The Ultimate Question - Why is there something rather than nothing?

Are you sure about this one? Isn't a "state"* something? Don't we have a problem with the idea of nothingness existing, as this would give it the state of existence?To put it another way, wouldn't nothingness involve the absence of everything? But isn't absence a state, meaning that in nothingness something is present? Therefore, not everything is absent.Have you got a headache yet? The word nothing may be a nonsense term. Whenever we use it to describe a real area (there's nothing in the room; there's nothing in space) there is always actually something.If I'm right, then the answer to your question would be "necessity". Pure nothing can't be real, because reality is something.*Nothing is No thing. I just looked up "thing", and the fifth definition in the first online dictionary that came up uses your exact phrase: "state of affairs". a fact, circumstance, or state of affairs: It is a curious thing.Thing Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.comNo-thing perhaps would be a curious and self-inconsistent thing, and a strange state of affairs.

"Nothingness" may actually just be one of our ideas. I'd be the last person to suggest that "ideas" would exist without matter and energy, and without biological creatures there to have them. Try GDR for that. But I suppose I am talking about abstracts.The difficulty seems to be that if we try to conceive pure nothingness, we come up with something. We have phrases like " there was nothing but emptiness". In that phrase, emptiness is seen as the exception to nothing; as something.If we use a phrase like "in the beginning, there was nothing", we've used a tense of the verb "to be", and turned "nothing" into something which existed, because it "was".Someone might claim "there could be such a thing as pure nothingness", but they've implied that nothingness would be a thing (not a no-thing) if it did exist.Maybe we don't have the language to cope with real "nothing" (another contradictory phrase).

Yes. And the O.P. question "Why is there something rather than nothing" implies that nothing could "be", giving it existence.I basically agree with Doc A. in the O.P. that we can't really sort the question out. However, it wouldn't make much of a thread if we didn't try. So, I'm trying to make the case for pure nothing being self-inconsistent.

I can imagine an infinite regression of absences of absences of absences, but isn't that rather a lot of nothing?

And I thought I was giving people headaches. One thing we can be sure of, even if true nothing could exist, the only place it could do it is nowhere.

The O.P. asked the interesting question "Why is there something rather than nothing". It doesn't ask "tell me a story about something making something".The O.P.'s in English, Black Cat.Giving your explanation of something making something has nothing to do with the subject of the thread.

Yes. But have you understood them? He's asking "why is there something rather than nothing". The part you replied to was his explanation that the question, fairly obviously, cannot be answered by evoking a thing of any kind as an explanation.What you quoted from W. L. Craig was about a design inference not having to explain the designer. But Adequate's question cannot be explained by design, because design is something.The state of there being something rather than nothing cannot be explained by any thing.

It wasn't faulty. The question of why there are things rather than no things cannot be answered by evoking a thing. So you haven't actually offered an explanation.Concentrate. A thing making other things is not an explanation of why there are things rather then no things at all.

I'm beginning to think that the question actually is answerable. Non-existent things can't actually be. So, a state of "no things" cannot exist/be. Because the O.P. question asks "Why is there....", using the verb to be, the answer must be necessity for "something". By definition.Q: "Why is there something rather than nothing".
A: There must be something because "nothing" cannot exist by definition.If I'm right, it's interesting, because that question is common, and it would be useful to have a neat little answer.It seems to be impossible to use the verb "to be" with "nothing" as you've done in the sentence above "there would be nothing if there were no things" without turning "nothing" into a being, and therefore something.Perhaps true nothing just can't be.

Did you try it? It appears that God is just as nonsensical as some of his EvC followers.Me:
why is there something rather than nothing?God:
Why do I exist?Me:
YesGod:
This was not a yes or no question.Me:
why do you exist?God:
Good metaphysical question.Me:
That is not an answerGod:
By definition it was an answer.Me:
It did not address the questionGod:
Did it really?Me:
No, it didn't. Why do you exist?God:
Are you serious? Did it really? Good metaphysical question.Me:
Are you omniscient?God:
I don't know whether or not I am omniscient.
I am a robot.Me:
Who made you?God:
I was created by Myself.Me:
Why did you create yourself?God:
It was determined by my programming.Me:
Why does the programming exist?God:
Why does the sun shine?Me:
I give upGod:
You surrender?Me:
No. I give up on asking you why there's something rather than nothingGod:
Are you serious? Thanks for the information: said give up on asking you why there is something rather than nothing.Have a go folks. God is here

So what would your answer to the O.P. question be?If I answer: "Why is there something rather than nothing?" with:"Because nothing, by definition, cannot be."Is there anything wrong with my answer?If we wanted to phrase the question in a way that's truly unanswerable, wouldn't it be better to avoid the verb "to be" and say: "Why existence?"

Isn't reality a thing?

The O.P. question asks about nothing's existence. So, doesn't your point apply to the question, and doesn't my answer agree with you?

There can certainly be an absence of anything specific in your backyard.So where can the absence of everything be, other than nowhere?

Have you tried giving a coherent answer to the question in the way that you understand it? And I certainly accept that nothing is not a thing.Try an answer:Why, Paul, is there something rather than nothing?