Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
Readers might be interested in a project group (which includes Hal and myself) which is aimed at a systematic investigation of the fundamental question encompassing this very issue. Anyone with a serious interest and commitment to careful rational thought can join in. Details at http://www.afproject.org. Alastair Malcolm (Personal emails to a.malcolmATphysica.freeserve.co.uk, replacing the AT) - Original Message - From: Russell Standish [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Why is there something instead of nothing? The answer I prefer is to say that the Nothing and the Everything are the same Thing. (or rather that they are complementary aspects of the same thing). Its a bit mystical I know, but the inspiration comes from the notion of duality in Category theory - for example in the theory of Venn diagrams, the universal set and the empty set are closely related (one can find a transformation whereby any theorem expressed in terms of universal sets can be transformed into an equivalent theorem containing empty sets). Hal Ruhl tried a theory based on logical contradictions inherent in nothings and evrything, that he posted on this list, which was kind of interesting...
RE: Why is there something instead of nothing?
From: Stephen Paul King [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Dear Norman, Perhaps because Nothingness can not non-exist. Stephen I'm not sure of the double negative, Stephen, but I think I am in agreement. Nothing (noun) cannot exist. Think about it. Maintaining an absolutely perfect Nothing would require infinite energy to control and perfectly balance all the +Nothings and -Nothings (or any other componentry you would care to dream up of which a Nothing is made) to an infinite number of decimal places. Any slight imperfection in this balance would immediately create Thing and that Thing would have magnitude, place and a past and a future (albeit possibly small, local and brief resp). Do a thought experiment: imagine you had to cut up chunks of +Nothing and -Nothing to make a perfect Nothing. How good is your cutting going to have to be? Nothing = 0 or 0.0 or 0.00 or 0.000 or 0. or...? Pretty kludgy analogy but you get the idea. It doesn't matter whther you Nothing is modelled as an infinite dimensional vector with every element = 0.... Or a simply scalar 0.. Nothing is therefore spontaneously likely to be noisy and that noise is likely to be able to create emergent anyThing (including monkeys with scripts for Hamlet etc) commensurate with any statistical coherence accidentally and spontaneously configured in this randomness. Based on this idea we would expect to find coherent Thing that has an overall tendency to vanish that any observer constructed of it would identify and measure as something like a second law of thermodynamics. Nothing (noun) simply cannot exist. Well it's just too hard. That's my slant on it, anyway. This is the stuff the 'Turtles all the way down' are made of IMHO :-) I like this stuff. Cheers, Colin Hales
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
How do you know the premise is true, that there is something instead of nothing? Maybe there could be both something and nothing. Or maybe the existence of nothing is consistent with our own experiences. I don't think all these terms are well enough defined for the question to have meaning in its simple form. It's easy to put words together, but not all gramatically correct sentences are meaningful. Hal Finney
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
In the spirit of this list, one might instead phrase the question as: Why is there everything instead of nothing? As soon as we have that there is everything, then we have that some aspects of everything will mold themselves into observable universes. It is unsatisfying though true to observe that there of course cannot be a case in which the question itself can be asked, and there simultaneously be nothing in that universe. I'm with the last respondent though in thinking that the right answer is that there is BOTH nothing and everything, but that the nothing is necessarily inherently unobservable by curious questioners like ourselves. Norman Samish wrote: Why is there something instead of nothing? Does this question have an answer? I think the question shows there is a limit to our understanding of things and is unanswerable. Does anybody disagree? Norman
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
Hal Finney, Thanks for the thought. I know that there is something instead of nothing by using Descartes reasoning. (From http://teachanimalobjectivity.homestead.com/files/return2.htm) The only thing Descartes found certain was the fact he was thinking. He further felt that thought was not a thing-in-itself, and had to proceed from somewhere (viz., cause and effect), therefore since he was thinking the thoughts, he existed --by extension--also. Hence, thought and extension were the very beginnings from which all things proceeded, Cogito ergo sum (I think therefore I am). I don't understand how there can be both something and nothing. Perhaps I don't understand what you mean by nothing. By nothing I mean no thing, not even empty space. In other words, it is conceivable to me that the multiverse need not exist. Yet it does. Why? This seems inherently unanswerable. Norman - Original Message - From: Hal Finney [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, November 15, 2003 11:12 PM Subject: Re: Why is there something instead of nothing? How do you know the premise is true, that there is something instead of nothing? Maybe there could be both something and nothing. Or maybe the existence of nothing is consistent with our own experiences. I don't think all these terms are well enough defined for the question to have meaning in its simple form. It's easy to put words together, but not all gramatically correct sentences are meaningful. Hal Finney
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
This question seems unanswerable, but set theorists have tried (though
that might not be how they view their own endeavours): One interpretation of
the universe of constructible sets found in standard set theory textbooks is
that even if you start with nothing, you can say that's a thing, and put
brackets around it and then you've got two things: nothing and {nothing}.
