Why something and not nothing? Why the entity and not nothing?

by Maria Odete Madeira

"Why something and not nothing?” (Leibniz) Nihil est sine ratione; “Why the entity and not nothing?” (Heidegger).

The matter of the foundation of the Being is a good, endless and disturbing metaphysical question that started with Parmenides and was lengthily developed by Heidegger.

Schelling placed the question of the foundation as a self-position of the Being unfolded in two positions: one as Absolute in itself and another as the other of itself, this last, reciprocally presupposed in a circular topology.

By placing itself as the foundation of itself, the Being placed itself in existence, as a difference from which all things come.

For Heidegger, each entity is one of the modes of the Being, and, each entity, is also its difference, each entity is the being-there (dasein) referring to itself (ek-sistence).

The truth of the Being (aletheia) belongs to the Being itself, Being physis is aletheia. The Being gives itself (es gibt) as Being and Time and, thus, as something that has given itself, the being is event (Ereignis), the logos that wants to be heard.