Naked Science Forum
Non Life Sciences => Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology => Topic started by: Alan McDougall on 24/05/2016 00:08:28
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What is absolute nothingness?
As an example of what I mean by this question, lets suppose the universe is everything that exists, then shrink it down back to the singularity and imagine, if possible that the singularity vanishing from existence.
Absolute nothingness (You cannot say nothing is left, or you have nothing left, because the word "IS" and LEFT and HAVE, denote that you have a something.)
Maybe we could use "Absolute nothingness= Total Absence of Everything?
An infinite totally empty void is not nothing, it is three dimentional empty space!
Can one describe a negation like this in words?
Alan
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There is very little that can be said about nothing; it is not a large subject.
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Actually,mathematicians talk about nothing fairly often: it is called the null set.
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In discussing nothing, a distinction needs to be made between the null set (a mathematical conception that embraces nothing but allows the existence of something elsewhere), and the ramifications of supposing that the equation of all existence would have the null set as its solution. Concerning the latter, it is by no means clear that such a situation would be possible even in principle.
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There is very little that can be said about nothing; it is not a large subject.
If you contemplate it for too long and too profoundly, you might lose your sanity!
Alan
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Actually,mathematicians talk about nothing fairly often: it is called the null set.
I know this! A null set is an imaginary concept, used by mathematicians in their equations , but not found in reality?
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In discussing nothing, a distinction needs to be made between the null set (a mathematical conception that embraces nothing but allows the existence of something elsewhere), and the ramifications of supposing that the equation of all existence would have the null set as its solution. Concerning the latter, it is by no means clear that such a situation would be possible even in principle.
We know we somehow have "Something" making it impossible to imagine, in the best thought experiment "absolute nothingness" or "the total absence of everything that exists"
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In discussing nothing, a distinction needs to be made between the null set (a mathematical conception that embraces nothing but allows the existence of something elsewhere), and the ramifications of supposing that the equation of all existence would have the null set as its solution. Concerning the latter, it is by no means clear that such a situation would be possible even in principle.
I agree with you but this subject has long been debated by science as well as philosophy for many centuries?
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The way I view it, the proper description of absolute nothingness is accomplished in a character string of zero length. What can be said about absolute nothingness? It can't be described it because it has no properties. So, when all is said and done, there really is no way to describe a state of absolute nothingness because there is nothing there.
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There is very little that can be said about nothing; it is not a large subject.
The ancient scientist where terrified by the concept of nothingness for instance the zero the evil twin of infinity if divided by anything would collapse the very fabric of their mathematics!
Alan
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what is absolute somethingness?
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The way I view it, the proper description of absolute nothingness is accomplished in a character string of zero length. What can be said about absolute nothingness? It can't be described it because it has no properties. So, when all is said and done, there really is no way to describe a state of absolute nothingness because there is nothing there.
Correct!
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What is absolute nothingness?
As an example of what I mean by this question, lets suppose the universe is everything that exists, then shrink it down back to the singularity and imagine, if possible that the singularity vanishing from existence.
Absolute nothingness (You cannot say nothing is left, or you have nothing left, because the word "IS" and LEFT and HAVE, denote that you have a something.)
Maybe we could use "Absolute nothingness= Total Absence of Everything?
An infinite totally empty void is not nothing, it is three dimentional empty space!
Can one describe a negation like this in words?
Alan
The closes analogy I can think of is death. Total absolute none existence.
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To understand absolute nothingness , a person needs to understand what nothing is, nothing in a sense of a numerical value relating to dimensions and nothing in a sense of the ''emptiness'' of the nothing space that is behind and co-existing with relative space and the absolute ''somethingness'' of relative space.
Someone mentions there is not much to say about nothing, however nothing is everything, the whole of space is a singularity of nothing occupied by something, all of space has nothing point sources of the whole of space. The mind can create thought, such as ''shrink'' the universe to a singularity of ''nothing'' however the nothing surrounded the nothings remains nothing. All of space at any 0 point source is nothing , 0 points are the whole of space and nothing points at the same time. When you ''shrink'' the universe to a singularity, you are not shrinking the universe, you are creating a ''black'' picture, you are removing the light , the very light that defines the ''size'' of the Universe by the ''inverse broken law'',(edit) clearly the misconception of nothing is a lack of rational thinking about nothing and nothing. Nothing is something, it is space.
