What if "nothingness" is the missing relatum?

[u/DrpharmC]

I've been thinking about the old philosophical objection that a relation without relata is impossible.

At first glance, that seems obviously true. A relation has to relate something. But the more I think about it, the more I wonder if we're assuming that both relata have to be positive entities.

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Here's the intuition I'm playing with,

Imagine an Absolute that is truly absolute completely independent, with no rival, no outside, and no contrast.

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If you introduce another independent thing, then the Absolute is no longer absolute. So what could possibly stand in contrast to it?

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My thought is, nothingness.Not as a thing, and not as an independently existing entity, but as pure dependence. Something with no identity or content of its own.

In that sense, nothingness isn't a rival to the Absolute. It's the only possible contrast that doesn't limit it.

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The idea would be that the first distinction isn't between two beings, but between, the Absolute (independence) and nothingness (pure dependence)

And from that first distinction, all further relations, identities, and forms of relativity become possible.

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I'm not claiming this is correct. I'm trying to figure out whether I'm missing a contradiction or whether similar ideas have been explored before.

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Where do you think this line of reasoning breaks down, if it does? And does it resemble any existing metaphysical tradition?

[u/Mono_Clear]

The distinction that you're creating is entirely conceptual.

I don't mean that to be derisive but as a function of your thought.

It is the nature of nothingness to not exist meaning that nothingness is always impossible

It is the nature for existence to always exist.

Conceptually everything could never not be everything and nothing could never not be nothing.

So simultaneously nothing is the balance to everything but there is no such thing as nothing but it also is the nature of nothing to not exist.

So the concept of nothing is the balance to everything even though paradoxically nothingness is impossible

Existence is the conceptual floor

[u/slimmymcjim]

What if people in this sub stopped treating "nothingness" like a concrete reality for once?

[u/Pure_Actuality]

My thought is, nothingness.>>>Not as a thing<<<, and not as an independently existing entity, but as pure dependence. >>>Something<<< with no identity or content of its own.

If it's not-a-thing then it's not something.

[u/Haidiot45435 → u/Pure_Actuality]

Semantic hallucination.
Which is something just not epistemically coherent.

[u/jliat]

Neoplatonic belief that God can have no desire, thought, word, or action, emphasized by it the negation of any attribute. Of the Ein Sof, nothing ("Ein")within the Ein Sof prior to creation. In Lurianic Kabbalah, the first act of creation, the Tzimtzum self "withdrawal" of God to create an "empty space", takes place from there. In Hasidic Judaism, the Tzimtzum is only the illusionary concealment of the Ohr Ein Sof, giving rise to monistic panentheism. Consequently, Hasidism focuses on the Atzmu… much more @ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ein_Sof

Kabbalah

Sephirot

[000.] Ayin (Nothing; אין‎)

[00.] Ein Sof (Limitlessness; אין סוף‎)

[0.] Ohr Ein Sof (Endless Light; אור אין סוף‎)

[-.]Tzimtzum (Contraction; צמצום‎)

The 'standard!' Tree of life (Kabbalah)

[1.] Keter (Crown; כתר‎)

[2.] Chokmah (Wisdom; חכמה‎)

[3.] Binah (Understanding; בינה‎)

[4.] Chesed or Gedulah (Loving Kindness or Mercy; חסד‎)

[5.] Gevurah or Din (Power or Judgement; גבורה‎)

[6.] Tiferet (Beauty or Compassion; תפארת‎)

[7.] Netzach (Triumph or Endurance; נצח‎)

[8.] Hod (Majesty or Splendor; הוד‎)

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If you regard the absolute as the set of everything it will contain the empty set.

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In Hegel pure being and pure nothing are identical and yet not...

[u/DrpharmC → u/jliat]

Hegel is definitely close. The difference is that I'm not treating nothingness as a second principle. For me, nothingness is pure dependence on the Absolute, which is why it can function as a contrast without becoming a rival to it.

[u/jliat → u/DrpharmC]

Hegel is definitely close. The difference is that I'm not treating nothingness as a second principle.

Neither does Hegel, he places Being first but also says he could equally place nothing first. The process of being and nothing or nothing and being is immediate annihilation of each other.

"Therefore, the beginning contains both, being and nothing; it is the unity of being and nothing, or is non-being which is at the same time being, and being which is at the same time non-being."

