ABSTRACT
“Metaphysics is to ontology as history is to sociology” (Sartre 1943: 713/619). 1 From this analogy, found in the very last pages of Being and Nothingness, two points can be deduced that lead to a specific question. First, we learn that, for Sartre, metaphysics is no more ontology than ontology is metaphysics. This idea breaks with the philosophical tradition that historically holds metaphysics to be a general domain that contains ontology—and not a special field like rational theology, cosmology, or psychology. This indicates a new conception if not of each individually, at least of their connection. But which? Second, we learn that, for Sartre, an original relationship unites metaphysics and ontology, although equal to the one entertained by history and sociology, even if Sartre doesn’t make the relationship perfectly clear, which allows us to form a relative idea of it in the Kantian sense. 2 But again we must ask: which one? From this choice stems our entire problem which is to know, since metaphysics and ontology are not the same, what each of them means and how they are they related. This is an especially puzzling question because Sartre never returns to the topic of metaphysics in his later works. Once more, Sartre initially considered the project of Being and Nothingness “metaphysics,” 3 but he ends up qualifying it as an “ontology.” 4 Consequently, Sartre muddles his tracks. So, what is the correct track, ontology or metaphysics, and why? By adding phenomenology into the mix, we may be able to better clarify the terms metaphysics and ontology. So, let us pick up again, from the beginning, the two roads that at the end lead to Rome—or, specifically, to Sartre’s magnum opus: Being and Nothingness. The rest of this paper follows these two roads. The first part of this paper consists in playing phenomenology against metaphysics in favor of ontology (and addresses Sartre’s works written before 1939), the second part makes phenomenology pass through ontology in favor of metaphysics (in works written after 1939).
