenomenological manner. By letting Heidegger speak for himself, we find that there is a sense in which ontology does not qualify as phenomenology and another sense in which ontology is phenomenology. A form of ontology (the traditional brand) which understands an essent only as an "object" cannot qualify as phenomenology.