Martin Rees - Why Is There Anything At All?
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Why is there a world, a cosmos, something, anything instead of absolutely nothing at all? If nothing existed, there would be, well, ‘nothing’ to explain. To have anything existing demands some kind of explanation. Of all the big questions, this is the biggest. Why anything? Why not nothing? What can we learn from the absence of nothing?
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Martin John Rees, Baron Rees of Ludlow is a British cosmologist and astrophysicist. He has been Astronomer Royal since 1995 and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge from 2004 to 2012. He was President of the Royal Society between 2005 and 2010.
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Closer To Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.
I totally get this question as I too have wrestled with this from my early teenage years and I am now just short of 70. What’s more, I have always been struck by how scientific materialism, of its nature, is simply unable to connect with the deeply realised, experiential nature of this question.
For me, the question, as to ‘why should anything exist at all?’, when total nothingness, void, zilch makes much more logical sense, leads me to an affirmation of the sheer wonder and miracle of existence of something (me) that experiences. What’s more, I wonder at how the ‘natural state’ of everything is to struggle to build against the force of entropy, to grow towards the warmth of a sun, to expend precious energy to build our world for the ‘good of what’ and to strive for nurture and love. I notice, also, that it is only when this natural state is thwarted that this ‘all things good’ can become twisted, and spiral into ‘all things bad’.
For those, whose ‘reality’ is cold materialism, I can only wish that they can somehow touch this essence of what is a truly spiritual question, ‘why does anything exist at all - how is it that I sit here, smack bang in the middle of this wonder.
Love and peace to all.
The correct answer is
God created the Heavens and Earth
science has discovered much of the mechanical mechanism
however without God there is no reason for matter to exist
or randomly form into a complex universe.
BOLLOCKS @@mhughes1160
@mhughes1160 Please leave God out of the question for once. Do not use God as a filler for things we do not understand. It sounds so childish!
@@mhughes1160 I totally respect your view. We would only differ in how we see the nature of that ultimate principle. But, at end of the day, that would just be ‘words’ which can never fully touch the spiritual reality, which is -as its fundamental nature - love, compassion and the source of all wisdom. On this we would surely agree, my friend🙂.
@@Markusableitinger1 This is what goes right to the heart of what makes the original question so powerful and insightful. Given that science is powerless - and always will be - to understand sentiency (or, if you prefer can the brain ever fully understand its own self-nature?). The fact that I have an experience arrayed in front of my nose and in my other senses seems preposterous given that it would be far simpler if nothing at all existed; neither a thing experienced nor an experiencer. The undeniable fact that there is a universe that does exist, and which is populated by countless entities that can experience this wonder, affirms to me that there is deeper spiritual reality that underpins all things - you and me included. I do not call it God but the spiritual foundation of all things is confirmed to me in the question, ‘why does anything exist?’
I believe the question was not "How?", but rather, "Why?"
They are not the same thing.
I guess you didn't watch the whole video.
Ask both.
One question is scientific, the other one is philosophical/religious, I guess...
Maybe the question should be "what is real?" Our perception is limited through our minds.
Sometimes they are though; ‘why is the sky blue’ isn’t a useful question or one that makes sense in the way you define ‘why’. For that question, everyone understands that what we’re really asking is ‘how is the sky blue’
I think we haven’t advanced to the point where we can understand existence, that’s how I deal with the extreme discomfort. Very glad to have found this channel.
Why do you feel extreme discomfort not to know? Does it have something to do with the fear of losing control and the fear of death? By the way, I like your art!
Check out this channels past examination on the various levels/concepts of nothing, worth a look.
This WAS an EXCELLENT weekly show!
The humility here is refreshing. Not just what happened, but can we understand it?
Rees has an amazing series titled "What we still don't know" - still worth a watch.
I have a hunch it's way above our pay grade.
Yes on the latter. Un means one. Hence One Understanding. Awake from the dream!
@@mabaker No thank you.
@@sven888 at least give waking from the dream a chance....
I think it’s interesting when people say we can’t know, but seem so confident in knowing that.
Well, there are things we can prove logically that are unknowable. For example Gödel's incompleteness theorems establish limits to what is logically provable. In fact those theorems are part of the foundation of proposals on the limits of what can be known scientifically.
Knowing something and proving something are two different things. For example, we can know the laws of logic but can’t necessarily prove them.
Yeah I mean I can see what you're saying that, in a technical sense, it's a bit of an overreach. If they wanted to communicate exactly what they mean they probably should say something more like: "according to our current knowledge and our current abilities, there doesn't appear to be a realistic way, in the near future, to acquire any knowledge about this."
What is your question? We are one! Yet we are many in life for love!!!
@@sven888 the question is why? do you know the answer?
It's a wonder that those who ponder questions such as this every day as their work don't go stark raving loopy.
Some have
We have.... we all have.... those who act normal... are actually not.
@@isaacnovinger3566 Cheers brother. I salute our madness.
@@isaacnovinger3566 They do but what else can they do but ponder and go crazy ?? Blessed are those who have gone crazy seeking the truth
Mad? Only if you don't see the ethereal beauty of it. Or feel the excitement of it. It takes you to and elegant place beyond your corporeal existence, self, almost like an out of body experience. You feel like you are on the verge of stepping into another plane mentally and spiritually.