And then you also have {nothing and {nothing}}. Proceeding in this manner
you get a mathematical structure equivalent to numbers, a structure which in
turn is known to contain unimaginable richness and texture, in which
mathematical physicists (like me) attempt to 'find' the structures of our
universe embedded.
-Chris C
- Original Message -
From: Norman Samish [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Sunday, November 16, 2003 6:09 PM
Subject: Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
Hal Finney,
Thanks for the thought. I know that there is something instead of nothing
by using Descartes reasoning. (From
http://teachanimalobjectivity.homestead.com/files/return2.htm) The only
thing Descartes found certain was the fact he was thinking. He further
felt
that thought was not a thing-in-itself, and had to proceed from somewhere
(viz., cause and effect), therefore since he was thinking the thoughts, he
existed --by extension--also. Hence, thought and extension were the
very
beginnings from which all things proceeded, Cogito ergo sum (I think
therefore I am).
I don't understand how there can be both something and nothing. Perhaps I
don't understand what you mean by nothing. By nothing I mean no
thing,
not even empty space.
In other words, it is conceivable to me that the multiverse need not
exist.
Yet it does. Why? This seems inherently unanswerable.
Norman
- Original Message -
From: Hal Finney [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Saturday, November 15, 2003 11:12 PM
Subject: Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
How do you know the premise is true, that there is something instead
of nothing? Maybe there could be both something and nothing. Or maybe
the existence of nothing is consistent with our own experiences.
I don't think all these terms are well enough defined for the question
to have meaning in its simple form. It's easy to put words together,
but not all gramatically correct sentences are meaningful.
Hal Finney
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
Norman Samish wrote: ... I don't understand how there can be both something and nothing. Perhaps I don't understand what you mean by nothing. By nothing I mean no thing, not even empty space. I think of it this way. 1. Information (a strange and inappropriately anthropocentric word - it should just be called differences) is the most fundamental thing. 2. The plenitude, or multiverse (of possible worlds) can be conceived of as the potential for all possible information states or in other words, all possible sets of differences, or in otherwords, an infinite length qu-bitstring simultaneously exhibiting all of its possible states. 3. In that conception, nothing is just the special state of the qu-bitstring in which all of the bits are 0 (or 1 - there are two possible nothings, but they are equivalent, since 1 is defined only in its opposition to 0 and vice versa.) That is, in that conception, nothing is a universe in which there is no difference, and thus no structure. i.e. That state of the bitstring has zero entropy, or zero information. So it is truely nothing. 4. but that special state of the qu-bitstring is only one of the 2 to the power (bitstring-length) simultaneously existing information-states of the qu-bitstring. And some of the other sets of information-states are our universe (i.e. something.) and similar universes (everything? or at least everything of note.)
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
Does this question have an answer? I think the question shows there is a limit to our understanding of things and is unanswerable. Does anybody disagree? Norman The less anything is, the less we know it: how invisible, how unintelligible a thing, then, is this Nothing! John Donne The Nothing will come of nothing, of King Lear, seems in trouble, since von Neumann identified zero with the empty set and then identified one with the set which contains the empty set ... et cetera. And J.Conway defined a new family of numbers constructed out of sequences of binary choices. But is zero, or the empty set = nothing? H ... definitely not for John Donne.
