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Meontology
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The study of non-Being is referred to as Meontology. The word comes from the Greek for non, "Me" and ontology. It refers not exactly to the study of what does not exist, but an attempt to cover what may remain outside of ontology. It can also be associated more recently, with the emphasis placed upon absence or deferral by both Heidegger and Derrida.
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 means care (Sorge).
Meontology has a slim tradition in the West, see, Sophist and negative theology, but has always been central to the Eastern philosophies of Taoism and the later Buddhism.