In brief, I propose that a thing exists if it is a grouping . From tiny things like atoms, to really big things like galaxies. dark count number, although, continues to be purely theory. As weird as it seems, inflation fits the facts rather well. "If space and time are quantized, they can fluctuate," says Lawrence Krauss at Arizona State University in Tempe. Nothing and something are opposing ends of the same coin toss. I have been fascinated with living things since childhood. Those universes might be profoundly different to ours. Discover how "self-existence" can solve this puzzle. Somehow, matter won. Philosopher and author Jim Holt plays the role of the inquisitive detective who is on a mission to answer the ultimate question of existence. Alternatively, space-time could curve outward like a saddle. There could just be nothing, but instead there is something, and none of us truly know why. Abstract. Guth calls inflation "the ultimate free lunch". The universe next door might have five dimensions of space rather than the three – length, breadth and height – that ours does. Matter might be built out of utterly different particles. Einstein's theory of general relativity tells us that the space-time we live in could take three different forms. Inflation also gave cosmologists the measuring tool they needed to determine the underlying geometry of the universe. So how comes there’s something, not nothing? That is, why is there anything rather than nothing? It could be as flat as a table top. area isn't a void. In other words, little bubbles of space and time can form spontaneously. That information, they say, should give us a clue about how and why the cosmos exists. But it has the odd awkward lapse. By Mike Sygula, Is reincarnation real, do souls exist? Still, it seems like a big leap from an infinitesimal space-time bubble to a massive universe that hosts 100 billion galaxies. As weird as it seems, inflation fits the facts. Sign up to read our regular email newsletters. Why Does Anything Exist? This seemingly outlandish notion was put forward in the 1980s by Alan Guth at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and refined by Andrei Linde, now at Stanford University. Gravity might be ten times stronger or a thousand times weaker, or not exist at all. A solution to the question "Why is there something rather than nothing?" Or am I just high? We already know that particles spring into existence at the quantum level, so we might expect the universe to contain a few odds and ends. Philosopher and writer Jim Holt follows this question toward three … It uses sensible words and grammar and has the form of a question and so on. The basic reason that “anything” exists is that shortly after the initial diffusion of the “Big Bang”, the Higgs field allowed the newly-formed subatomic particles to have mass. Nothing and something are opposing ends of the same coin toss. The reason that anything exists and there is something rather than nothing, is because God made it. Why Life Does Not Really Exist. That's where inflation comes in. That inflating space can spawn more universes, with yet more inflating space around them. The conjecture that the superposition principle of QM explains literally everything - from why anything exists at all to the properties of our phenomenally-bound minds - can't directly be verified. I know how much he stated about reasons why we should not exist such as Nirvana being the highest goal to escape from the karma bond!! You can take the number 1 (“All That Is,” so to speak) and divided it down into infinitesimally smaller parts. That information, they say, should give us a clue about how and why the cosmos exists. When a new universe stops inflating, says Linde, it is still surrounded by space that is continuing to inflate. Nothing doesn’t result in something. This balances the energy needed to create the matter in the first place. What's more, if it's possible for these bubbles to form, you can guarantee that they will. This idea may sound bizarre, or just another fanciful creation story. At first all the matter and energy in the universe was crammed together in one unimaginably small dot, and this exploded. If all the galaxies are flying apart, they must once have been close together. And, especially, why do we exist? It is puzzling how there could be *something* rather than simply nothing (ever). THERE is plenty to recommend the standard model, our best description of particles and their interactions. And where the hell are we? This follows from the discovery, in the early 20th century, that the universe is expanding. Their admittedly controversial answer is that the entire universe, from the fireball of the Big Bang to the star-studded cosmos we now inhabit, popped into existence from nothing at all. That's because every object in the universe creates gravity, pulling other objects toward it. It's a bit like an old-fashioned measuring scale. But this is only true in a flat universe. THERE ARE here two questions: (1) Why does the Universe exist at all? Here’s my view. The immune system: can you improve your immune age? in certainty, scientists have faith dark count number makes up a lot extra of the universe than seen count number does, which in part explains why gravity exists in places the place there ought to be