+- Scivillage.com Casual Discussion Science Forum (https://www.scivillage.com)
+-- Forum: Science (https://www.scivillage.com/forum-61.html)
+--- Forum: Logic, Metaphysics & Philosophy (https://www.scivillage.com/forum-80.html)
+--- Thread: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy (/thread-15099.html)
Pages:
1
2
The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - Magical Realist - Dec 12, 2023
The deepest question in all philosophy is "Why is there something instead of nothing?" Many philosophers have struggled to answer this. Some have even claimed it cannot be answered. But I find the following answer efficient and sufficient:
"The easiest way to show that there must be something rather than nothing is to try to define nothing. Nothing must have no properties: No size. No shape. No position. No mass-energy, forces, wave forms, or anything else you can think of. No time, no past, no present, no future. And finally, no existence. Therefore there must be something. And this is it."
Larry Curley, Sawtry, Huntingdon, UK
https://philosophynow.org/issues/125/Why_Is_There_Something_Rather_Than_Nothing
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - Syne - Dec 13, 2023
Nah, that's just the old fallacy of "if there was ever nothing, there would still be nothing."
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - Zinjanthropos - Dec 13, 2023
There’s many versions of this but:
“There’s always a possibility”
How true? idk…in a quantum universe? Is there a quantum nothing?
https://bigthink.com/hard-science/nothing-exist-quantum-foam/
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - geordief - Dec 13, 2023
If we can only define "nothing" by reference to something then "nothing" has no absolute meaning and we have to ask "nothing with regard to what?"
(similarly with "everything")
Of course we can define "nothing" any way we choose. So we are really just discussing "which definition?"
There is an old joke on "Nobody" in Homer's Oddyssey where Oddyseus makes his escape by telling the Cyclops "My name is Nobody" - typical naval standard humour.
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - Zinjanthropos - Dec 13, 2023
(Dec 13, 2023 03:07 PM)geordief Wrote: If we can only define "nothing" by reference to something then "nothing" has no absolute meaning and we have to ask "nothing with regard to what?"
(similarly with "everything")
Hey geo, good to hear from you now and again.
Speaking of nothing…
I don’t think the past exists, and I don’t think the future exists until I get to the present, but the present I never experience as it arrives because it zips by while I’m still digesting the most recent past events(presents).
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - C C - Dec 13, 2023
(Dec 12, 2023 10:20 PM)Magical Realist Wrote: The deepest question in all philosophy is "Why is there something instead of nothing?" Many philosophers have struggled to answer this. Some have even claimed it cannot be answered. But I find the following answer efficient and sufficient:
"The easiest way to show that there must be something rather than nothing is to try to define nothing. Nothing must have no properties: No size. No shape. No position. No mass-energy, forces, wave forms, or anything else you can think of. No time, no past, no present, no future. And finally, no existence. Therefore there must be something. And this is it."
Larry Curley, Sawtry, Huntingdon, UK
https://philosophynow.org/issues/125/Why_Is_There_Something_Rather_Than_Nothing
Via the "is" addressing both as alternatives, the question is conflictingly asserting that nothing ("absence of absolutely everything") is a form of being itself. Even if you deviate to interpret "nothing" as a blank placeholder that can be potentially filled, that placeholder is thereby treated as something (a be-ing). The generality of the latter is accordingly already substantiated by that specific item (a slot that exists waiting to be occupied by other existential affairs).
Non-consciousness (by death or whatever) would achieve "absence of everything", but that does not equate to an objective world not existing. It merely means there is no representation of that world occurring, that is augmented with a cognitive apparatus that can validate that the representation is present or manifesting.
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - geordief - Dec 13, 2023
(Dec 13, 2023 08:59 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote:(Dec 13, 2023 03:07 PM)geordief Wrote: If we can only define "nothing" by reference to something then "nothing" has no absolute meaning and we have to ask "nothing with regard to what?"
(similarly with "everything")
Hey geo, good to hear from you now and again.
I don’t think the past exists anymore, and I don’t think the future exists until I get to the present, but the present I never experience as it arrives because it zips by while I’m still digesting the most recent past events(presents).
Hard to tell whether that is an objective analysis or an attempt to lay out a subjective experience.(both?)
