Freethought & Rationalism Archive

DRFseven · 01-18-2002, 09:17 PM

Quote:

Joedad: My own opinion? "Nothingness" and ex nihilo are fantasy.

joe

"The Candyman can 'cause he mixes it with love and makes the world taste good." - (sung by) Sammy Davis, Jr.

Hats off, Joedad; you win. I'm seriouns. a little drunk but serious.

Laurentius · 01-19-2002, 10:17 AM

I (still) abide by the triad:

The linguistic nothing is just a word, nothing more.

The notional nothing is an evasive thought, hardly a meaningful one.

The physical nothing is the vacuum.

The vacuum presents various degrees of excitation at different times, which is believed to lead to the popping out of ephemeral particles that may “survive” if specific conditions allow it, a phenomenon which may allow the (either gradual or sudden)formation of the structures responsible for the evolution of the universe as we know it.
AVE

hinduwoman · 01-23-2002, 06:04 PM

I don't think it is possible for an existing creature to know what nothing is. Even if we are suddenly dumped into a'nothing' space, it would be no longer nothing but a place with something, namely me , in it.

SteveD · 01-23-2002, 08:09 PM

Laurentius,
If a vacuum can have degrees of excitation how can you then consider it to be nothing? Wouldn't the exitation be "something"?

Steve

citpeks · 01-30-2002, 05:39 PM

A concern: It is very difficult to talk about nothing, for the reason that English treats it to be something.
Let me explain. I take it that nothing has no properties and cannot have any properties. But, notice that the preceding sentence treated nothing as a thing that has a property (having no properties.) Yet, I take it that having no properties is not a properties.
So, we must be extremely careful here. Merely by talking about nothing in English, we may be misunderstanding what is meant by nothing. It is simply impossible to talk about nothing without treating it as something (this sentence included.)

Francois Tremblay · 01-30-2002, 05:45 PM

Tsk tsk, talking about nothingness as if it can exist... can you spell "fallacy of reification of the zero" ? (^_^)

Existence is a constant. To posit anything "before" existence is meaningless.

joedad · 01-30-2002, 09:21 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by citpeks:
<strong>A concern: It is very difficult to talk about nothing, for the reason that English treats it to be something.
Let me explain. I take it that nothing has no properties and cannot have any properties. But, notice that the preceding sentence treated nothing as a thing that has a property (having no properties.) Yet, I take it that having no properties is not a properties.
So, we must be extremely careful here. Merely by talking about nothing in English, we may be misunderstanding what is meant by nothing. It is simply impossible to talk about nothing without treating it as something (this sentence included.)</strong>

Yes. It seems that the default setting for "nothingness" is "somethingness."

joe

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01-19-2002, 10:17 AM	#12
Laurentius Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Lucky Bucky, Oz Posts: 5,645	I (still) abide by the triad: The linguistic nothing is just a word, nothing more. The notional nothing is an evasive thought, hardly a meaningful one. The physical nothing is the vacuum. The vacuum presents various degrees of excitation at different times, which is believed to lead to the popping out of ephemeral particles that may “survive” if specific conditions allow it, a phenomenon which may allow the (either gradual or sudden)formation of the structures responsible for the evolution of the universe as we know it. AVE

01-23-2002, 06:04 PM	#13
hinduwoman Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: India Posts: 6,977	I don't think it is possible for an existing creature to know what nothing is. Even if we are suddenly dumped into a'nothing' space, it would be no longer nothing but a place with something, namely me , in it.

01-23-2002, 08:09 PM	#14
SteveD Regular Member Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: California Posts: 118	Laurentius, If a vacuum can have degrees of excitation how can you then consider it to be nothing? Wouldn't the exitation be "something"? Steve

01-30-2002, 05:39 PM	#15
citpeks New Member Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 2	A concern: It is very difficult to talk about nothing, for the reason that English treats it to be something. Let me explain. I take it that nothing has no properties and cannot have any properties. But, notice that the preceding sentence treated nothing as a thing that has a property (having no properties.) Yet, I take it that having no properties is not a properties. So, we must be extremely careful here. Merely by talking about nothing in English, we may be misunderstanding what is meant by nothing. It is simply impossible to talk about nothing without treating it as something (this sentence included.)

01-30-2002, 05:45 PM	#16
Francois Tremblay Banned Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: Montreal, QC Canada Posts: 876	Tsk tsk, talking about nothingness as if it can exist... can you spell "fallacy of reification of the zero" ? (^_^) Existence is a constant. To posit anything "before" existence is meaningless.

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