The fact that contemplating the possibility of nothingness terrifies and gives him chills is a blessing in disguise...
And why is that, might I ask?
the present moment is simply infinity resisting nothingness
If there was nothing at all, then there wasn't any rule preventing of something becoming existent.
so then what was was no rule. :)
Nothing. Nothing to prevent something. :-)
@@MrJPI that is incorrect. There would be nothing to give rise or cause anything to exist. As soon as anything exists which prevents anything else from existing, you no longer have nothing. There is no bridge between "nothing" and "something", so I must conclude there must be an eternal "something" or "someone".
@@danielskelton1145 That maybe so, but you said: " As soon as anything exists which prevents anything else from existing, you no longer have nothing". Instead I didn't suggest there was anything which prevents or allows something to exist. I meant there was nothing, so no rules, to prevent something to pop up without any rules. :-)
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'There was nothing at all',..... there may not be any rule to prevent any thing to come into existence, but there has to be something (not a 'thing'), as the ground from which a 'thing' can come into existence.
If you are interested, you can look up non duality.
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It was always something, nothing doesn’t exist.
Correct. It can't
Matter + Antimatter = Nothing and so Nothing - Antimatter = Matter !
Yeah. While I'm not 100% sure as I can't prove it, I agree with your statement.
Yes it can, I've just checked my bank balance !
@@billcook7483 well played
We're so young as a species'. Every time humans begin to understand, we are rewarded with access to a whole new dimension of reality and study..each a breadcrumb to the next piece of the puzzle. Truly we can't imagine what discoveries are ahead, but we can be excited by the chase. The drive to "know the answers" never ends. Best wishes all.
You cannot get outside the system and so you cannot have the view from outside. We are bound within and must be clear what viewpoints we cannot adopt.
I can get my mind around a quantum field that erupts into a universe after certain astronomically unlikely conditions are met, because -- after all -- we're talking about infinity, and given an infinite amount of time, a lot of unlikely things can happen. But I can't get my mind around the idea that at some point we went from literally nothing to literally something.
Magic 😊
We didn’t.
perhaps take off the human hat...it is so limited .
try a top hat one off infinite soul
At the beginning, Kuhn says: "The question of why there is anything at all ... frightened me so, I tried everything to put it out of my mind." And it still chills him. This fear causes many people to (mostly unconsciously) accept a divine being who is (under certain conditions) inclined towards them as an "explanation" - as a kind of painkiller. Rees does not have this fear of not understanding, of losing control. I think that is a good prerequisite for being a good scientist because your thinking is not disturbed by fear but motivated be the wonderful feeling of not knowing and pleasure of exploring.
No one has no fear of that which he doesn’t know. Whether he shows it or not, matters not.
@kutya9407 Your statement only shows that you are projecting your own fear onto everyone else.
The explanation is obvious. The fear is from the subconscious willfully denying what it knows is right.
Excellent!
I have also always asked the question, "why is there anything at all?", but then with the follow up question, "then, why this?".
I hope to one day look as dope as the host of this show.
The utter drip. It's astonishing. I long to rock my turtleneck and mustache as fearlessly and proud as this man. Matching black jacket but with silver frames to match the coif. Magnificent!
Oh, also right, wtf why is there all this stuff everywhere?
I've known a lot a people that could make something out of nothing.
there are more breakthroughs now than ever before - so of course we can go further in understanding
There are wondrous breakthroughs but they always slam against a brick wall of the brute facts of existence itself
To let Understanding stop at what cannot be understood ,is Truly a high Attainment.
A choice. But the restless question for a few, remains.
Sometimes I'll try to think about this question and if I get deep enough into it I get a very visceral reaction. The best way I can describe it is like magnets that can't touch. I can't tell if it's fear or what it is. My mind just can't continue to think about it and I get "pushed out" of thinking about it. Repulsed like a magnet
this question is well beyond physics... how can we even test it 🤔
We can’t. There’s no need to either.
it's in realm of metaphysics. Maybe at death, answers will be given.
If we really want to understand then we first have to understand how thinking alone is a limitation, that it does not express the actual. It is more like a reflection in a mirror or a lens of concepts, ideas and mental images that we perceive through, but never the actual experience.
The direct experience, like feeling/knowing is where we perceive the true revelations, without a doubt realizations.
Physics cannot answer it…. Because the process was a supernatural ( triggered without any antecedent) event…. How or “ why “ it happened brings in the idea of “ intent”.
@@chetsenior7253i the question itself is aiming for an answer/reason/purpose of existence from our perspective... but from where other than existence itself can such purpose derive from 🤔
The fact that it's impossible for nothingness to exist makes sense but it's just so deeply terrifying.
Eternity gives rise to all manner of things you could possibly imagine (and can't imagine). Our conscious existence, either experiencing this life over and over infinitely or experiencing your worst nightmare over and over. We are forced to exist (and suffer) against our will, such is the nature of eternity and infinity.
Actually he is wrong. Nothingness and everythingness are just meaningless words. THAT WHICH IS ALWAYS IS. YES. YOU!!!
Actually it is uncertain whether nothingness or everything ness are meaningless or are meaningful @@sven888
@@billkotas9049 So why is there differentiation within oneness? PS: Un-certain means One-certain. Latin....