Without light you observe nothing...but space exists even in the ''dark'', (end edit)
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what is absolute somethingness?
Things that occupy nothing....
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What is absolute nothingness?
As an example of what I mean by this question, lets suppose the universe is everything that exists, then shrink it down back to the singularity and imagine, if possible that the singularity vanishing from existence.
Absolute nothingness (You cannot say nothing is left, or you have nothing left, because the word "IS" and LEFT and HAVE, denote that you have a something.)
Maybe we could use "Absolute nothingness= Total Absence of Everything?
An infinite totally empty void is not nothing, it is three dimentional empty space!
Can one describe a negation like this in words?
Alan
The closes analogy I can think of is death. Total absolute none existence.
Countless would disagree with you making your argument not absolute, other than from your own subjective opinion.
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What is absolute nothingness?
As an example of what I mean by this question, lets suppose the universe is everything that exists, then shrink it down back to the singularity and imagine, if possible that the singularity vanishing from existence.
Absolute nothingness (You cannot say nothing is left, or you have nothing left, because the word "IS" and LEFT and HAVE, denote that you have a something.)
Maybe we could use "Absolute nothingness= Total Absence of Everything?
An infinite totally empty void is not nothing, it is three dimentional empty space!
Can one describe a negation like this in words?
Alan
The closes analogy I can think of is death. Total absolute none existence.
You cannot say "Total" the word "Total means something. Zero might be better?
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Nothingness is the absence of anything. Absolute nothingness is the absence of absolutely everything. Only a human would be stupid enough to find the concept interesting.
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It's actually quite easy to contemplate absolute nothingness. Just think about what it was like before you were born. Now that's what absolute nothingness is.
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There can be a place where there is nothing but space and time, but elsewhere there is matter. A place is something. Time and space too. Pitch black is no light.
Hypothetically time and space, matter and energy started. Before that there was either God, or quantum mechanics, self existent, for want of a better word than before.
Absolute nothingness could never have existed, there always had to be a source, a creative power. Otherwise nothing means no dimensions, space, time, light, matter, energy or chance... no nature of quantum mechanics... nothing.
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not
.. or the "not" accounts in some sense for something?
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There can be a place where there is nothing but space and time, but elsewhere there is matter. A place is something. Time and space too. Pitch black is no light.
Hypothetically time and space, matter and energy started. Before that there was either God, or quantum mechanics, self existent, for want of a better word than before.
Absolute nothingness could never have existed, there always had to be a source, a creative power. Otherwise nothing means no dimensions, space, time, light, matter, energy or chance... no nature of quantum mechanics... nothing.
I loudly agree with you for the above post, it concur exactly with what I believe and belief does not require proof.
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belief does not require proof
I suggest that belief is on more secure ground if it is supported by evidence.
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Nothing is relative. Nothing is based on the place where observation, can no longer be objectified. For example, we can't see individual cells of the body with the naked eye. Therefore, these did not exist, as an objective fact, before the microscope was invented to extended our range of sight. Cells existed way before we could see them. However, with only the naked eye for a tool, cells would have been subjective speculation, based on faith; unicorns. Cells would originally count as nothing, to those who require, something, be objectified with tools.
Absolute nothingness is a moving target based on the state of art of our observational tools. These tools are often made more affective by subjective speculation based on faith; theory, which knows what to look for, so the tools can hit the bulls-eye, and make nothing, into something.
An interesting application of nothing is in wet chemistry and drinking water. Below detectable levels essentially means there is none since, it can't be objectified. There may still be scary unicorns that bite; but not objectified. But as the tools got better, we can objectively see something. Now, 100 parts per trillion seems so much more than nothing at 1 part per billion. The layman sees more because the 100 tangibles are more than 1000 nothing.
With modern tools, more and more attached to computers, this union is allowing us to see simulations of subjective perception, which is a subjective-objective hybrid. The computer can generate what appears to be a tangible something, because we can see it in pictures. Video game physics engines use this type of tool, where the imagination can become something that appears objectified, by the subjective addendum to the tool and how it interacts with our character.
Below is a picture of 4-D space within 3-D space. This is not easy to see with a solo tool, without the computer addendum. But it become something, to those who wish to see, if we use the addendum. The addendum allows applied science to buds off from pure science, with the two often mistaken for each other. Applied is useful but may be an invention of man and may only exist where we find the tool composite. It is something in the computer and on its monitor, but elsewhere, it may be part of nothing. We may not see it on the moon, unless we bring along its container; computer.