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
Dear Norman, Perhaps because Nothingness can not non-exist. Stephen - Original Message - From: Eric Hawthorne [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Norman Samish [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, November 16, 2003 3:19 PM Subject: Re: Why is there something instead of nothing? Norman Samish wrote: ... I don't understand how there can be both something and nothing. Perhaps I don't understand what you mean by nothing. By nothing I mean no thing, not even empty space. I think of it this way. 1. Information (a strange and inappropriately anthropocentric word - it should just be called differences) is the most fundamental thing. 2. The plenitude, or multiverse (of possible worlds) can be conceived of as the potential for all possible information states or in other words, all possible sets of differences, or in otherwords, an infinite length qu-bitstring simultaneously exhibiting all of its possible states. 3. In that conception, nothing is just the special state of the qu-bitstring in which all of the bits are 0 (or 1 - there are two possible nothings, but they are equivalent, since 1 is defined only in its opposition to 0 and vice versa.) That is, in that conception, nothing is a universe in which there is no difference, and thus no structure. i.e. That state of the bitstring has zero entropy, or zero information. So it is truely nothing. 4. but that special state of the qu-bitstring is only one of the 2 to the power (bitstring-length) simultaneously existing information-states of the qu-bitstring. And some of the other sets of information-states are our universe (i.e. something.) and similar universes (everything? or at least everything of note.)
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
The answer I prefer is to say that the Nothing and the Everything are the same Thing. (or rather that they are complementary aspects of the same thing). Its a bit mystical I know, but the inspiration comes from the notion of duality in Category theory - for example in the theory of Venn diagrams, the universal set and the empty set are closely related (one can find a transformation whereby any theorem expressed in terms of universal sets can be transformed into an equivalent theorem containing empty sets). Hal Ruhl tried a theory based on logical contradictions inherent in nothings and evrything, that he posted on this list, which was kind of interesting... Cheers Eric Hawthorne wrote: In the spirit of this list, one might instead phrase the question as: Why is there everything instead of nothing? As soon as we have that there is everything, then we have that some aspects of everything will mold themselves into observable universes. It is unsatisfying though true to observe that there of course cannot be a case in which the question itself can be asked, and there simultaneously be nothing in that universe. I'm with the last respondent though in thinking that the right answer is that there is BOTH nothing and everything, but that the nothing is necessarily inherently unobservable by curious questioners like ourselves. Norman Samish wrote: Why is there something instead of nothing? Does this question have an answer? I think the question shows there is a limit to our understanding of things and is unanswerable. Does anybody disagree? Norman A/Prof Russell Standish Director High Performance Computing Support Unit, Phone 9385 6967, 8308 3119 (mobile) UNSW SYDNEY 2052 Fax 9385 6965, 0425 253119 () Australia[EMAIL PROTECTED] Room 2075, Red Centrehttp://parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/rks International prefix +612, Interstate prefix 02
Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
John Collins wrote:
One interpretation of
the universe of constructible sets found in standard set theory textbooks is
that even if you start with nothing, you can say that's a thing, and put
brackets around it and then you've got two things: nothing and {nothing}.
And then you also have {nothing and {nothing}}
Why start with nothing? Isn't this arbitrary?
In fact zero information = all possibilities and all information = 0
possibility.
of course, (0 possibility) = 1 possibililty
What is not arbitrary? Certainly anything is arbitrary. The least
arbitrary seems to be everything which is in fact zero information.
.
Start with the set(everything) and start deriving your numbers.
To do this, instead of using the operation set( ), use the operation
elementof( ).
Hence one=elementof(everything) and two = elementof(everything - one);
three = elementof(everything - one - two)
George
RE: Why is there something instead of nothing?
The set of everything U is ill defined.
Given set A, we expect to be able to define the subset { x is element of
A | p(x) } where p(x) is some predicate on x.
Therefore given U, we expect to be able to write S = { x an element of U
| x is not an element of x }
Now ask whether S is an element of S.
- David
-Original Message-
From: George Levy [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Monday, 17 November 2003 2:15 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Why is there something instead of nothing?
John Collins wrote:
One interpretation of
the universe of constructible sets found in standard set theory
textbooks
is
that even if you start with nothing, you can say that's a thing,
and
put
brackets around it and then you've got two things: nothing and
{nothing}.
And then you also have {nothing and {nothing}}
Why start with nothing? Isn't this arbitrary?
In fact zero information = all possibilities and all information = 0
possibility.
of course, (0 possibility) = 1 possibililty
What is not arbitrary? Certainly anything is arbitrary. The least
arbitrary seems to be everything which is in fact zero information.
.
Start with the set(everything) and start deriving your numbers.
To do this, instead of using the operation set( ), use the operation
elementof( ).
Hence one=elementof(everything) and two = elementof(everything - one);
three = elementof(everything - one - two)
George