none. Pretty much every ancient culture came up with its own creation story - most of them leaving the matter in the hands of the gods - and philosophers have written reams on the subject. Should you avoid alcohol when getting a coronavirus vaccine? One thing they have found is that, when quantum theory is applied to space at the smallest possible scale, space itself becomes unstable. What links post-Everett QM; the cancellation of the Universe's conserved constants to zero; black holes; and zero construed as a number in mathematics? By David Pearce. It turns out that a flat universe is crucial. Without God creating, nothing would exist. Some dismiss these questions, thinking them idle. The universe is flat and why that's important. If one space-time bubble popped into existence and inflated to form our universe, what kept other bubbles from doing the same? It’s just a big infinite maze of possibility, and it never started and it never ends. These are some big questions that have been debated over and over for centuries. But the physicists argue that it follows naturally from science's two most powerful and successful theories: quantum mechanics and general relativity. 100% Upvoted. So it's not just particles and antiparticles that can snap in and out of nothingness: bubbles of space-time can do the same. Everything that exists, from stars and galaxies to the light we see them by, must have sprung from somewhere. Linde offers a simple but mind-bending answer. 0 comments. share. The question "Why is there anything at all? As yet we don't have hard evidence that other universes exist. He thinks universes have always been springing into existence, and that this process will continue forever. In other words: Why does the universe exist (and why are we in it)? Their admittedly controversial answer is that the entire universe, from the fireball of … ", or, "Why is there something rather than nothing?" You might remember from maths class that the three angles of a triangle add up to exactly 180 degrees. Existing subscribers, please log in with your email address to link your account access. Log in or sign up to leave a comment Log In Sign Up. Linde says eternal inflation is not just the ultimate free lunch: it is the only one at which all possible dishes are available. THERE is plenty to recommend the standard model, our best description of particles and their interactions. What I Learned From … (See Four causes) The search for the origin of life: From panspermia to primordial soup. The Mystery of Existence asks the haunting question: Why does anything exist? Growing up in northern California, I spent a lot of … They point out that we now have an understanding of the history of the universe, and of the physical laws that describe how it works. Why is there something instead of nothing? The first edited volume to cover an extremely wide variety of solutions to what must be the ultimate mystery, it features dozens of luminaries. Some things are better reasoned through from first principles, and I think the universe is definitely one of those things. : An Existential Detective Story by Jim Holt "Why Does the World Exist?" Why is there something rather than nothing? Why does the Earth and the universe exist? People have wrestled with the mystery of why the universe exists for thousands of years. There could be a mind-boggling smorgasbord of universes. "In quantum physics, if something is not forbidden, it necessarily happens with some non-zero probability," says Alexander Vilenkin of Tufts University in Boston, Massachusetts. Some physicists think they can explain why the universe first formed. HY DOES THE UNIVERSE EXIST? hide. If you draw a triangle on the surface of a balloon, its three angles will add up to more than 180 degrees. At this point, making a universe looks almost easy. It says that in the big bang, matter and antimatter should have been created in equal measure. Relativity is very different from quantum mechanics, and so far nobody has been able to combine the two seamlessly. should have been created in equal measure. Alternatively, if you draw a triangle on a surface that curves outward like a saddle, its angles will add up to less than 180 degrees. The old metaphysical question – why anything exists at all – has perplexed and intrigued humankind for ages. Thus, the fact that anything should exist at all demands an explanation. The Big Bang - Before and After May 12, 2019. In the case of the universe, the matter goes on one side of the scale, and has to be balanced by gravity. Actually, it’s worse than that: the standard model positively insists we don’t exist. Many would agree that things that exist must have an explanation; a reason why they are. I'm stuck on this for now ...does the Buddha say anything about why we exist ( mankind ? If the universe had been curved, the two sums would not cancel out. They should have snuffed each other out in a hot orgy of mutual destruction during the first second of the universe’s existence, leaving a cosmos filled with nothing but light. report. Physicists have calculated that in a flat universe the energy of matter is exactly balanced by the energy of the gravity the mass creates. However, some theorists have been able to bring the two theories to bear on particular problems by using carefully chosen