Part of it seems to chime with what is the latest trend these last few years ,mindfulness.
I haven't worked out what that is supposed to be ,but it seems to be sometimes described as living (being?)in the present.
You seem to be saying that the present is/feels like something of a candle burnt away at both ends.
I may have seen a description of the present as when there are no thoughts but just an awareness of being(being something)
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - Zinjanthropos - Dec 14, 2023
(Dec 13, 2023 10:13 PM)geordief Wrote:(Dec 13, 2023 08:59 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote:(Dec 13, 2023 03:07 PM)geordief Wrote: If we can only define "nothing" by reference to something then "nothing" has no absolute meaning and we have to ask "nothing with regard to what?"
(similarly with "everything")
Hey geo, good to hear from you now and again.
I don’t think the past exists anymore, and I don’t think the future exists until I get to the present, but the present I never experience as it arrives because it zips by while I’m still digesting the most recent past events(presents).
Hard to tell whether that is an objective analysis or an attempt to lay out a subjective experience.(both?)
Part of it seems to chime with what is the latest trend these last few years ,mindfulness.
I haven't worked out what that is supposed to be ,but it seems to be sometimes described as living (being?)in the present.
You seem to be saying that the present is/feels like something of a candle burnt away at both ends.
I may have seen a description of the present as when there are no thoughts but just an awareness of being(being something)
Just asking if something isn’t real does it exist and, if something doesn’t exist is it something? IOW does something not real mean it’s nothing?
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - geordief - Dec 14, 2023
(Dec 14, 2023 03:09 AM)Zinjanthropos Wrote:(Dec 13, 2023 10:13 PM)geordief Wrote:(Dec 13, 2023 08:59 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote:(Dec 13, 2023 03:07 PM)geordief Wrote: If we can only define "nothing" by reference to something then "nothing" has no absolute meaning and we have to ask "nothing with regard to what?"
(similarly with "everything")
Hey geo, good to hear from you now and again.
I don’t think the past exists anymore, and I don’t think the future exists until I get to the present, but the present I never experience as it arrives because it zips by while I’m still digesting the most recent past events(presents).
Hard to tell whether that is an objective analysis or an attempt to lay out a subjective experience.(both?)
Part of it seems to chime with what is the latest trend these last few years ,mindfulness.
I haven't worked out what that is supposed to be ,but it seems to be sometimes described as living (being?)in the present.
You seem to be saying that the present is/feels like something of a candle burnt away at both ends.
I may have seen a description of the present as when there are no thoughts but just an awareness of being(being something)
Just asking if something isn’t real does it exist and, if something doesn’t exist is it something? IOW does something not real mean it’s nothing?
Are you asking ,eg whether the Christian god exists because there is a belief that it does even though it is pretty obvious that this belief is wrong?
I think obviously the belief exists and so the concept exists.There are real life consequences to that belief and the forms that belief takes.
Again ,the emperor had no clothes and only one person saw this clearly(to believe the story).
Prior to the child exclaiming "the emperor has no clothes" was he in fact clothed?
Which is superior ?The reality of the mind or the inconvenient external data that was knocking at the door but nobody was opening it?
When I was interviewed for University it was for a language and philosophy course.
They asked me a question I have since forgotten but I answered "if they thought they were right then they were right"(a kind of an internal logic that appealed to me then-and perhaps that I thought would show me as a deep thinker)
Anyway they followed it up with "Was Hitler right?" which I answered according to the same logic "Yes,if he thought he was right"
I passed the interview (got accepted) but I wondered since whether they may have liked my answer a little "too much"-I didn't like them very much ,anyway.
RE: The most fundamental question in all of philosophy - Syne - Dec 14, 2023
People usually don't really dissect what we mean by "nothing." I start from a usage standpoint. What do you mean, or are referring to, when you say "nothing." It is correct that "nothing" has a context (in reference to what), but few seem to really delve into what that context would be. For example, if someone shows you an empty box and asks what's in it, you'd naturally say "nothing." The context is the box, but more so, the context is the potential of the box. You wouldn't normally say there was nothing in a solid cube, but you recognize a capacity of a box's space. So "nothing," in an everyday context is really synonymous with potential. The only difference between our common, contextual "nothing" and an absolute "nothing" is the magnitude of potential.