Comments on: Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing?

By: Philosophy and Cosmology: Day Three | Cosmic Variance | Discover Magazine

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 23:03:08 +0000

[...] conference closes with a posh dinner at Balliol College, featuring a talk by John Hawthorne on the primordial existential question. Then we have a response by Max Tegmark. Apparently my principled refusal to go to talks after 9:00 [...]

By: Richard

Richard — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 01:51:55 +0000

My head feels like it’s going to explode. I’ve been contemplating about this brute fact since age 12, and I don’t think I’m getting any closer to the answer, I feel pessimistic about the chance of we ever coming up with the right answer!

By: Don

Don — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 01:43:42 +0000

Imagine there is only one thing in the universe and it expands to fill infinity. Now, ask yourself: how is that any different than an infinite amount of nothing?

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.

By: justjonathan001yahoo.co.uk

justjonathan001yahoo.co.uk — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 06:53:15 +0000

Why is there something rather than nothing…
Semantically, the concept ‘is not’ has no ‘definite description’ or presentation. The universe just ‘is’ universe of contingent ‘things’, beings which ‘are’ have the copula ‘is’. and are ‘explained through their antecedent ’causes” The apophantic. Being is equated with ‘is’.

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

By: justjonathan001yahoo.co.uk

justjonathan001yahoo.co.uk — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 06:35:16 +0000

Semantically, the concept ‘is not’ has no ‘definite description’ or presentation. The universe just ‘is’ universe of contingent ‘things’, beings which ‘are’ have the copula ‘is’. The apophantic. Being is euuated with ‘is’. This in no way elucidates the ‘fact’ 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.

By: Andrew H.

Andrew H. — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 19:23:48 +0000

The egg came first. A genetically modern chicken hatched from an egg. Its parents were the common ancestors of the modern chicken.
Carl stated that eternity cannot exist because our universe has an apparent beginning. In this case, our universe must one day cease to exist. We are then left with two avenues to contemplate.
1. Before and after the existence of the known universe, there is nothing.
2. The known universe has indeed a cause for existence, and comes from another, possibly larger universe.
If this larger universe has no beginning, It could be described as eternal. In an eternal universe, there is no longer a such thing as pure “nothing”.
While the existence of a megaverse is not yet verifiable, It illustrates we have the ability to come up with a solution to the big “something vs. nothing” question. Unfortunately, it’s not good enough to be a full fledged “answer”. Existential questions persist in a megaverse too.
Luckily, this idea is compatible with M theory (brane theory), so there are scientists looking for evidence for this.

By: zubair

zubair — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 23:26:30 +0000

something rather than nothing huh..
chk out my views here..
http://neozubair.wordpress.com/2009/07/28/nothingness/

By: Fred

Fred — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 00:52:21 +0000

It is like the chicken or the egg, who came first. The reason for existence, is because without it, there could not be nothing. You must have to have not.

By: Carl

Carl — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 23:32:39 +0000

Absolute nothingness is impossible. Why?

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

By: Jeffrey

Jeffrey — Fri, 29 May 2009 16:27:22 +0000

Qualium, comment #228, hits the nail on the head. Something and nothing are two aspects of a binary opposition. Each aspect defines, contradicts, and confirms the other.

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.