Hi, Stephen,
when I first made the mistake of barging int ontology
I started from "Nothingness" and continued: once it
becomes aware of it's nonexistence it starts to exist
and realizing its emptyness it became "Somethingness".
I had a good laugh. Since then (~1990?) I don't think
in "so smart" lines. I had some delicious talks at
that time with Hal Ruhl whose ideas were not (too)
contradictory to mine, but since then he went ahead
into more sophisticated domains and I stayed back.
I don't think 'nothingness' IS an empty string,
because and empty string IS - as you thought correctly
- a string. I would not suggest for 'nothingness' a
nice substitute of "the content of an empty string"
because what does identify a string with nothing in
it? It is not nothingness, it is a string without
substance. A pictureframe without a picture in it.
Something anyway.
But I apologize, I still should not speculate in
things which are beyond our speculative (human)
domains.
And whether there really IS something? We THINK so,
the solipsists don't. As Descart should have said:
We think, because we think that we think - so we ARE.
Etc.
John M
--- Stephen Paul King <stephenk1.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
> Hi Norman,
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Norman Samish" <ncsamish.domain.name.hidden>
> To: <everything-list.domain.name.hidden>
> Sent: Monday, March 06, 2006 12:14 AM
> Subject: Why is there something rather than nothing?
>
>
> >
> > "Why is there something rather than nothing?"
> >
> > When I heard that Famous Question, I did not
> assume that "nothing" was
> > describable - because, if it was, it would not be
> "nothing." I don't
> > think
> > of "nothing" as an empty bitstring - I think of it
> as the absence of a
> > bitstring - as "no thing."
> >
> > Given that definition, is there a conceivable
> answer to The Famous
> > Question?
>
> Yes, there is an answer! Because Nothingness can
> not non-Exist.
>
> Onward!
>
> Stephen
>
>
>
>
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Received on Mon Mar 06 2006 - 12:21:57 PST