  In modern terms, minus the language of yin-yang cosmology, this translates into an understanding of the Dao as “an absolute entity which is the source of the universe,” as the Oxford English Dictionary (online edition, under “Tao”) defines it. Not being anything in particular, the Dao may be described as “nothing” (wu). However, on this reading, wu does not mean “nothingness,” “negativity” or absence in the nihilistic sense, in view of the creative power of the Dao.