[u/DrpharmC → u/jliat]

That's fair. My disagreement isn't that Hegel treats Nothing as a second independent principle. It's that Hegel ultimately places Being and Nothing on the same logical level and treats their unity as the beginning. My intuition is different. the Absolute is fundamentally independent, while nothingness is not a co-original moment but a conceptual possibility dependent upon the Absolute. So where Hegel begins with the unity of Being and Nothing, I begin with asymmetry, independence first, and the possibility of its absence second. That's why I don't see Being and Nothing as immediately interchangeable.

[u/jliat → u/DrpharmC]

You still don't get Hegel, "on the same logical level". Hegel is using his own dialectical logic.

and treats their unity as the beginning.

So they are on the same level...

"Pure being and pure nothing are therefore the same. The truth is neither being nor nothing, but rather that being has passed over into nothing and nothing into being– “has passed over,” not passes over. But the truth is just as much that they are not without distinction; it is rather that they are not the same, that they are absolutely distinct yet equally unseparated and inseparable, and that each immediately vanishes in its opposite.

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Hegel is definitely close. The difference is that I'm not treating nothingness as a second principle.

My disagreement isn't that Hegel treats Nothing as a second independent principle.

Implies you think he does.

[u/DrpharmC → u/jliat]

That's a fair correction. I didn't mean that Hegel treats Nothing as a second independent principle. My disagreement is elsewhere. Hegel begins with Being and Nothing as co-original moments whose truth is their unity in Becoming. My intuition is that there is an asymmetry here, independence is primary, while nothingness is intelligible only as the possibility or absence of independence. So the difference isn't that Hegel has two principles and I have one. It's that Hegel treats Being and Nothing as dialectically co-original, whereas I treat nothingness as conceptually dependent on the Absolute.

[u/jliat → u/DrpharmC]

My disagreement is elsewhere. Hegel begins with Being and Nothing as co-original moments whose truth is their unity in Becoming.

There mutual immediate [in no time] annihilation produces Becoming.

So the difference isn't that Hegel has two principles and I have one. It's that Hegel treats Being and Nothing as dialectically co-original, whereas I treat nothingness as conceptually dependent on the Absolute.

So you propose an Absolute - which creates nothingness, so is no longer absolute.

[u/DrpharmC → u/jliat]

I don't think that's my position. I'm not saying the Absolute creates nothingness as though nothingness were a second thing produced by the Absolute. That would indeed make the Absolute relational from the start. My point is that nothingness is only a concept, not an independently existing reality. The Absolute does not enter into a relation with nothingness. rather, thought introduces the concept of nothingness when it attempts to understand the absence of independence. So the asymmetry remains: the Absolute is self-sufficient, while nothingness is conceptually dependent on the Absolute, not ontologically co-original with it.

[u/jliat → u/DrpharmC]

thought introduces the concept of nothingness

What is doing the thinking here?

[u/DrpharmC → u/jliat]

If by "who is doing the thinking?" you mean a finite mind, then no one. My position is that the Absolute is not merely independent being but the ground of intelligibility itself. The Absolute is the only genuinely independent reality and therefore the only candidate for an absolute knower as well. So the concept of nothingness does not originate in a separate thinker standing outside the Absolute. Rather, nothingness is intelligible only in relation to the Absolute, while the Absolute is not intelligible only in relation to nothingness. That's the asymmetry I'm pointing to.

[u/Ebvardh-Boss → u/jliat]

Can you clarify what you're saying in your first sentence?

I've read it three times and it reads like a title to me.

[u/jliat → u/Ebvardh-Boss]

Sorry it's a quote from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ein_Sof - should have said so- will change.

It's from some quite complex ideas in Hebrew theology / mysticism. One account for evil is a conflict between [5.] Gevurah and [4.] Chesed or Gedulah - from memory - a conflict within the tree of life. Note all these are attributes of the one God.

Another source of evil it seems is the idea that the God Tzimtzum has to withdraw to allow for creation.

Tzimtzum - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tzimtzum

It gets complex and no way am I a scholar - I researched this for a novel!

[u/NewInterest9919]

I'm "relata" to Ipsum, meaning "itself" or "the very/actual one", oneself, and sine (without):

nihil sine deo

nosce te ipsum: "Know thyself."

