Is it possible that an infinite amount of anything, even nothing, could cause existence itself?

I don’t think we’re going to ever know the answer to these questions, so I suggest we focus on things we CAN understand.

This in no way elucidates the ‘fact’ /nature of existence. It’s brute ‘thatness’,

Reason are called for. the theistic are rejected for requiring their equally implausible, counter-factual, improbable suppositions. We are left with the question. Why is there something rather than nothing.

Language attempts two answers: 1. non-existence is meaningless. it has no definite description or referent. It i not presentable. It fall’s outside the scopes of experience and language. Talk about the universe not existing is therefore literally meaningless. (constructive metaphysical non-sense) In so far as this is supposedly an abstract, extreme example

Alternatively, terms like ‘nothingness’ and some thing ness’ are infra-referential, pointing to an immanent and not transcendetal constituting of language. Language constitutes the world but doesn’t do so prohibitively. It cannot do so without the concept of nothingness.

The approach ( not solution) is to distinguish metaphysics, ontology, logic and the philosophy of language. ‘Why is there something rather than nothing is a profound existential and ontological question precisely because the emphasis and status is on the status of the question before it is on the status of the answer

Language attempts two answers: 1. non-existence is meaningless. it has no definite description or referent. It i not presentable. It fall’s outside the scopes of experience and language. Talk about the universe not existing is therefore literally meaningless. (constructive metaphysical non-sense) In so far as this is supposedly an abstract, extreme example

Alternatively, terms like ‘nothingness’ and some thing ness’ are infra-referential, pointing to an immanent and not transcendetal constituting of language. Language constitutes the world but doesn’t do so prohibitively. It cannot do so without the concept of nothingness.

The approach ( not solution) is to distinguish metaphysics, ontology, logic and the philosophy of language. ‘Why is there something rather than nothing is a profound existential and ontological question precisely because the emphasis and status is on the status of the question before it is on the status of the answer

Just as yourself the following question with respect to absolute nothingness. Is it true that absolute nothingness obtains? If it is not true, then absolute nothingness does not obtain, and therefore there is something rather than nothing. But if it is true, then there is truth, and hence a way things are, and thus some kind of reality, i.e. something, even if it is totally barren of physical or concrete objects. Hence, contra the initial supposition, absolute nothingness is impossible, i.e absolute nothingness could not obtain. That’s why there is (necessarily) something rather than nothing.

Carl

You know, like a photon is a wave and a particle, its binary opposite, at the same time although both cannot be observed simultaneously as Heisenberg showed with the thought experiment that led to his Nobel Prize.

It was Heisenberg’s mentor, Niels Bohr, who observed that — while wave-particle descriptions of a single photon were inconsistent and incompatible [and contrary to Aristotle's principle of non-contradiction] — both were necessary for a complete description of nature.

If you are interested, there’s more on this at http://donnee.com.

I only perceive time if I believe in cause and effect as separate, cause preceding effect. What if they are the same thing? Then time is no longer necessary. I imagine there are billions of universes that don’t bother with time.

Why is there Something rather than Nothing? Perhaps reality solved that problem by applying Occam’s Razor and being both Something AND Nothing.

Where is the Nothing? It’s here, just not observable. Never will be . . .

My conclusion, for peace of mind, is that all the comments to this post are true.

To quote Walt Whitman:
“Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)”

Reality contains ALL possibilities, even untrue ones. Don’t worry about it. The purpose of existence is to have fun.

The Set {Something, Nothing} is not exhaustive. Space (volume in three or more dimensions) is a third member of the Set. Space combines characteristics of somethingness and nothingness,and may exist ad infinitum without predeterminates or cause.

In a universe being created, the creation of mass and the creation of space appear together as canonical variates. Space and matter also disappear together when you run the movie backwards – as in the Big Crunch. Since other physical properties such as charge can sum to zero with, eg. positron colliding with electron, isn’t it possible that some quanta of space may be the anti-particle of mass, viz. SPACE = – MASS/ENERGY. Space can be present ad infinitum without predeterminates or cause. The presence of space may occur cannonically with the creation of mass/energy; under certain conditions – possibly the Big Crunch- space and mass can also annihilate one and other into nothingness. Conversely, nothingness could just as likely be nothingness within a three (or higher) dimensional volume, ie, Space, which would impel the creation of mass/energy – the latter, acting as the anti-particle to space, would maintain the Conservation of Nothingness.

“When” there is nothing there are no conditions that need to be fulfilled for something to be created from nothing. There are no need for causes for something to be created from nothing.

Proof: “When” nothings exists there exists no conditions (like conservation laws) since there is simply nothing.
“When” nothing exists there exist no need for causes for something to start to exist. When nothing exists there exists also no need for causes.

Only nothing is needed for something to start to exist. So it is not strange at all that something actually do exist.

PS – I’m probably the only one here without a physics degree xD.

I suppose there is a difference between ‘imaginary’ and ‘nothing’, obviously in the ‘imaginary world’ Santa exists, but in the ‘nothing world’ Santa does not (nor does anything else for that matter).

Why Something over Nothing? Why Reality over Imaginary may be a better question. Why Higgs Fields over Santa Fields? Are Fields even real? Can you see one? Touch one? Well, as electrostatic discharge or radioactive heat decay I expect we ‘feel’ the fields… sort of.

I’ve been reading Brian Greene’s popular books (The Elegant Universe and, currently, The Fabric of the Cosmos). He frequently discusses the ‘Why something instead of nothing’ (Leibniz), especially in Fabric of the Cosmos.
Apparently, it was inevitable that there is something (universe) due to virtual quantum fluctuations in the nothingness vacuum. Go figure.

It is what it is.

Meanwhile, the real universe calls. Ciao.

Zenny, strictly imaginary in concept and design