It's terrifying the energy bill arriving through the letter box 😊
Nothing is defined differently by physicist and by philosophers. Important point!!
except for 'nothing' itself. Philosopher's acknowledge the subject, physicists choose only to acknowledge the objective. Philosopher's know there's no difference between metaphysics and physics. The physicists posit they're completely different.
But do we really know what nothing is?
There is no nothing. One of the greatest, if not the greatest insights of quantum physics.
Understanding how everything on our own planet is functioning is truly in my humble belief given far to shallow effort to be explained among the scientific community.
Thinking about the amount of different lifeforms we have here on earth and our lack of understanding surrounding all those lifeforms. The list is nearly endless with things to find answers to right here on our planet.
The question of who created the creator in an infinite regression is typically modeled by Russell paradox in logical science.
The paradox resolution by logicians applies Godel incompleteness theories 1 and 2 on our whole universe to deduce that an external axiom to our universe exists.
Because science is continuous, that external axiom is metaphysical and is the cause of the universe creation.
This analysis is completely scientific and defines the existence of a creator.
Creating a creator assumes a moment of creation for said creator.
Just because such a moment exists for us is poor reasoning to assume the same holds true for a creator.
There is nothing preventing a creator from being infinite and eternal , with no beginning or end.
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would you like to study non duality - you will see there is no infinite regression, you will hit ground in no time just behind the mind, intellect, and identity.
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I always think, why go through all this trouble?
Perhaps not quite the question pondered here but my mind goes back to those moments as a child when I’d run up a staircase into another room on some errand and suddenly I’d stop dead in my tracks - I am! I exist! I’m here! It struck me with complete conviction. I was aware of my Being in the world. What a feeling and knowing it was.
Namaste
IMHO, your childhood ah moment is not a bit less than the 'deep' questions being pondered here. You did hit on something very Real at that time, but society, education, and living a life has made you forget it.
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Modern physicists are saying that time is an emergent property. So by extension one can say space is also an emergent property? Now the Q is, emergent from what? This, no scientist is saying. Not blaming them, because when you don’t have time and space, how do you do physics, science ? This is the problem.
According to Advaita Vedanta of Hinduism, time (kala), space (desa) and causality (karana) are emergent properties. Again, the Q is, emergent from what ? Advaitins also don’t have a scientifically or even psychologically satisfying answer. They have said that science can be done only via 2 instruments - sensory observation and intellectual inference. Impossible for senses and intellect to work without time and space. Leave alone mathematics and science, even language fails when you don’t space, time and causation to work on.
But one thing Advaitins argue logically, if it is emergent, then there has to be something from which it has to emerge. They call it ‘Sat’ = Reality.
So this Sat cannot be tied down to a time interval when it is (or not). Nor can it be confined to a space where it can be observed. Sat then necessarily has to be before and after time, and inside and outside space. Since Causality is also an emergent property, you cannot ask ‘why is there Sat?’. Sat simply Is. It is Existence per se.
Now, another thing is, if a property is an emergent from something, it will also dissolve back into that.
So now we are facing 2 options - 1. - either time, space and causality are emerging and dissolving back in cycles of creation and dissolution and hence totally unreal, or 2.- they are dependent realities dependent on the Sat, and they are ever present as dependent realities at the same locus as Sat.
Now the conclusion that can be drawn from all this is, Space, Time and Causation are dependent realities dependent on the One Reality (Without a Second), having no ontological independence, they are Appearances, dependent on Reality. Since the elements of the universe are space, time, and causation, then it means that the universe also is an Appearance having no ontological independence.
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The answer to this mind-bending question is very simple: We don't know. Perhaps a more salient question would be to ask, will we ever know?
This question is better approached either philosophically or spiritually because, as I suspect, it comes from a need to understand our human condition rather than the science in which it is framed. Science may be able to answer part of that question but even if it does, it is unlikely to help us answer the meaning or meaninglessness of our human condition. Ultimately, it is the human condition which has to be explained in order for us to know why there's a universe fit to contain us and our questions.
Just as the puddle pretends the pothole was designed with it in mind.
@@Paine137 I sense that this little image, neat and fun, is what you pretend to be enough of an answer?
@@catherinemoore9534 We’re emergent in the same way all species are evolutionarily emergent. Meaning itself is an idea of our own making.
we're here to find the meaning of life, & i found it
@@No-xw3jl Meaning isn’t objective. It’s relative to each person. There’s nothing to find.
We can only know things that touch our reality. Instead of asking 'why is there anything at all?" I would ask "why is there anything at all that we recognize as existing?" and the answer to that is obvious, because we recognize things precisely because they exist in our reality. There are some things so much outside our reality that it is pointless to even speculate about because we don't have knowledge of the existence or non-existence of those things.
What a great and important question “why is there anything at all”. I’ve spent countless hours listening to great thinkers explaining various theories but in all honesty, I am still wondering, WHY?
Marin has one of the most interesting faces I’ve ever seen. I can listen to him talk for hours.
Cheech?
I totally agree. He looks like a very intelligent vampire who can´t leave that old room
He looks very 18th century
Reminds me a bit of the Star Trek character. Data.
Maybe you should ask him on a date.
Probably the most important question in the world. I believe real wisdom can start there.
Life always finds a way to live, in any form. That is something and everything you need to know.
