We are grateful to everyone who has left a response.
1. Why is there something rather than nothing?
- Is it meaningful?
- Can it be definitively answered one day?
- What are the philosophical implications in either of the cases of it being answered or not answered?
- Any suggestions for an answer, however outlandish?
The Parmenideum's Reply
Reality is in a state of quantum superposition, instantiating both a void and existence. This is more or less the Democritean answer, but the question is why?
Meaningful?
The question is not totally meaningless since our suggestion for an answer (below) allows that nothingness is possible, provided that "somethingness" is also possible.
Definitive Answer?
If we intend to answer the question as to why anything exists at all - whether a universe, a multiverse or a transcendental realm in which abstract truths reside (as some people claim there is) - then this question is very likely unanswerable. Though we do have a stab below.
Implications
As far as getting along with one's life, the philosophical implications of anything to do with this question are unimportant. But this is not true of any religious/spiritual implications, since god is a worse explanation for either of the scenarios of existence ex-nihilo or existence eternally. Apart from this, the question is probably simply excellent for contemplation.
An Answer!
We suggest that if there is going to be an answer then it will involve some form of quantum thinking, but that it will be very much weirder than anything even wildly conceivable at present. One suggestion is that reality plays an eternal and timeless game of "flip-flop", in which it oscillates between being and not-being. These oscillations beat out a random pattern of timeless, dimensionless, abstract points that can be assigned values of zero's and ones. The resulting "population" of binary flip-flop points will, quite randomly, somewhere contain the code of an entire universe or multiverse. In effect, the flip-flopping constitutes some kind of hyper universal Turing machine.
Why "flip-flop"?
Why reality should actually "be" is quite straightforward according to current quantum theory: because it can. Quantum theory states that it is possible for something to pop into existence ex-nihilo provided the total sum is zero. However, why should it flip-flop between being and not-being? The answer to this is also "because it can". If quantum physics allows that something can pop into existence from nothing, then it should surely permit that it could pop back out of existence. Time is not a factor and in fact reality can be considered to be an eternally enduring, infinite and timeless dimensionless population of binary points that look as if they have been generated by a flip-flopping process.
The discussion of this "random state space" is rather longer than what we have room for here. We hope to post an article on it soon.
Written by The Parmenideum |
