Being and Nothingness was "a pretentious metaphysical thesis" and "principally an exercise in misusing the verb 'to be'." The philosopher William Barrett, writing in "Irrational Man" (1958), described "Being and Nothingness" as "a great, uneven, brilliant and verbose tome". He noted Sartre's debts to Heidegger, but nevertheless credited him with originality. He criticized Sartre for neglecting Heidegger's "notion of the truth of Being", his understanding of what it means for a subject or object to be. In his view, Sartre failed to "deal with the problem of truth in a radical and existential way", instead viewing truth in "the ordinary intellectualistic sense that
Ernst Bergmann (philosopher) Ernst Bergmann (philosopher) Ernst Bergmann (7 August 1881, Colditz, Kingdom of Saxony – 16 April 1945, Naumburg) was a German philosopher and proponent of Nazism. Bergmann studied philosophy and German philology at the University of Leipzig and got his PhD in 1905. Subsequently, he continued his studies in Berlin. Later he returned to Leipzig, where he received the status of Privatdozent at the university in 1911. In 1916 he was awarded the position of Ausserordentlicher Professor (professor without chair). He developed a religious philosophy with mystical aspects. Later he embraced the ideas of the National Socialist German Workers Party and