In my opinion, 'Why is there something rather than nothing?' may turn out to be the most profound and mysterious question of all. Perhaps even more so than 'What is consciousness?'. It could turn out that something is inevitable for reason X (i.e. nothing is impossible - which funnily enough has a double meaning, bringing into question whether our words or minds can be ask the right questions!) but whether we'll ever know or understand reason X is yet to be seen by humanity. Of course, if space and time exist all at once that might get us a little closer to understanding the ultimate philosophical question.
Let me point out that your ultimate philosophical question is stated in language. You will never get to an answer unless you understand language.
I fully agree with importance of this question because I believe most of us have had the same mind blowing experience in trying to conceptualize nothingness. I had that when I was ten. Why do we all have the same vision as youngsters? As we grow up learning about the cosmos we are awed by its expanse and at the same time shocked by the idea of its absence.
There is something because, like everything, there has to be
Discussion here and therre but, still, we can not answer the question from where 'the beginning energy/mass' comes from.
Martin Rees’ answer was just to say how wonderful our advances in science have been in analyzing the universe. He never addressed the question. Fractions of seconds or fractions of millionths of seconds are equally far away from beginnings. A God is lovingly awaiting us to give up on this approach to why. And I ain’t no evangelistic preacher. I’m just saying what I feel to be true.
The thing with this question is thst it almost seems unanswerable because whatever answer you come up with that was the reason everything exists, you could just ask the same question about that.
Hello infinite regress my old friend
Aristoteles explained, that it is logically impossible to find the first cause without leaving the system.
@stefanblue660 Well it's probably impossible to find the first cause while in the causation system, that's the thing.
@@stefanblue660so there's higher dimensions which will provide answers about lower dimensions.. Our brain is not capable of working infinite dimensions.. impossible.. i may have typed a load of nonsense there but I'm just saying what's in my little brain 😊
What? Nothing is no energy and since energy cannot be created or destroyed, there has always been something. Why????? ??????????????????????????
Nothing is full of energy because of quantum fluctuations. Nothing does not exist.
We are one. Don't let them fool you with words. We are one. I love you hence for good reason.
"Why?" was not answered, but there is a reason as to why is there anything at all.
@@No-xw3jl You know it brother.
yep
Sir thanks for this video, one day you have to talk about this with Prof. Harald Lesch, a few years ago he tackles a philosophical question in an unusual way: Why does the universe exist at all? How can nothing become something why is not nothing?
Why is there something rather than nothing? The question seems to assume that "nothing" is something that could conceivably have existed instead of "something." But by definition, "nothing" is not something that can exist. Nothing is not something, nothing is nothing. The second we try to imagine that there might have "been" nothing instead of something, we catch ourselves in a contradiction.
And when we try to imagine that there might have been "nothing" rather than something, we find ourselves imagining something like an empty space. But an empty space is not nothing. In fact, we cannot imagine "nothing." There would be nothing to imagine. Nor can we conceive universal "nothingness." Even if we try to conceive "nothing" as the absence of the universe, we fail, because as soon as we conceive an absence, we are not conceiving of nothing.
The whole question why is there something rather than nothing seems to arise due to a confusion. After all, we do experience that this or that thing or person can be absent, so that where there was that thing or person previously present, now we say there is nothing of that thing or person present. But from that we then make a false leap. We leap from a specific thing or person being absent, to imagining that everything, all that is, might under some circumstances never have been present, meaning there might have been "nothing." But notice that then we are imagining "some circumstances," and that is not nothing. In fact "everything," "all that is," cannot be absent. Everything, "all that is," is not just a particular thing or a collection of particular things that is just accidentally there and might just as accidentally not be there. Contingency applies to facets of existence, aspects of existence, but not to existence itself.
Existence is fundamental, necessary, inescapable, that which underlies all, the ground of the world. In that light, existence evokes wonder. But not because it might not have been. It evokes wonder because it can show us the ground of the world, the ground of existence, something ultimate, and in that sense has a characteristic or characteristics in common with some descriptions of God. Being, existence, has its first causes living within itself. Gilbert Sorrentino once said that the mysterious thing about the world is not that things are hidden from us. The mysterious thing, rather, is that everything is visible, or potentially visible. We can catch glimpses of the very bottom of things, the very core of reality. Often we think we are just material creatures living on the periphery of existence. But we have a connection to the core of all things, and that connection is not material.
Existence itself, Being itself, is not something that might not have been. Particular aspects or kinds of existence might be contingent, might not have been, but existence itself, Being itself, can only be, it cannot not be. Being, existence, is all there is and all there ever could be. "Nothing" cannot "be," precisely because "nothing" is not something. The question "why is there something rather than nothing" therefore seems to be fundamentally misconceived.
He could have summed up his response in only 3 very powerful words.
I Don’t Know.
for me, the key was asking "what are the implications of the fact that we can even ask this question?" that is, how is it that we can "notice" our being and contrast it with the concept of possible non-being? A fish is not aware of the water in which it lives, but if it is taken out of the water, then it will become aware of the water. Similarly, if we were simply existent, we would not be aware of our being. The only way we can "notice" our being is from a ground that is beyond being. This has been known since at least the time of Plato and was then elucidated by Plotinus and had a profound influence on Christianity through Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite and Meister Eckhardt. There is a whole tradition of apophaticism in the western tradition, and of course it is also present in Vedanta and some flavors of Buddhism especially Dzogchen. Trying to answer the question using materialist physics talk is simply playing with concepts and not experiencing the question existentially. Not to mention that physics paradigms change all the time so in a hundred years physicists will try to answer the question with completely different theories. But it is not a question that can be answered in such a way, it requires an interior interrogation and revelation.