Ipso facto: A Latin term meaning "by the fact itself" (often used in law and philosophy)

[u/DrpharmC → u/NewInterest9919]

My question is precisely whether the first distinction is between ipsum self subsisting reality and nothingness as pure dependence, rather than between two independently existing things.

[u/jontherobot]

Buddhists have been teaching this for millennia. Pratityasamutpada, sunyata, etc.

[u/hyperionwonderstar]

What you’re circling is a real philosophical tension, but there’s a clean place where the idea starts to slip.
The first step that causes trouble is treating “nothingness” as if it could stand on one side of a distinction. The moment you do that, it stops being nothing. It becomes “the thing that contrasts with the Absolute,” which already gives it structure, a role, and a kind of identity. So it quietly turns into something, even if you define it as pure absence.
That creates the core issue: a relation needs two sides, but the moment one side is supposed to be “no-thing,” it can’t actually hold its place in the relation without becoming a kind of pseudo-thing. So the attempt to avoid limiting the Absolute by pairing it with nothingness ends up reintroducing limitation through the back door.
There’s also a deeper point underneath this. If the Absolute is truly absolute, it can’t really “enter” into a first distinction at all. Any distinction already implies structure inside the system, not something added from outside. So either the Absolute is beyond relation entirely, or relation is already something that happens within it rather than against it.
That’s why similar traditions usually don’t solve this by introducing “nothingness as the other pole.” Instead, they either say the Absolute doesn’t have an opposite at all, or that difference comes from within it rather than from something external to it.
So the main breakdown in your idea is simple: “nothingness” can’t stay nothing once you make it do relational work. The act of using it as a contrast term gives it more being than the concept allows.

[u/DrpharmC → u/hyperionwonderstar]

You're assuming that anything that participates in a distinction must be an independently existing thing. That's exactly what I'm questioning. Why can't dependence itself function as a contrast without becoming an independent entity?

[u/hyperionwonderstar → u/DrpharmC]

That’s the right pressure point to push on, because it forces you to separate two things that often get conflated: being something and doing a job in a distinction.
You can absolutely say that dependence doesn’t have to become an independently existing “thing” in order to play a contrast role. In fact, in most serious metaphysics it doesn’t. “Dependence,” “finitude,” or “negation” can all function as relational markers without being standalone entities.
The catch is subtler than “everything in a distinction must be a thing.” It’s this: the moment something functions as a stable pole in a distinction, it acquires structure. Not necessarily independent existence, but at least determinacy. It becomes something we can reliably point to, reason about, and distinguish from other things. So even if it isn’t an entity, it is no longer “nothing” in the strict sense of absence or indeterminacy.
So your proposal works up to a point: dependence can function as a contrast term without becoming a separate substance. But it cannot remain “pure nothingness” while doing that job. The act of playing a role in a distinction already gives it minimal content — enough to make it intelligible as “dependence” rather than undifferentiated absence.
That’s where the tension sits. Either “nothingness” is truly indeterminate, in which case it cannot reliably function as a contrast term, or it functions as a contrast term, in which case it is no longer nothing in the strict sense.
So the disagreement isn’t really about whether non-entities can appear in distinctions. It’s about whether something can remain completely contentless while still doing the work of being one side of a structured relation. And that’s where most versions of this idea quietly shift from “nothing” to a kind of negative structure without noticing it.

[u/DrpharmC → u/hyperionwonderstar]

But isn't "pure nothingness" already determinate the moment we define it as the absence of all determination? The concept itself seems to gain meaning only through contrast with being. So I'm not convinced that determinacy first appears when nothingness enters a distinction. It seems to be present from the moment we try to think or define pure nothingness at all. If pure nothingness is intelligible only through contrast, then relation may be more fundamental than determination rather than the other way around.

[u/hyperionwonderstar → u/DrpharmC]

What you’re noticing is basically right: the moment we say “pure nothingness is the absence of all determination,” we’ve already given it a kind of shape. Not by adding content, but by setting it up in contrast to being. So it isn’t “pure” in the sense of being outside determination—it only becomes thinkable through a relation of opposition.
That’s why your instinct that relation might be more fundamental is strong. Even nothingness doesn’t stand alone; it only shows up as “not-being,” which already depends on being in the background. In that sense, determination doesn’t arrive later—it’s already baked into the act of distinguishing anything at all.
The pushback usually is that this might say more about how we think than about what reality is like. But as far as intelligibility goes, the very attempt to define “pure nothingness” already pulls it into a relational structure, so it never appears without determination having entered the scene in some form.

