Nothing

Nothing is a pronoun denoting the absence of anything. Nothing is a pronoun associated with nothingness. In nontechnical uses, nothing denotes things lacking importance, interest, value, relevance, or significance.Nothingness is the state of being nothing, the state of nonexistence of anything, or the property of having nothing.

Philosophy

Western philosophy

Some would consider the study of "nothing" to be foolish, a typical response of this type is voiced by Giacomo Casanova (1725–1798) in conversation with his landlord, one Dr. Gozzi, who also happens to be a priest,

However, "nothingness" has been treated as a serious subject worthy of research for a very long time. In philosophy, to avoid linguistic traps over the meaning of "nothing", a phrase such as not-being is often employed to unambiguously make clear what is being discussed.

Parmenides

One of the earliest western philosophers to consider nothing as a concept was Parmenides (5th century BC) who was a Greek philosopher of the monist school. He argued that "nothing" cannot exist by the following line of reasoning: To speak of a thing, one has to speak of a thing that exists. Since we can speak of a thing in the past, it must still exist (in some sense) now and from this concludes that there is no such thing as change. As a corollary, there can be no such things as coming-into-being, passing-out-of-being, or not-being.

Nothing (Dwight Yoakam song)

"Nothing" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music artist Dwight Yoakam. It was released in October 1995 as the first single from the album Gone. The song reached #20 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart. The song was written by Yoakam and Kostas.

Chart performance

References

External links

Nothing (A Chorus Line song)

Nothing is a song from the musical A Chorus Line. It is sung by the Hispanic character Diana.

Production

This song is the major centerpiece of Montage - Part 2.

Synopsis

City Beat explains "Diana...talks about a teacher who berated her". All About Theatre talks about "Diana's recollections of a horrible high school acting class". The Independent describes it as "an account of her humiliations at the hands of a high-school Method Acting teacher".

Critical reception

The Arts Desk describes it as "the song about theatrical pretension". Metro Theatre Arts wrote the song had "the essence of a star waiting to bloom". CT Theatre News and Reviews described the song as "dead-on and quite moving". The Independent "hilarious, gutsy to attack...that is one of the best songs in Marvin Hamlisch's snappy, agile score".

References

Southern Tenant Farmers Union

The Southern Tenant Farmers' Union (STFU) was founded in 1934 as a civil farmer's union to further organize the tenant farmers in the Southern United States.

Originally set up during the Great Depression in the United States, the reasons for the establishment of the STFU are numerous, although they are all largely centered upon money and working conditions. Predominantly, the STFU was established as a response to policies of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA). The AAA itself was designed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to help revive the United States' agricultural industry and to recharge the depressed economy.

The AAA called for a reduction in food production, which would, through a controlled shortage of food, raise the price for any given food item through supply and demand. The desired effect was that the agricultural industry would once again prosper due to the increased value and produce more income for farmers. In order to decrease food production, the AAA would pay farmers not to farm and the money would go to the landowners. The landowners were expected to share this money with the tenant farmers. While a small percentage of the landowners did share the income, the majority did not. This led to the formation of the STFU, whose existence serves historically as evidence that such a problem existed.