  The logical schema of topoi is paralleled by an ontological account. Nishida articulated the topoi also in terms of what we may call a me-ontology, from the Greek meon or non-being. The topos of being describes the world of nature. The topos of relative nothingness comprises the field of consciousness that is no-thing with respect to the things of which it is conscious. This nothingness, however, is still opposed to being, and so differs from the absolute nothingness that underlies both sides of the opposition. Here and elsewhere Nishida plays on the word for absolute in Japanese, zettai, which literally means breaking through or overcoming opposition. His premise is that the meaning of “to be” is “to be within”; the ultimate “within” is the topos of absolute nothingness.