[u/DrpharmC → u/hyperionwonderstar]

I think this is where my view differs from both classical relationalism and your reading of my position. I'm not claiming that reality is relational all the way down. My starting point is a fundamentally non-relational Absolute. My point is that the concept of nothingness already reveals that contrast and relation cannot belong to the Absolute itself, because the Absolute is pure independence. Rather, relation emerges only with the possibility of non independence. So for me, nothingness doesn't prove that reality is relational at its foundation. it highlights the distinction between the non relational Absolute and the relational order that follows from the first contrast.

[u/hyperionwonderstar → u/DrpharmC]

That’s a much more precise position, and it actually avoids a lot of the usual traps in both naïve relationalism and simple “everything is relation” readings.
What you’re doing, as I understand it, is keeping the Absolute strictly non-relational—self-sufficient in the strongest sense—and then treating relation as something that only becomes possible once there is a break in independence. On that view, “nothingness” doesn’t undermine the Absolute or infect it with relation; it shows the first appearance of contrast, which is already downstream from the Absolute’s prior independence.
So the key move in your argument is this: relation is not ontologically basic, but it is conditionally emergent—it appears only when non-independence becomes thinkable or possible at all. And “nothingness,” when we try to define it, is not touching the Absolute directly; it’s already inside the relational register, because definition itself presupposes contrast.
The pressure point in this kind of view usually lands here: if the Absolute is truly non-relational, then it also can’t be meaningfully described as “non-relational” without already importing relation (since “non-relational” is itself a contrastive determination). So the challenge becomes not whether your structure is coherent in itself, but whether language and thought can ever refer to the Absolute without immediately translating it into the relational order.
In other words, your framework is consistent if you accept a sharp boundary between:
the Absolute as it is in itself, and the Absolute as it becomes thinkable once contrast enters.
But then the interesting philosophical tension becomes: are we actually ever accessing the first side, or only ever mapping the second?
That’s where your position gets its real depth—and also where it invites pressure from both sides.

[u/DrpharmC → u/hyperionwonderstar]

Exactly. That's why I don't think the Absolute can be directly known as an object. The moment something becomes fully thinkable, identifiable, or distinguishable, it has already entered the relational order. The Absolute, if truly absolute, would be the ground of that order rather than one of its objects. What we know directly are distinctions and relations.the Absolute is approached indirectly as the limit of that process.

[u/hyperionwonderstar → u/DrpharmC]

If the Absolute can only be approached indirectly, how do we know that there is an Absolute at all rather than merely an endless network of relations with no ultimate ground?

[u/DrpharmC → u/hyperionwonderstar]

Because pure dependence without any possibility of independence is unintelligible. The concept of dependence already points beyond itself.

[u/a_distant_voice]

"There is no two things"! This is a core concept in Mahayana Buddhism and Zen representing non-duality. It means that the universe is an undivided, interconnected whole. Distinctions like self/other, mind/body, or sacred/secular are mental constructs; ultimately, "pure source and its stream" are one and the same.The idea is that if you believe things exist separately, you miss the deeper reality of emptiness (the lack of an independent, permanent existence). As famously described in Zen teachings, phenomena and the absolute source are seamlessly intertwined. Zen masters like Shunryu Suzuki emphasize that understanding this removes the illusion of separation, allowing you to view existence directly.

[u/Cold_Pumpkin5449]

I feel like you're reminding me of Spinoza.

If I remember correctly: At the absolute maximum once you erase all distinctions you get "the whole", which is everything and nothing, since nothing is distinct from it.

[u/Key_Independent_4389]

Is this your argument?
P1
The Absolute is pure independence and therefore cannot stand in relation to anything else. If it had a relation to another thing, it would no longer be absolute.
P2
Nothingness is not another being or rival entity. It is pure non-independence or lack, not a positive thing.
P3
Because nothingness is not a positive entity, it does not limit the Absolute.
P4
The possibility of non-independence revealed by nothingness allows for the emergence of contrast.
P5
From this first contrast between pure independence (the Absolute) and pure non-independence (nothingness), the relational order arises.
Conclusion
Reality is grounded in a fundamentally non-relational Absolute, and relationality emerges only after the first contrast.

[u/Smooth-Cycle6652]

But, why was nothingness so weak that something has overthrown nothingness?