The Existance of .. Nothing

[Paradox1]

Guys, this is one thing I've been thinking of for quite a while. Is there such thing as "Nothing"?

By nothing I don't mean "My coffee! It's gone! There's nothing left!", I mean .. Is there, somewhere, a place or location or whatever that is completely devoid of EVERYTHING, including the "building blocks" of life?

Give your ideas people.

[GoshisDead]

I've met some people who i could swear had nothing in their heads, but i really doubt there is a such a thing as nothing, unless there is anti-matter.

[de_budding]

The closest I can get is if all our senses were blocked/disabled, surely we could then claim, we sense nothing.

[Arjen]

Originally Posted by Paradox1

Guys, this is one thing I've been thinking of for quite a while. Is there such thing as "Nothing"?

By nothing I don't mean "My coffee! It's gone! There's nothing left!", I mean .. Is there, somewhere, a place or location or whatever that is completely devoid of EVERYTHING, including the "building blocks" of life?

Give your ideas people.

And what, pray tell, would this nothing be to you? The begin all and end all?

For ex falso sequitur quodlibet.

[Aristoddler]

Descartes based his philosophies on nothing, or the existence of nothing...sorta.

Nothing is a vacuum.
The existence of nothingness would typically suggest that there is something there to represent nothing. A zero is the representative number of nothing. The number ten is represented by the numbers 1 and 0, denoting a 10. The 1 is the space that denotes that you have ten of something, and the 0 is there as a placeholder, because 11-1 would be stupid to use, and we're a step ahead of Roman numerals which uses an X.

204 tells us that we have two hundreds, 4 somethings and nothing representing ten.
199+1 would be dumb.
Yet the Romans wrote it as CC...so who's stupid now?

As a number, nothing is easy to explain the lack of.
In a metaphysical sense, it's a little different...we can have "some" coffee, or a "little" coffee, but to say that you have "no" coffee in your cup, you way as well say you have "no" hay bales in your coffee cup, because it makes just as much sense in the long run.

"Hey mom, I have no snowmen in my pockets, can I have some loose change to fill them with?"

It makes sense to say I have "no" coffee in my cup, because I am suggesting that I would like "some" coffee in my cup, and not milk.
When I say "I have nothing in my cup," then you would ask, "what would you like in your cup?" wouldn't you?
But to tell someone that you have nothing in your cup, then you are simply telling us that you require or want something to be in the place of nothing, and you are not fussy as to what we fill it with.

You ask however, "Is there such thing as "Nothing"? "
Yes. It is typically the absence of something.
Or it could be a vacuum...or a void, a black hole, or Britney Spears' soul.
Perhaps it is not something that can be described in a physical sense, since it is the lack of a physicality. "nothing" in this sense, is subjective, and not objective.

You also ask, ". Is there, somewhere, a place or location or whatever that is completely devoid of EVERYTHING, including the "building blocks" of life?"

That seems like a two part question to me.
So here is the first half in my eyes... To: ". Is there, somewhere, a place or location or whatever that is completely devoid of EVERYTHING..."
if there was a place that is devoid of EVERYTHING...then would it not be devoid of a place as well? If there is literally NOTHING there, then anything that you could describe with a noun would be nonexistent. Persons, places and things are all nouns and therefore would not exist. So to this part of the statement, NOTHING would consist of a non-place or as white is described as the absence of colour, then NOTHING would be described as the absence of persons (easy enough) things (also easy) and places (not so easy). So nothing would consist of none of these things, which would make it the absence of everything, hence making it a location in itself to consist of a devoid space.

Which brings me to the second part of the equation.
"...including the "building blocks" of life?..."

The building blocks of life are things, which are nouns, so that answers that...I bet you thought that was going to be hard, huh?
Sorry to disappoint.

In my opinion, nothing exists between time now and time then, as well as time later.
Nothing is something that you could describe as being an increment of time, but not to simply exist between physical objects such as universes...if you had nothing between the universes, then they would be as two pools of water seeking to fill the empty space, and the nothing would cease to be, therefore it cannot become to begin with.

So in short: Nothing = The space between times.

[Paradox1]

The way I see it - Nothing and "something", let alone ANYTHING, can correspond at the same time.

I.E - You can't have nothing as well as something, to say nothing exists implies that it cancels out everything (This makes sense in my head)

You can't have nothing without not having anything else.

If something was there to represent nothing, nothing would not be nothing, it would be whatever the placeholder was. Saying you have nothing in your cup is false - You'd most likely have whatever was in the surrounding area - air etc, although it would not be filling the cup, but it would be occupying the space.

But as to your other points - I agree. The thing is, I can't make up my mind as to whether nothing exists, to be honest, and probably won't ever make up my mind, although you HAVE swayed me a little.

[SantaMonica1369]

Aren't people that seriously meditate in a way pursueing "nothing" as a concept?
Not as in what they're doing is a pointless quest...
But are they seeking what we all sit here and discuss?

[Holiday20310401]

Originally Posted by GoshisDead

I've met some people who i could swear had nothing in their heads, but i really doubt there is a such a thing as nothing, unless there is anti-matter.

Reply to that statement. Why would antimatter be relevant. Matter is not the only thing that has potential or is something. And when matter annihilates with antimatter, there is energy being given off right? And is matter not just a physical state of energy? 'Nothing' has no actuality right?, so living is only perceiving the sense of reality, the fundamental given potential to actuality. So when we leave reality you can't say that the fundamental becomes nonexistent (unless it was always that way), it just has no effect on what is concrete. Therefore, nothingness is simply a matter of perspective, whether or not you wish to view actuality as existing even when there is no perception for input upon it. Kind of like the paradox thing with the tree falling in a forest but nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound? The difference is that of chaos theory still having an effect upon the living, who can cohere with the effects of the tree falling. The tree is of reality having an effect upon actuality, in limitless vast amounts, and therefore on the living that can perceive those effects. When one dies it is not reality's potential producing an effect upon actuality, but of reality's conversion to actuality, (rotting matter).
'Nothingness' is like an illusion that I think people see as perception still having potential upon it. I believe that it is simply the loss of perception and therefore irrelevant, in fact the opposite of living. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

[Holiday20310401]

So in short: Nothing = The space between times.[/quote]

Are you implying that time is a force that is actually in 'instances' and the flow of it is an illusion, because space between times would be hard in my opinion if it flows.
And it doesn't make sense to fit nothing into a space, regardless if its not concrete.

[Holiday20310401]

Originally Posted by Aristoddler

Descartes based his philosophies on nothing, or the existence of nothing...sorta.

Nothing is a vacuum.

I do not agree that 'nothing' is a vacuum because a vacuum would mean there is still dimension to perceive. To me, dimension does not rely upon relative points in space, fundamental, or concrete, it doesn't really matter. Besides, why would 'nothing' be a vacuum?
I believe that 'nothing' should be something that you could never ask that something, who, what, where, when, why, how. That is nothing, and therefore words can't describe it.
Also, that would imply that the nature of nothing is analog because it does not rely upon the comparisons of anything to contrive a difference, displaying the who, what.. etc. Funny as this sounds, nothing can only be an entirety, just as the cosmos is, being analog. All the finite parts that make up the entireties are digital aspects, so the coffee cup example is useless. No coffee could be compared to having coffee. Therefore, the way of eliminating this is to get rid of the perceivance of that vacuum, or that coffee from existing or having the potential to exist. Thus reality's loss of potential to actuality.