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

"There is no reason" is just another way of saying that the question (O.P. version) is unanswerable. No thing can be evoked to answer it, unlike the "contingent things" version, which can accept a theoretical necessary being.Grnbaum isn't proposing that the question can be properly answered. He's questioning the question. He's claiming that it poses a "pseudo problem". (That's both versions of the question).For analogy: "Why are there birds rather than angels?"That's unanswerable, and suggests an alternative reality with angels flying around instead of birds. When we're seriously inquiring into the nature and origin of "birds", we don't need such a question.A much better "ultimate question" might be something like: "What exactly is the universe and why is it as it is?" That's unanswerable at the moment, and may always be, but at least we can explore it and improve on existing explanationsDo we really need to ask: "why does this reality exist rather than one of our fantasies?"Well, exactly. That's another way of saying the same thing. That's why Leibniz refines the question into "why are there contingent things rather than no contingent things".Absolute nothingness (the "null world" of the O.P. version) forbids logical inconsistency, just as it forbids anything else (including "necessity").Whether or not the O.P. version has built in unanswerability (I think it does - unless taken completely literally as I did earlier in the thread), Grnbaum's "pseudo-problem" point applies to both versions. Edited by bluegenes, : typo - wrong word!

A good way to view this is that something and nothing are post-universe duality counterparts, whereby one part cannot exist without the other part. There is no something or nothing pre-universe. 'THING' is a corporeal entity and limited to this finite realm.

Ah! Right. That's that sorted, then.

Sure that's that. But if you want to go complicated, I'll take you on.

You could start by explaining what "pre-universe" means.

quote:

---

"There is no reason" is just another way of saying that the question (O.P. version) is unanswerable. No thing can be evoked to answer it, unlike the "contingent things" version, which can accept a theoretical necessary being.

---

Giving an answer rather disproves the claim that the question is unanswerable. Aside from that you're really only repeating points that I've already made.

quote:

---

Grnbaum isn't proposing that the question can be properly answered. He's questioning the question. He's claiming that it poses a "pseudo problem". (That's both versions of the question).

---

As I understand it Grunbaum is only arguing against the assumption that we should expect nothingness to exist, in the absence of a necessary entity or entities causing contingent entities to exist. That is reasonable, but doesn't establish that the question is silly without the apologetic baggage that Grunbaum is answering.

quote:

---

Well, exactly. That's another way of saying the same thing

---

Only in the same sense as "you are dead wrong and here's proof" is saying the same thing as "you're right"

quote:

---

Absolute nothingness (the "null world" of the O.P. version) forbids logical inconsistency, just as it forbids anything else (including "necessity").

---

Only given both your dubious reading of the question and the assumption that abstracts exist.

quote:

---

Whether or not the O.P. version has built in unanswerability (I think it does - unless taken completely literally as I did earlier in the thread), Grnbaum's "pseudo-problem" point applies to both versions.

---

Your assertion that the question is unanswerable has been disproven, and Grunbaum's point seems limited to attempts to argue that some necessary entity must exist.

quote:

---

You could start by explaining what "pre-universe" means.

---

Prior to this finite universe emerging.

An unsupported claim ("there's no reason") isn't an answer to the question "why is it a fact that there's something rather than nothing".The O.P. version of the question cannot be answered by anything (any-thing). That relies on your dubious reading of what I said, which was that "necessity could only be demonstrated in the context of the something world", which, to me, implies pretty much this: In other words, the O.P. version cannot be answered by "necessity", which requires a necessary thing(s). I think we both assume that abstracts don't exist in the absence of something concrete. "Necessity", therefore, cannot apply in the "null world" of the O.P. question, although it can in Leibniz's modified version. I missed the "disproof". Grnbaum is really questioning the validity of suggesting that angels might have been there rather than birds merely because we can perceive such a state of affairs as logically possible.

How can anything be "prior" to time?

quote:

---

An unsupported claim ("there's no reason") isn't an answer to the question "why is it a fact that there's something rather than nothing".

---

Of course it isn't unsupported at all, because I supported it right back at the start of the thread. But even if you were right about the lack of support that it would not disqualify it as a possible answer. Indeed what you are saying is that an answer not shown to be true cannot possibly be true which is obviously fallacious.

quote:

---

That relies on your dubious reading of what I said, which was that "necessity could only be demonstrated in the context of the something world", which, to me, implies pretty much this

---

In which case I have to ask whether you are being stupid or just trolling. In fact your version of the "nothing world" IS logically impossible from your own arguments. That is one of the reasons I regard your reading as wrong.

quote:

---

In other words, the O.P. version cannot be answered by "necessity", which requires a necessary thing(s).

---

Do you really fail to understand the difference between am argument and an answer ? Or the difference between an assumption and a supported conclusion ? Proposing necessity as a possible answer is not an argument and so can't beg the question. A successful argument that something necessarily existed would make that a conclusion not an assumption.

quote:

---

I think we both assume that abstracts don't exist in the absence of something concrete. "Necessity", therefore, cannot apply in the "null world" of the O.P. question, although it can in Leibniz's modified version.

---

My view is somewhat different. However it is irrelevant, because if it truly were necessary that something exist the null world could not exist anyway. Unless you assume that the "nothing world" is basic - and you say that you don't - the objection can't arise.

quote:

---

I missed the "disproof".

---

You didn't see the possible answers ? Odd when you seem quite desperate to dismiss them.

Time, like space, and anything contained in this uni, is post-uni. A finite cannot contain an infinite component.

If we know that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, why can we not say that there has always been something?If there has always been something, isn't that a sufficient reason for there being something rather than nothing?

There is something rather than nothing because the state of "nothing" is UNSTABLE.

It's far more intriguing to confront the reality facing us. The uni is absolutely finite - its exapanding, which says it wasn't infinite 10 seconds ago? This says anything contained in this universe could not have existed pre-universe: this includes phenomenons and faculties such as space, time, light, energy, history, geography, laws and the sciences. In this scenario, things never existed; so no-thing is a counterpart of some-thing; both are moot factors.This is the challenging premise of Genesis and Creationism, but its interest to me is not a theological one, but more a mental grasp of the issue facing humanity outside of theology. There are only two possible scenarios: Creationism or No Creationism. While none are provable, making both legitimate premises, the latter has no alternative answer for us.The big Q arises, what scenario can we imagine or postulate, if the universe is absolutely finite?

My reading is common. And it doesn't make the non-existence of all things impossible. I'm pointing out that the question precludes possible answers. "Something" answers invariably assume the something world.You cannot evoke something, any something, to answer the question: "Why is there something rather than nothing?"That's the point that Adequate makes, correctly IMO, in the O.P.The problem with the question is that it asks for something, (the reason that something exists rather than nothing), making it self-defeating. Whatever something could possibly be given as the answer would itself be subject to the question.When I describe the question as unanswerable, I mean that we cannot provide what it asks for (the reason why there's something rather than nothing). When you give the opinion that there is no reason, you have not answered the question in this sense. Indeed, you've said "there isn't a reason, and therefore no answer".Here's the O.P. again, to save us clicking back. Why do you disagree with the conclusion that the question is unanswerable (not to mention the implication that the question is nonsense)?