Néantissement

Néantissement is a French noun formed from néant, meaning nothing or void. It designates the act or process of reducing something to nothingness, of erasing it completely, or of bringing it to extinction. The term can be used in various domains to express a total destruction, disappearance, or negation of existence.

In philosophy and literature, néantissement is often associated with nothingness and negation. In phenomenology and existential thought, it may describe the experience or phenomenon by which beings confront or are confronted with non-being, thereby delimiting what is and is not. The concept is sometimes linked to discussions of freedom, meaning, and the limits of intentionality, and it can be employed to analyze how identities or states are dissolved or overridden.

In the sciences, the language of destruction or transformation is more commonly expressed with the term anéantissement, especially in physics where it denotes annihilation. In particle physics, the annihilation of a particle with its antiparticle converts mass into energy. While néantissement appears in scientific and popular discourse, it is generally used in a broader or figurative sense, whereas anéantissement is the precise technical term for annihilation processes.

Related concepts include néant (nothingness) and the broader idea of obliteration or negation. The term appears across contexts—from theoretical discourse to literary or rhetorical uses—reflecting a central concern with disappearance and the cessation of being.