If there was nothing we wouldn't know about it. There's something so we do know that there is something and we can speculate about nothing.
It's wild to consider that no mind in all of existence has ever known the answer to this, and may never.
There must have always been something, but not necessarily something we could ever understand.
Same! This question scares me. Even trying to imagine nothing gives me massive anxiety.
Something gives you anxiety, nothing will give you peace.
Why? It's not like there would be a 'you' to worry about it.
@@ManiBalajiC I like that notion. But if there's nothing, there's no peace either.
@traildoggy that's true. Maybe that's what scares me.
To start with: Aren't the concept of "nothing" and the concept of "being" contradictions? How can there be nothing? If there were nothing, then there would be something, namely that nothing. Wouldn't there?
But how would know there was something from nothing? Nothing is the absence of anything/something.
That was a very lengthy way of saying I don't know. It's like being asked why there are cars and responding with telling you we will get there with technicalities about spark plugs and cam belts.
how can we discern and question about "nothing"? Where does this information to question anything, come from?
It looks like science can establish a link all the way back to the big bang. But also our own growth in knowledge can develop in the opposite direction into the future with greater understanding possible: Each person can try to understand the world as it is to humans both as individuals and collaboratively collecting knowledge cumulatively; and shape the future accordingly at our point in time. One example of this is to understand the biosphere and improve it's integrity which would be beneficial not just as knowledge but as experience also.
Because, if there wasn't anything, there would be no one to ask such a question.
Clever, but not a valid answer. You are just sidestepping the question. The universe existed before life, and the question was just as valid then as it is now.
@@beam5655The question is a very human one. Without humans the question wouldn’t exist. We experience the universe in a limited human way. For the universe, the universe just is, and makes perfect ‘sense’, and is bound by, and free of, all kinds of rules we can’t even imagine because we’re limited by being human.
As Baron Rees indirectly alludes to, a better question to ask is "why is there (also) _order_ (aka the Cosmos, or negentropy) rather than (only) _disorder_ (aka the Chaos, or entropy)". And there's plenty of reasons to think that there's already answers to this, because we can run computer simulations of any random continuum of data which will inevitably (given sufficient evolution) result in varying occurrences of non-randomness (that gradually dissolve back into randomness, where lower entropy results in lengthier dissolution or even super-positioning (such that the dissolving effect may even become the exception rather than the norm).
Existence is the ultimate paradox.
Come come now. The human brain is nowhere near big enough and sophisticated enough to deal with this question, we cannot possible comprehend the existence of matter. Its madness to even try to pretend we know.
it's certainly a fun exercise in contemplation, but the question always bothers me fundamentally because what exactly is "nothing"? Just because we have a concept doesn't mean it exists outside of our heads.
Yes, you can't really describe 'nothing' without quantifying it in some way or at least imbuing it with some properties...and if it has properties then it's not nothing, it's something. That way lies madness.
@@AlFresco3442it's just an absence of matter , and space time for it to exist.
It's impossible to quantify, because if there was completely nothing, then nobody would be there to analyze it.
@@ManiBalajiC but there is no evidence of any absence of both matter and spacetime
There will always be something , when you move in any direction tending to infinity you will find something , even if we find nothing and nothing tends to infinity , even then you will find something
Something will always be there !!!!
Micro versus macro. Are they one system? Does quantum theory apply here? 🤔
are time and matter coincidental? did both come into being together?
time has always been in existence - infinitely, it's just that we've picked up on what it is. It was always here before us & will continue to exist after us.
Time is a characteristic of our universe. Time might not have existed before the Big Bang.
So there is never nothing but it can look like nothing to us since we are specific something. Once we edit the body way more and can see more of “reality” then we can predict more but also see the differences in between and where there was nothing, we see something.
To cyberdactyl: Why, what do you have? Not a clue?
Trying to consider this constructively, I would suggest that if there was ever going to be anything, by definition it has to be everything, and if an entire universe were to begin, go through its entire existence and eventually end without ever producing minds capable of investigating what existence actually was, then its entire existence would have no significance whatsoever; so we can at least infer that minds such as ours and, I hope, millions of others, are what gives any significance to our universe... against vast odds our Universe has produced minds like ours, so I am inclined to suggest that whether we exist in a multiverse with our universe being the only one that has minds, or not, we are at least one little component of its reason for existing... and that gives us the responsibility to aspire to becoming as worthy and knowledgeable as we can, otherwise, we ourselves will amount to nothing, so let us celebrate by our actions being worthy of this magnificent almost infinite miracle of existence itself, and prove ourselves worthy of the gift it has given us.
It crosses my mind (others below likely make this point) that if there was nothing, then not only can the question not be asked, but also there is no 'asker.' Nothing-: that's the rude glory of nothing. The question, in other words, is its own answer.
there has always been "something", it's all around & within us but only i know what it is (oh, & it's not love)
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Modern physicists are saying that time is an emergent property. So by extension one can say space is also an emergent property? Now the Q is, emergent from what? This, no scientist is saying. Not blaming them, because when you don’t have time and space, how do you do physics, science ? This is the problem.