(https://www.sciencenews.org/sites/default/files/8603)
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Take a peace of something, say plastic, flatten it into a two dimensional object, turn it over and flatten it again and you have a line, compress the line until it vanishes into nothing, zero, null set, nothing?
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The null set/empty set is actually a really fascinating tool in discrete math. It's literally written as the compliment of the universe. Another way of saying that is "the opposite of everything". An interesting way of looking at this from a philosophical standpoint is that every discrete universe (mathematically speaking) whether it be finite or infinite all have *at least* one common element in their power sets, the null set itself. I see this as a way of saying that all universes are built from the null set to begin with; so the null set is like a blank canvas, it's more than "nothing", it's emptiness and possibility unbridled. It's a big bang waiting to happen.
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(The following is based on a more extensive idea first described by me in 1963):
A previously undefined concept of Absolute Nothingness may be postulated. This principle is more easily understood if instead of customarily accepting the division of time as being limitless, it should rather be considered quantized into finite units. In other words, a degree of time partition could be reached by which no further segmentation would be possible. The unit at that point would be the fundamental quantum of time. Combinations of these quanta constitute various spans of time passage. It is here assumed that primordially the fundamental quantum was not the same as it is now at any particular locus such as the Earth and was in fact infinitely large universally.
[A more complete discussion can be found at Cosmology and quantized time. I. An alternative to the Big Bang Theory; in the publication: Speculations in Science and Technology 19,225-233 (1996).]
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Only a human would be stupid enough to find the concept interesting.
Interestingly judgemental, Alan.
Frank Close, for example, wrote a book entitled "Nothing". Assuming that people write books about things they are interested in; does this mean you consider Frank Close "stupid"?
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Nothingness is the absence of anything. Absolute nothingness is the absence of absolutely everything. Only a human would be stupid enough to find the concept interesting.
If I may say, that should include every member here at TNS unless we have uninvited alien guests.
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Empty space is something, but absolute nothingness, it is not possible, not in the future nor in the past.
An imaginary example of absolute nothingness: say we have a box full of particles and whithin this box is a another one. If you remove all the particles in the box within the other, you get empty space. If you remove the empty space too, the geometry of the space left stretches and occupies the left.
P.S.
It is more interesting if you follow an order:
First freeze time: time can be an axis from start to end (or to infinity). When you freeze the time, it becomes a single frame, like when you have a point in one axis of space, so mathematically you still have time. Then you remove the particles, but you still remain with one frame on time axis and 3d space. Now we can see that space without time doesn't quite nake sense. Last thing, you remove space and tine dissapears as well.
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i would say that because objective time cannot stop, the future is as close to absolute nothingness that we can possibly conceive. time itself is the something that makes absolute or permanent nothingness a contradiction
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If E=mc(squared), then E=m(x/t)squared, where t is the magnitude of the quantum of time. If the quantum is infinitely large, E would be = 0 (our definition of absolute nothingness). Energy (and, hence, mass) would appear as t decreases from infinity. This would avoid the need for a squeezed black hole to get things going. Hence, the origin of mass and energy would not need to involve a big bang.
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If E=mc(squared), then E=m(x/t)squared, where t is the magnitude of the quantum of time. If the quantum is infinitely large, E would be = 0 (our definition of absolute nothingness). Energy (and, hence, mass) would appear as t decreases from infinity. This would avoid the need for a squeezed black hole to get things going. Hence, the origin of mass and energy would not need to involve a big bang.
If x is constant then as t approaches infinity you have something that has not moved forever. Is which case you have zero speed. So yes zero energy but not for the reason you state. If relativity were that easy we would be so happy.
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What is beyond the limits of the universe? Is it absolute nothingness?
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", , , , there is evidently 'nothing' to worry about"
(I forget the 1st part)
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What is beyond the limits of the universe? Is it absolute nothingness?
Cosmology is not only about things that could make us worry. It is about how the universe works. Things that are happening in the universe deserve an explanation.
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it's a relation to mass, and if you want 'mass' to be 'energy' or vice versa then?
Does it exist? It does mathematically though, 'zero', then again, so does 'minus'.
Awwh, now I got a headache.
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I get a kind of headache too, when I think "Suppose the Universe didn't exist, not just no stars or galaxies or planets, but even existence itself didn't exist".
It gives a weird swoony feeling, like trying to touch something inconceivable.