Re: WHY DOES ANYTHING EXIST

From: Russell Standish <r.standish.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Fri, 20 May 2005 09:01:09 +1000

On Thu, May 19, 2005 at 09:54:49AM -0700, "Hal Finney" wrote:
>
> The question then becomes not, why is there something instead of nothing;
> but, why is there something instead of everything.

But don't you see the answer to this is trivial? If everything exists,
then conscious observers exist that see something.

That is why I say Nothing and Everything exhaust the possibilities.

>
> Now, we don't know yet if everything exists, or merely some things exist,
> so it is an open question. But it does seem to be a question that needs
> to be answered.
>
> Hal Finney

If only some things exist, not everything, then we have a deep
mystery. Until there is clear evidence that not everything exists, we
should assume it does so by Occam's razor.

Cheers

-- 
*PS: A number of people ask me about the attachment to my email, which
is of type "application/pgp-signature". Don't worry, it is not a
virus. It is an electronic signature, that may be used to verify this
email came from me if you have PGP or GPG installed. Otherwise, you
may safely ignore this attachment.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A/Prof Russell Standish                  Phone 8308 3119 (mobile)
Mathematics                         	       0425 253119 (")
UNSW SYDNEY 2052         	         R.Standish.domain.name.hidden             
Australia                                http://parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/rks
            International prefix  +612, Interstate prefix 02
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Received on Thu May 19 2005 - 19:30:08 PDT