According to Advaita Vedanta of Hinduism, time (kala), space (desa) and causality (karana) are emergent properties. Again, the Q is, emergent from what ? Advaitins also don’t have a scientifically or even psychologically satisfying answer. They have said that science can be done only via 2 instruments - sensory observation and intellectual inference. Impossible for senses and intellect to work without time and space. Leave alone mathematics and science, even language fails when you don’t space, time and causation to work on.
But one thing Advaitins argue logically, if it is emergent, then there has to be something from which it has to emerge. They call it ‘Sat’ = Reality.
So this Sat cannot be tied down to a time interval when it is (or not). Nor can it be confined to a space where it can be observed. Sat then necessarily has to be before and after time, and inside and outside space. Since Causality is also an emergent property, you cannot ask ‘why is there Sat?’. Sat simply Is. It is Existence per se.
Now, another thing is, if a property is an emergent from something, it will also dissolve back into that.
So now we are facing 2 options - 1. - either time, space and causality are emerging and dissolving back in cycles of creation and dissolution and hence totally unreal, or 2.- they are dependent realities dependent on the Sat, and they are ever present as dependent realities at the same locus as Sat.
Now the conclusion that can be drawn from all this is, Space, Time and Causation are dependent realities dependent on the One Reality (Without a Second), having no ontological independence, they are Appearances, dependent on Reality. Since the elements of the universe are space, time, and causation, then it means that the universe also is an Appearance having no ontological independence.
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It noble for men to ponder these questions of which we've already answered so many over the years. Of course, now that politics has polluted science, that trend will no longer continue and, even if it does, eventually all life on this tiny blue dot will flicker out and return to the dark, icy cold from whence it came. No one will even know we were ever here and there will be no way to hit the collective "save" button to retain all the knowledge we amassed. Nor will there be anyone to read it if we did. At that point, the age old philosophy question (what is the meaning of life) will finally be answered. There was none.
I already know what the meaning of life is, it is finally here
"Nothing" is scary, because we're afraid of dying. But don't worry -- there's clearly something, at least for the moment.
In my opinion, all those scientific questions Mr. Rees mentions are irrelevant to the question we are focused on.
Agreed, too much discussion about what we know already.
@@johnsgarage6622 Bread and games...
I thought that too. Doesn’t really address the question.
Because of me!
'Why is there anything at all?' Is that the same as 'The universe is contingent, just like everything else in the universe, so what effect brought about the universe?'
Does the question 'Why is there anything at all?' presuppose `nothing' or 'nothingness' as a primary?
Try to imagine nothing. I sometimes wonder if it’s consciousness alone that creates something out of nothing.
Disappointed he didn’t actually answer the question.
Agreed - I think the direct answer is we don’t know at the moment, perhaps never.
Will you accept 42?
Do you seriously think it is a question which has an answer?
The fact you exist inside of something means you can never know what is outside of it
Do you think he actually knows the answer?
Yes, many poets agree that the biggest mystery of our existence isn’t that life exists… it’s that there anything exists at all.
Why ? Because as long as particles are moving, even the most unlikely event will happen one day, provided there are an infinite number of universes where every possible event can be tried out. So this means if there exists something, there will always be life one day.
But who made the first particles ? This is the biggest mystery.
You’re begging the question by saying ‘who’ made X
Didn't Antoine Lavoisier say matter could not be created or destroyed? If that's the case, the question presented in this video is most relevant.
We are LIVING the "why?"
The better question is "How"?
Because the state of nothingness is unsustainable
Why? 🤷♂️😃
@@paul8000 I don’t know.
Why would there necessarily have ever been nothing?
If there’s a red square on the left and blue square on the right, and both squares switch places infinitely fast, both squares would be on opposite sides infinitely fast before being on opposite sides continuously. Would it be possible for the squares to stay on the sides they are on, then suddenly be on the sides they are on infinitely fast without switching sides in the first place. If they did that it would be like they had suddenly switched sides even though they haven’t, like a sort of lie.
