On Nothing in a void.

river said:
Nothing is not just what can be observed . It is also about what nothing can not do .

I have mentioned before , but most important nothing does not have the quality of the ability to manifest into something . Nor change into something .

No movement , nor change , will transform nothing into something .
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The only substantial problem I can see in this thread is all to do with the non-standard use of the word "nothing", something you're also guilty of here. You conclusions are of course all correct nonetheless but your implicit assumption isn't, the implicit assumption coming from treating the word "nothing" as if it referred to some thing. If you had done a reductio ad absurdum that would be fine but it's not even what you did since you're conclusions are indeed correct and therefore not absurd.
You treat "nothing" as if it referred to some thing in this example here: "Nothing is not just what can be observed". So nothing is indeed something that you can observe and even more than that. You do that throughout your post.
In normal usage, "nothing is lost", for example, just straightforwardly means "there is no thing which is lost".
In your post here, "nothing is not just what can be observed" cannot be read as "no thing is not just what can be observed". There's just one negation too many. It wouldn't even be grammatical but more importantly wouldn't mean what you meant initially. However, the sentence "something is not just what can be observed" would make sense. Obviously, it still would not be what you meant but suggests you treated the word "nothing" as if it referred to some thing.

So, I guess we have to interpret your sentence as saying "something which is nothing is not just what can be observed". Which again suggests "nothing" refers to something. Which is precisely not the case. Certainly, "nothing" means something, but definitely doesn't refer to something.

I could do the same for the rest of your post.

Again, your conclusions are all correct, it's not the point. The point is that the problem raised by the OP comes from asking a question in such a way as to treat the word "nothing" as if it referred to some thing. So the OP is really nothing but a loaded question and unfortunately your post here just keeps the charade going.
EB
 
Speakpigeon said:
The only substantial problem I can see in this thread is all to do with the non-standard use of the word "nothing", something you're also guilty of here. You conclusions are of course all correct nonetheless but your implicit assumption isn't, the implicit assumption coming from treating the word "nothing" as if it referred to some thing. If you had done a reductio ad absurdum that would be fine but it's not even what you did since you're conclusions are indeed correct and therefore not absurd.
You treat "nothing" as if it referred to some thing in this example here: "Nothing is not just what can be observed". So nothing is indeed something that you can observe and even more than that. You do that throughout your post.
In normal usage, "nothing is lost", for example, just straightforwardly means "there is no thing which is lost".
In your post here, "nothing is not just what can be observed" cannot be read as "no thing is not just what can be observed". There's just one negation too many. It wouldn't even be grammatical but more importantly wouldn't mean what you meant initially. However, the sentence "something is not just what can be observed" would make sense. Obviously, it still would not be what you meant but suggests you treated the word "nothing" as if it referred to some thing.

So, I guess we have to interpret your sentence as saying "something which is nothing is not just what can be observed". Which again suggests "nothing" refers to something. Which is precisely not the case. Certainly, "nothing" means something, but definitely doesn't refer to something.

I could do the same for the rest of your post.

Again, your conclusions are all correct, it's not the point. The point is that the problem raised by the OP comes from asking a question in such a way as to treat the word "nothing" as if it referred to some thing. So the OP is really nothing but a loaded question and unfortunately your post here just keeps the charade going.
EB
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Nothing will always be referred to something .

So what to you is the difference between some-thing and something ?
 
Write4U said:
I can understand the concept of nothing in relation to something, but that requires for something to exist to begin with.
We can even speak of a condition of nothingness, but then the condition itself would be something which does not exist in reality.

But in the end the recognition of non-existence is the definition of "nothing". It's an observational problem. "Nothing" cannot be observed, except in relation to something which can be observed.
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Same problem here. Strictly speaking, saying as you do that ""Nothing" cannot be observed" really means ""Nothing" is something that cannot be observed". So, it means nothing is something, just something we can't observe.

