Lorenz B. Puntel was Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at Ludwig-Maximillians University, Germany.Alan White is Mark Hopkins Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Williams College, USA.

Absolute nothingness is unthinkable. This apparently innocuous philosophical insight is the structuring point in Lorenz Puntel’s seminal Being and Nothingness. From this principle, Puntel shows how fundamentally flawed key philosophers – from Parmenides to Heidegger – have addressed the question of being. It’s an intriguing exercise in history of philosophy that is critical yet constructive, leading to Puntel’s own alternative proposal that has both broad scope and deep insights

• PART IChapter 1. First metaphysical approaches: the development of ancient Greek philosophy: from Being itself to metaphysics as the science of beings as beings and to the dimension beyond beingness Chapter 2. Christian-metaphysical approaches in high- and late-scholasticism; from an inchoative Being-theoretical to a purely onto-theo-logical determination of Being and nothing Chapter 3. Leibniz and the question “Why is there anything at all rather than nothing?“Chapter 4. Nihilism, critique of metaphysics, and the topic Being and nothing: Nietzsche and HeideggerChapter 5. Sartre’s The Being and the Nothing: a purely subjective phenomenological conceptionChapter 6. The fading-out and absence of the question about Being itself and absolute nothing in the main stream of analytic philosophy Chapter 7. Relative nothingPART IIPreliminary remarksChapter 1. Essential components of the theoretical framework of the structural-systematic philosophy (SSP)Chapter 2: Systematic onto-logy as theory of beingness/beingsChapter 3. Possible worldsChapter 4: Disclosure of the dimension of Being: a systematic approachChapter 5: Making explicit the dimension of Being as the result of the overcoming of the modern philosophy of subjectivity I: Kant and HegelChapter 6. Disclosure of the dimension of Being as result of the overcoming of modern subjectivity II: Husserl and the transformation of phenomenologyChapter 7: Disclosure of the dimension of Being as the result of the overcoming of analytic philosophy interpreted as philosophy of subjectivityChapter 8: Theory of Being I: basic features of a theory of Being as suchChapter 9: Theory of Being II: theory of modal status of the dimension of Being as the ultimate systematic clarification of the topic Being and nothingChapter 10: Theory of Being III: systematic explication of the modal two-dimensionality of the dimension of BeingAfterword: A look back and a look aheadBibliographyIndex of namesIndex of subjects

Lorenz B. Puntel was Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at Ludwig-Maximillians University, Germany.Alan White is Mark Hopkins Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Williams College, USA.

Absolute nothingness is unthinkable. This apparently innocuous philosophical insight is the structuring point in Lorenz Puntel’s seminal Being and Nothingness. From this principle, Puntel shows how fundamentally flawed key philosophers – from Parmenides to Heidegger – have addressed the question of being. It’s an intriguing exercise in history of philosophy that is critical yet constructive, leading to Puntel’s own alternative proposal that has both broad scope and deep insights

• PART IChapter 1. First metaphysical approaches: the development of ancient Greek philosophy: from Being itself to metaphysics as the science of beings as beings and to the dimension beyond beingness Chapter 2. Christian-metaphysical approaches in high- and late-scholasticism; from an inchoative Being-theoretical to a purely onto-theo-logical determination of Being and nothing Chapter 3. Leibniz and the question “Why is there anything at all rather than nothing?“Chapter 4. Nihilism, critique of metaphysics, and the topic Being and nothing: Nietzsche and HeideggerChapter 5. Sartre’s The Being and the Nothing: a purely subjective phenomenological conceptionChapter 6. The fading-out and absence of the question about Being itself and absolute nothing in the main stream of analytic philosophy Chapter 7. Relative nothingPART IIPreliminary remarksChapter 1. Essential components of the theoretical framework of the structural-systematic philosophy (SSP)Chapter 2: Systematic onto-logy as theory of beingness/beingsChapter 3. Possible worldsChapter 4: Disclosure of the dimension of Being: a systematic approachChapter 5: Making explicit the dimension of Being as the result of the overcoming of the modern philosophy of subjectivity I: Kant and HegelChapter 6. Disclosure of the dimension of Being as result of the overcoming of modern subjectivity II: Husserl and the transformation of phenomenologyChapter 7: Disclosure of the dimension of Being as the result of the overcoming of analytic philosophy interpreted as philosophy of subjectivityChapter 8: Theory of Being I: basic features of a theory of Being as suchChapter 9: Theory of Being II: theory of modal status of the dimension of Being as the ultimate systematic clarification of the topic Being and nothingChapter 10: Theory of Being III: systematic explication of the modal two-dimensionality of the dimension of BeingAfterword: A look back and a look aheadBibliographyIndex of namesIndex of subjects

Lorenz B. Puntel was Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at Ludwig-Maximillians University, Germany.Alan White is Mark Hopkins Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Williams College, USA.

Absolute nothingness is unthinkable. This apparently innocuous philosophical insight is the structuring point in Lorenz Puntel’s seminal Being and Nothingness. From this principle, Puntel shows how fundamentally flawed key philosophers – from Parmenides to Heidegger – have addressed the question of being. It’s an intriguing exercise in history of philosophy that is critical yet constructive, leading to Puntel’s own alternative proposal that has both broad scope and deep insights

• PART IChapter 1. First metaphysical approaches: the development of ancient Greek philosophy: from Being itself to metaphysics as the science of beings as beings and to the dimension beyond beingness Chapter 2. Christian-metaphysical approaches in high- and late-scholasticism; from an inchoative Being-theoretical to a purely onto-theo-logical determination of Being and nothing Chapter 3. Leibniz and the question “Why is there anything at all rather than nothing?“Chapter 4. Nihilism, critique of metaphysics, and the topic Being and nothing: Nietzsche and HeideggerChapter 5. Sartre’s The Being and the Nothing: a purely subjective phenomenological conceptionChapter 6. The fading-out and absence of the question about Being itself and absolute nothing in the main stream of analytic philosophy Chapter 7. Relative nothingPART IIPreliminary remarksChapter 1. Essential components of the theoretical framework of the structural-systematic philosophy (SSP)Chapter 2: Systematic onto-logy as theory of beingness/beingsChapter 3. Possible worldsChapter 4: Disclosure of the dimension of Being: a systematic approachChapter 5: Making explicit the dimension of Being as the result of the overcoming of the modern philosophy of subjectivity I: Kant and HegelChapter 6. Disclosure of the dimension of Being as result of the overcoming of modern subjectivity II: Husserl and the transformation of phenomenologyChapter 7: Disclosure of the dimension of Being as the result of the overcoming of analytic philosophy interpreted as philosophy of subjectivityChapter 8: Theory of Being I: basic features of a theory of Being as suchChapter 9: Theory of Being II: theory of modal status of the dimension of Being as the ultimate systematic clarification of the topic Being and nothingChapter 10: Theory of Being III: systematic explication of the modal two-dimensionality of the dimension of BeingAfterword: A look back and a look aheadBibliographyIndex of namesIndex of subjects