One billionth of a second is to fast for us to experience, so I guess it’s fair to say that in that amount of time time we are not conscious. Matter and atoms move a distance that is so small, that we are not conscious while they are covering that tiny distance. The time frame we are conscious of is made up of time frames where we are not conscious, so how can we be conscious at all. Now let’s imagine that we are forever looking at a screen that never change’s colour. That screen would continuously be in the present, or would it. You see, our consciousness involves time, like a moving environment or clock. We get a personal sense of how long we’ve been staring at this unchanging screen, and our thoughts are changing. So now this is the opposite as mentioned above. Our consciousness is moving forward in time, but the screen we are staring at is unchanging, nonetheless the screen has to be moving forward in time because our consciousness is. We also need to visualise a colour to be a conscious being, whether we look at or imagine it. Now let’s say this screen we are looking at is what we are imagining and there’s no physical thing we are looking at. If so, then this screen we are imagining becomes the physical thing we are looking at. If for the whole time we are looking at this unchanging screen we were not conscious, it would seem to us that the screen would change to another colour in the blink of an eye, because we don’t have any memory of being unconscious (such as in a billionth of a second). If a group or infinite amount of people were zero dimensional points that mixed together to form one single zero dimensional point, every one would agree with what number they are looking at because every one would be one. But would everyone agree with what colour the numbers are, or how far away they are. For numbers to exist, you need a three dimensional space between your vision and the numbers, you need colour, and you need gaps or boundaries in between the numbers. All numbers are made of the same digit one, but the gaps and boundaries in between numbers truly are different from the digit ones that make numbers. Now, because every one is now one point, does that mean every one is now agreeing with the same number. Let’s say five points from that group saw the numbers as a different colour, does that mean they will form a different point of the same colour consciousness. They say during the Big Bang, different forces made one single force. Would it be possible for a colour conscious point, number conscious point, distance conscious point, to make one single point. Why does an hour seem like an hour to us and not one second or one year. If one week was like one second to an infinitely long falling line of dominos, would it feel like it’s acting at its own free will. Imagine if you kept mixing pinballs together forever that are the same size, and you still end up with one pinball exactly the same size. That’s what would happen if you kept on mixing zero dimensional points together, you would still end up with one single zero dimensional point without any dimensions. Let’s say 20 zero dimensional points are mixed together to make one single zero dimensional point, and one individual zero dimensional point mixes in, it would still be like two individual points mixing together. This individual zero dimensional point that has mixed in with the zero dimensional point made of 20 individual points, would make the point made of 20 points half as different, then after having done that, it would be meaningless because it would now be mixed in with the other 20 points and be part of one single point. Or would this individual point devour the 20 others, so the 20 others would become as meaningless as one individual point mixed in, followed by this individual point that devoured the 20 others becoming meaningless as it to would be one point mixed in with the rest.
If a number of points are mixed together to make one single point, would all the points agree with what number they are looking at. If you were part of another point because you disagree with the other points on what colour the number is in the point you’re in, you would be in two seperate points at once. When we’re not conscious (such as in a billionth of a second), we don’t exist. If we’re in two points at once, it’s faster than our consciousness, because it’s the same as shifting between two points of consciousness infinitely fast. Our sense of being is zero dimensional, so does that mean we’re each a seperate zero dimensional point. When we don’t have a sense of being such as in a billionth of a second, we are nothing, so we can’t be a zero dimensional point. If we’re in one point we are conscious but we are mixed in with the other points to make one single point, so we exist but don’t exist.
All numbers are just the digit one that is a certain length up the number line. What makes four four or nine nine. Four is made of two twos so are you looking at four or two. Nine is made of three threes so are you looking at three or nine. When we look at two or three things we know there is two or three without counting them. When we have to count something we are not conscious of how many a there, a bit like like not being conscious of what happens at a billionth of a second (if we were we would experience time going a lot slower). If all numbers are the same digit one, do we get an illusion of how far up the number line they are. We need two different colours for numbers to exist. Like numbers could all colours be the same digit one but we just have a dilution of how far up the number line they are. If we are zero dimensional points mixed in with a heap of other zero dimensional points, we would all agree with the other points on what number we are focusing our attention on because we would all be one point. But if we disagreed on what colour the numbers or background was, would we form our own seperate point. If we swapped the numbers we are focusing on for the colours the numbers and background are, would that do anything. What if the point was made of 20 individual points, then split to form 20 individual points. You are now theorising the existence of 20 individual points, so now you yourself are an individual point with a consciousness of 20, so by looking at these 20 scattered points you are looking at yourself. If there are multiple other points mixed in with you they all to would get the illusion they are seeing 20 scattered points. If one point consisted of multiple points, it wouldn’t consist of a number of points because there would be no order. You could keep mixing an infinite number of zero dimensional points points together forever and still end up with one single zero dimensional point. If there were different points scattered around because every point had different opinions of what colour the numbers were, and we don’t know how many individual points are scattered around, we theorising this would be an individual point with a consciousness of infinity or nothing. If only two multi point points exist, one good way to leave the point we’re in and enter the other multi point point would be to disagree with the other points we’re mixed with on what number we are focusing on, or forget what number we are focusing on.
If you have say five different things, even though they are different things what makes them the same is they are in the same category of being a different thing. To escape this to truly get not just a different thing but a different category, is if we look at the gaps or boundaries in between numbers because they are different to the digit ones that are either side of them.
If we have a red square on the left and blue square on the right, and they switch places infinitely fast, what happens is the blue square is on the left infinitely fast then on the left continuously. Could the two squares remain in their spaces, then remain there infinitely fast followed by continuously, without leaving their spaces in the first place.
You can’t see what space is made of because the blocks or material the make space would not contain space. Imagine a nut and jellybean made one. You can’t see what the jellybean and nut are made from because the stuff that makes the jellybean doesn’t make the nut, and the stuff that makes the nut doesn’t make the jellybean. What if the jellybean and nut was overall space, not mattering if they were both next to each other, or miles or light years apart, because they both make up overall space. Just as the building blocks that make space wouldn’t contain space (making you blind towards them), you can’t see what both the jellybean and nut are made from, because the stuff that makes the jellybean doesn’t make the nut and the stuff that makes the nut doesn’t make the jellybean. Think of a tank filled with jellybeans and nuts. The jellybeans and nuts would be the cause of the stuff inside the tank to exist, at the same time the jellybeans and nuts (being overall space) could be outside the tank, each having their own seperate causes of existence by the stuff that makes them. So if time stops, the cause doesn’t stop. A domino that is falling over will cause the one next to it to fall over, followed by the one next to it. But if time stops, so everything freezes, the cause of something doesn’t stop, because what something is made of causes it to exist.