Mind you, that could even be really the case but it would mean that the world contains a foultitude of things we don't know are there because we can't observe them. So, perhaps, yes, it's somewhat like the many-worlds of Quantum Mechanics. Just a bit far fetched, perhaps.

Write4U said:
Comes to mind Schroedinger's cat which to the observer is both alive and dead until actual observation establishes which. It is a contradiction in terms. In reality it can only be one or the other..:?
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I certainly don't understand how any cat which is not actually observed yet as you say could be anything at all to the observer!!!

In my view, this can easily stops being any contradiction at all as soon as you recognise that it isn't the same cat. And that's easy do since one is assumed to be alive and the other is assumed to be dead.
So, where's the problem already?
EB
 
river said:
Nothing will always be referred to something .
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That's obviously not the case. "Nothing", the word "nothing", means something but does not refer to any thing. It means "not some thing", and this is precisely why it does not refer to any thing.

river said:
So what to you is the difference between some-thing and something ?
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"Something" is a rather ambiguous term and usually understood as having a very broad scope, possibly meaning for some people as little as anything you could think up that maybe doesn't even exist. In this case, I would take "something" to refer in fact to an idea, which is indeed something but not something with an objective existence, i.e. something that we could all agree we can somehow observe it. "Some thing" is normally used to refer to some definite thing, i.e. still something but something with an objective existence, i.e. not just some vague idea in somebody's private mind.
EB
 
Same problem here. Strictly speaking, saying as you do that ""Nothing" cannot be observed" really means ""Nothing" is something that cannot be observed". So, it means nothing is something, just something we can't observe.
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No it means nothing can never be something , ever
 
Write4U said:
Well, I am now reintroducing a philosophical question if NO THING can exist at all?
This presents a contradiction in terms.
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Where's the contradiction in terms?!

"No thing can exist" is just the negation of "some thing can exist". It makes perfect sense.

"No thing can exist" is obviously false since we're here but it's obviously not a contradiction in terms.
EB
 
Write4U said:
But sentience would not be able to create something out of nothing either.
The question is if nothing can have a dynamic aspect to it. A vacuum does.
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???

Sure it would, especially if you change the meaning of the word "nothing" to mean "something". Hey, presto!

It's not philosophy, that. It's just word play.
EB
 
Speakpigeon said:
???

Sure it would, especially if you change the meaning of the word "nothing" to mean "something". Hey, presto!

It's not philosophy, that. It's just word play.
EB
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Causal Dynamical Triangulation (CDT) is word play?
Causal dynamical triangulation (abbreviated as CDT) theorized by Renate Loll, Jan Ambjørn and Jerzy Jurkiewicz, and popularized by Fotini Markopoulou and Lee Smolin, is an approach to quantum gravity that like loop quantum gravity is background independent.

This means that it does not assume any pre-existing arena (dimensional space), but rather attempts to show how the spacetime fabric itself evolves.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causal_dynamical_triangulation
 
Speakpigeon said:
I certainly don't understand how any cat which is not actually observed yet as you say could be anything at all to the observer!!!
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That is the point. It can be considered to be in superposition of being dead and alive.
Only by observation can its actual state be determined by the observer.
In my view, this can easily stops being any contradiction at all as soon as you recognise that it isn't the same cat. And that's easy do since one is assumed to be alive and the other is assumed to be dead. So, where's the problem already? EB
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The problem is that you are wrong. The box contains only one cat. We know this because only one cat was placed in the box along with the poison which may or may not be triggered by a photon entering the box. It is an exercise in probabilism.

It is the same cat and it is either alive or dead in reality, but its state is "unknown" to any observer until actually observed.
 
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Write4U said:
That is the point. It can be considered to be in superposition of being dead and alive.
Only by observation can its actual state be determined by the observer.
The problem is that you are wrong. The box contains only one cat. We know this because only one cat was placed in the box along with the poison which may or may not be triggered by a photon entering the box. It is an exercise in probabilism.

