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Author | Topic: The Ultimate Question - Why is there something rather than nothing? | |||||||||||||||||||
bluegenes Member (Idle past 2505 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
tubbyparticle writes: Nothing defines reality when nothing else defines it. Isn't reality a thing?
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: What do you mean by "reality"? If you mean "all the things that are real" then it obviously only has a referential if at least one thing exists. If you ,dan something more abstract, why would you think that it is a "thing"?
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
I'd ask you to explain what you mean, but it does look as if you are begging the question in exactly the way I suggest. Nothing is not a thing, therefore to talk about it existing or not, as a thing - as you seem to be doing - is obviously wrong.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 312 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
If I answer: "Why is there something rather than nothing?" with: "Because nothing, by definition, cannot be." Is there anything wrong with my answer? Yes. See posts #147 and #149.
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bluegenes Member (Idle past 2505 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
PaulK writes: I'd ask you to explain what you mean, but it does look as if you are begging the question in exactly the way I suggest. Nothing is not a thing, therefore to talk about it existing or not, as a thing - as you seem to be doing - is obviously wrong. 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?
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: I would suggest that you are being overly pedantic here and misinterpreting the question as a result. We can only make sense of the question if we accept that nothing is not a thing. Therefore my point does not apply to the question if it is properly understood.
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bluegenes Member (Idle past 2505 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
Adequate writes: Can there be a complete absence of unicorns in my back yard? By your reasoning, no. "Complete absence", you would tell us, "indicates a lack of a subject", and "be", you say "indicates the presence of a subject" ... so an absence of unicorns cannot be. Well then, where are the unicorns? You're just confusing yourself with grammar. There can certainly be an absence of anything specific in your backyard. So where can the absence of everything be, other than nowhere?
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bluegenes Member (Idle past 2505 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
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?
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 312 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
There can certainly be an absence of anything specific in your backyard. So where can the absence of everything be, other than nowhere? Everywhere? Like the absence of unicorns? Of course, if there was no space, then everywhere and nowhere would be synonymous.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
Sure, I have. Aside from the attempts to show that it is logically impossible that no things exist (which seem to generally rely on the error of treating nothing as a thing) the only possible answer seems to be to appeal to a brute fact. As I explained right back at the start of the thread.
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bluegenes Member (Idle past 2505 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
Dr Adequate writes: Everywhere? Like the absence of unicorns? Everywhere is somewhere (or lots of somewheres), and somewhere is something.
Of course, if there was no space, then everywhere and nowhere would be synonymous. Space (and any place) is something. So:
Only nowhere can there be an absence of everything. Time is something, so, even better:
Only nowhere and never can there be an absence of everything. Can we make a case for "necessity" as the answer to the O.P. question? I think it's beginning to look like it.
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bluegenes Member (Idle past 2505 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
PaulK writes: Sure, I have. Aside from the attempts to show that it is logically impossible that no things exist (which seem to generally rely on the error of treating nothing as a thing) the only possible answer seems to be to appeal to a brute fact. I'll certainly agree that nothing, by definition, is not a thing, but no-thing. I've been treating "existence" as a state of things. So there doesn't seem to be a need to treat "nothing" as a thing. Quite the opposite.
Nothing is not a thing, and therefore cannot have the state of existence by definition. Something is necessary.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 312 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Space (and any place) is something. So: Only nowhere can there be an absence of everything. Time is something, so, even better: Only nowhere and never can there be an absence of everything. And if there was, it would be true to say: "Everywhere and at all times there is an absence of everything." The fact that these superficially look like opposites is that you are used to a situation in which space and time do exist, and your use of language reflects that. (Consider the fact that in logic it is correct to say both that all unicorns are pink and that no unicorns are pink --- so long as unicorns don't exist.) Like Catholic Scientist, you are tacitly taking the syntax and semantics of the English language to be significant to the question. But it really isn't. It would not in fact be self-contradictory for there to be no time or no space. Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given. Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Treating existence as a property is another mistake, which allows defining things into existence. Worse, your argument is self-contradictory, because it explicitly denies that nothing is a thing while implicitly assuming that it is. If nothing is not a thing then there is no need for it to exist as such. This is the point of the post starting this subthread.
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bluegenes Member (Idle past 2505 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
Dr Adequate writes: bluegenes writes: Only nowhere and never can there be an absence of everything. And if there was, it would be true to say: "Everywhere and at all times there is an absence of everything." The fact that these superficially look like opposites is that you are used to a situation in which space and time do exist, and your use of language reflects that. Carry that thinking through, and it would also be true to say in those hypothetical circumstances "everywhere and at all times there is everything". So, in nothingness, if nowhere becomes everywhere, and no time becomes all times, no-things become everything. Perhaps the problem is that you phrased the O.P. question in space-time language, where things "be", so we have to contemplate the paradox of the being/existence of no-things.
Like Catholic Scientist, you are tacitly taking the syntax and semantics of the English language to be significant to the question. But it really isn't. It would not in fact be self-contradictory for there to be no time or no space. I think that the same problems would exist in all languages, but that you'd have a good point if you said that human languages come from beings in space-time, and we may automatically have a problem in discussing true nothingness. Nowhere men (all the men who exist in nothingness) would have all the necessary words (all the words there) to describe all of it, of course, and all the time necessary to contemplate everything that's there. And all the unicorns would be pink (as well non-pink) as you point out.
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