You seem to have confused the question 'why is there anything rather than nothing?' with the question 'Is there really anything rather than nothing?'. If you had not mixed them up, why did you say you scared a lot by this question? Only when what you have in mind is the second question, it is scaring; if it is the first, it is just about the ultimate reason behind the fact that there is something, nothing scaring, just deep, and even perhaps interesting and intriguing.
Another thing: this scholar's speech appears to contain some contradiction. When he quoted Wittgenstein's famous dictum, he was expressing agnosticism, because 'cannot speak' of course represents impossibility of understanding. But when he mentioned Newton's ignorance of how our Solar System formed and our now having known the answer, he was trying to say that we are making and can make much progress in answering further questions whose answer we now do not know, which is diametrically opposed to agnosticism.
To ask this question is to admit one's own nihilism. It presupposes that nothingness has ontological priority over being, which is a complete inversion of reality. The truth is that if there was not being, then there could not even be nothing.
Even if there’s nothing, there’s something.
Imagine how a prediction isn’t real but the neurons are real and reflect that potential. Now imagine a simulation and it’s the same. Built on reality but not real in the full spectrum. That’s why we imagine the details between and expand our understanding and knowledge so that we can imagine the paths to those things and we alter our current to align. Like lining reality up with the potential and then revealing it in reality because of the pieces. If the pieces are what make something real then what about all potentials and how they aren’t current, the only thing real would be now but shifting currently which makes all real.
How can there be nothing? Nothing is non- existence, and non- existence can’t exist.
The question is self evident. If there wasn’t anything, the question could not be asked. I think, the first immeasurable instant spawned proto universes….until one was stable enough to persist. The point being those first attempts occurred before time could be established as the dimension we have in our successful universe…so literally you have an infinite rate of universe generation until one works….and therefore the creation becomes inevitable.
Law of commonsense - there will always be something , even when nothing tends to infinity, nothing is also something
I learn nothing from this video, so it does exist !
The problem we have is we offer two choices… a big bang or god. The trouble is both are flawed. Big bangs are no more spontaneous than the idea of a god that has existed forever. The answer must be that a creator caused a big bang with everything needed to sustain a Universe with us in it. A creator isn’t a god in divine being. It is energy full of knowledge. A benign creator is the only thing that makes sense to me.
The answer may lie in thoroughly understanding the laws of physics and quantum physics, as then we could predict, or assume where it could all have possibly started...laws that expand across this and probably other universes..
'Nothing': can't be. 'Something': requires an explanation. 'Everything Possible': seems like the only option left.
That which IS, IS. That which IS NOT, also IS. What IS it? It IS NOT. IS it? It, IS.
The issue is the paradox of cause and effect. Our paradigm of understanding is based on everything having a cause and an effect. If we apply reverse engineering to the universe we get to the Big Bang being the cause. But if we go further than that we need to adopt a different paradigm to cause and effect. This is impossible since we have no notion of what other paradigm makes as logical sense as cause and effect. Hence we are trapped and we cannot invent or discover the new paradigm of thinking using the brain and laws of reality that we live with.
Martin is in Rocky Horror
'First, let me bring you up to speed: We know nothing." --- Inspector Clouseau
There was always everything. never a time there wasnt everything
The questioner asked the most fundamental question of all, and a question that nobody, including Martin Rees, has an answer to: 'Why is there something rather than nothing in the universe'? If there is nothing then that is easy, but as there is something we have to ask, 'Where did it come from?' This is a question which is impossible to answer.
Left to itself, how did the cosmos ever produce a being like us who asks, "Why is there something rather than nothing?"
The beginning of misunderstanding is not to ackknowledge that electrons do the same "calculations" that we can derive. Than one should begin to understand that the universe could be programmed if every electron is capable of executing any operation. The "program", allthough immense is such that we are bound to get conscient off (since one particle governs all there is); only to conclude that nothing is to change about it. Embracing that (Spinosa) was possible without physics. It is remarkeble, that the "conscious" minds on public media never philosophy about this obvious insight. And so the beginning of this universe is only to be understood if the right people in the right future learn to live a full life of understanding and motivation. Anyway, who is expecting an end of our world. The fuller one's life now, delivers a lot of necessairy patience and future prospects. If on board with these principles, more people should be able to emcompass maximal personal responsibility. For me it was the reason to become the first man behind a child carriedge; in hindsight a very good choice almost 60 years ago and it saved me a lot of unnecessairy "half knowledge".
As my brother said one night as we all camped out under the starts one summer night as kids when we all contemplated what caused the stars and what was here before all of it. Someone said, nothing. He said, there couldn’t be nothing be cause nothing is something.
There are fruitful ways to spend one's brief sojourn in this world; IMO, attempting, sometimes with significant angst, to answer this question via verbal reasoning, isn't one of them.
Referred to by M.R. @ 3:25 : "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent”.
Search result: "This profound statement is attributed to the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. It appears in his work “Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus”, where he explores the limits of language and the boundaries of meaningful expression. Wittgenstein suggests that there are aspects of reality that cannot be adequately captured or communicated through language. When faced with such ineffable subjects, silence becomes the most fitting response.
In this concise aphorism, Wittgenstein invites us to recognize the limitations of our linguistic tools and to appreciate the mysteries that lie beyond them. Sometimes, silence speaks more eloquently than words ever could".