It is the same cat and it is either alive or dead in reality, but its state is "unknown" to any observer until actually observed.
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You're going back to the scientific conundrum, that's a different question. Let's look at your initial claim:
Write4U said:
Comes to mind Schroedinger's cat which to the observer is both alive and dead until actual observation establishes which. It is a contradiction in terms. In reality it can only be one or the other..:?
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You did claim in there that there was a contradiction in terms from the point of view of the observer. Sorry, the cat at this point is inside a closed box and there is no observer inside the box. All your so-called observer can do at this point is to twiddle his thumbs and look at a closed box looking properly bored to death. No cat to observe whatsoever. Neither a dead cat, not a live cat, let alone one that would be somehow dead and alive.

Now, you claim something I knew you would, namely that it is the same cat. Well, not quite. And for the purpose of logic, not at all. Yes, it is the same cat, but only in the sense that I will be the same human being when I die as I am now. So, same thing alive and dead. Is there a contradiction there, do you think?

Now, obviously, you're going to counter that the cat is both dead and alive at the same time. Ah, you forgot that first time round. Yet, no, because it is not the same cat. One is alive and the other is dead. Sure, these two cats come, so to speak, from the same cat (that one is truly the same cat) but then that same cat isn't at the same time. So, you have the actual same cat but not at the same time, and you have the actual same time but not with the same cats. Ah, bother! Yes. The fact that they're coming from the same cat doesn't make them the same cat for the purpose of your nice "contradiction in terms". Logic is a bit more demanding than everyday verbiage. They are the same cat in a loose sense, like you would say they're the same family. But for logic they're not the same cat at all and that should be pretty obvious. They both come from the same cat. Yes, but then, this one isn't at the same moment. So, no, no contradiction in terms.

"The box contains only one cat". Well, no, you don't know that. And more importantly for your claim, the observer doesn't know that. That it contains only one cat is merely a reasonable assumption of our ordinary lives. But we're dealing with quantum mechanics here and not with the routine of feeding the cat. Yes, one cat is put inside the box but then the box is closed with the observer left outside the closed box. So, that foxy cat could multiply or even disappear altogether, or even change into a rat or a hamburger and your so-called observer would just see nothing at all of that rigmarole and therefore isn't at all "observer".

So, in effect, we may choose to say that there are two different cats inside the box, or two things not quite cats, but that doesn't matter since there is no observer to witness whatever there is inside the box at this point. And I think the more reasonable approach is to take quantum superposition as a purely abstract model of whatever there may really be inside the box. You may also think of it as a superposition of two different cats, one dead and the other alive. No problem, no contradiction.
EB
 
Speakpigeon said:
That? "... show how the spacetime fabric itself evolves".

Sorry, you'd have to go out on your limb a bit more for my satisfaction. Right now, I fail to see any relation between that and the meaning of the word "nothing", as the word is normally understood and used. You don't seem to have case.
EB
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Show me what's there before spacetime evolves.
 
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Speakpigeon said:
You may also think of it as a superposition of two different cats, one dead and the other alive. No problem, no contradiction.
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It all depends on the point of observation. But the longer the observer waits to look inside the box the greater the probability that the cat will be dead. Thus the condition changes over time.
 
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Write4U said:
Show me what's there before spacetime evolves.
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You're gone way too far out on your limb there. Your question doesn't make much sense.

So, answering your question would be nonsensical unless you could prove to me there's a space and a time before space-time.
EB
 
Write4U said:
It all depends on the point of observation. But the longer the observer waits (...)
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Observer? What observer? Observing what? A box? Interestingly boring, I guess.
Write4U said:
(...) to look inside the box the greater the probability that the cat will be dead.
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You would need to say it like this: The longer you wait to open the box, the greater the probability to find a dead cat.
And I still fail to see the "contradiction in terms" you said there was in this situation.
Write4U said:
Thus the condition changes over time.
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Condition? Sorry, I don't know what condition you're talking about.
EB
 
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