Being and Nothingness that among them the work usually went unread. Being and Nothingness Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology (), sometimes published with the subtitle A Phenomenological Essay on Ontology, is a 1943 book by the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, in which the author asserts the individual's existence as prior to the individual's essence ("existence precedes essence") and seeks to demonstrate that free will exists. While a prisoner of war in 1940 and 1941, Sartre read Martin Heidegger's "Being and Time" (1927). Heidegger's work, an ontological investigation through the lens and method of Husserlian phenomenology (Edmund Husserl was Heidegger's teacher), initiated
Thomas Vaughan (philosopher) Thomas Vaughan (philosopher) Thomas Vaughan (1621 − 27 February 1666) was a Welsh philosopher and alchemist, who wrote in English. He is now remembered for his work in the field of natural magic. A Royalist clergyman from Brecon, Wales, Thomas was the twin brother of the poet Henry Vaughan, both being born at Newton, in the parish of St. Briget's, in 1621. He entered Jesus College, Oxford, in 1638, and remained there for a decade during the English Civil War. Vaughan took part in the Battle of Rowton Heath in 1645. He became rector of the parish of Llansantffraed (St