approximations. the respond is not any. So why did it only happen once? In an incredibly brief moment, it went from being smaller than the nucleus of an atom to the size of a grain of sand. save. It’s just a big infinite … There is a way to tell. Everything that we observe and understand follows from that. We might want to know how we exist, which can be answered scientifically or with God, I don’t personally worry about that question either. Bizarrely, this doesn’t seem to be the case. Some even think they make no sense. Possibly the most important ‘why’ question of all, and as such it should receive more attention. Rather than remaining perfectly smooth and continuous, space and time destabilize, churning and frothing into a foam of space-time bubbles. Why is there something instead of nothing? Where did the universe get all this energy? Intuitively, there shouldn’t be anything to explain. Anything of any kind, anywhere. Then the resulting tiny bubble of space-time could have burgeoned into a massive, busy universe, thanks to inflation. Quantum mechanics tells us that there is no such thing as empty space. Science with Sam explains. Posted on November 18, 2015 by algekalipso . They range from Plato and Aristotle to Aquinas and Leibniz, and then to modern thinkers. Why does the concept of existence, exist? It had to happen, they say, because "nothing" is inherently unstable. It could curve back on itself like the surface of a sphere, in which case if you travel far enough in the same direction you would end up back where you started. When the expansion finally slowed, the force field that had powered it was transformed into the matter and energy that fill the universe today. But it takes a huge amount of energy to make all those stars and planets. Posted on 2018/12/4 under Articles, Featured, Science, Spirituality. As Krauss puts it, "The laws of physics as we understand them make it eminently plausible that our universe arose from nothing - no space, no time, no particles, nothing that we now know of.". Consider the universe—by which I mean everything that has existed, does exist, and will exist. Read about our approach to external linking. Since the existence of anything requires a cause, this is the proper way to ask the question: Why does anything exist? So which is it? Just like to know for balance of reality. This is the branch of physics that deals with very small things: atoms and even tinier particles. So once inflation starts it should make an endless cascade of universes, which Linde calls eternal inflation. NASA; ESA; G. Illingworth, D. Magee, and P. Oesch, University of California, Santa Cruz; R. Bouwens, Leiden University; and the HUDF09 Team. Inflation theory proposes that in the immediate aftermath of the Big Bang, the universe expanded much faster than it did later. Climate change: 2020 was the joint hottest year on record, Covid-19 news: Major incident declared in London as virus cases surge, CRISPR doubles lifespan of mice with rapid ageing disease progeria, Corals bleached from heat become less resilient to ocean acidification, Black holes leak energy when they eat plasma near the event horizon, UK may allow gene editing of crops and livestock following Brexit, Plants that suck metals from the soil can be farmed to make our tech, The scientific guide to a better Christmas dinner, How do mRNA coronavirus vaccines work? Everything that exists. “It is a somewhat embarrassing fact that it fails to explain our existence,” says Werner Rodejohann at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Germany. His argument summarizes and ends up concluding that God is the reason. Why does anything exist? There is the complexity of evolution and all kinds of things to talk about in this macro world if we wanted but it doesn’t explain anything why this macro world came to exist. In quantum physics, if something is not forbidden, it necessarily happens. Yet the conjecture can be experimentally refuted. Mystery: Why does anything exist at all? So to find out if the universe is flat, we need to measure the angles of a really big triangle. You can put a heavy weight on one side, so long as it is balanced by an equal weight on the other. One possibility is that the antimatter is just hiding: some of it, somehow, escaped the death match, taking refuge in little safe spots that eventually became distant regions as the cosmos cooled and expanded. If this universe is the only thing there is, that’s kind of weird and illogical—why would this big space just exist by itself in … If the number 1 exists, then any other possible number MUST exist. Our best theories predict that all the matter in the universe should have been destroyed as soon as it existed. The energy of matter is exactly balanced by the energy of the gravity the mass creates. Why does anything exist at all? Actually, it is possible for the bubble to survive. The health benefits of sunlight: Can vitamin D help beat covid-19? is proposed that also entails a proposed solution to the question "Why do things exist?". In that case, there should be …. Why does anything at all exist? So there could be a mind-boggling smorgasbord of universes. View image of (Credit: NASA, ESA, M. Postman (STScI), CLASH Team, Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)), View image of The Stephan's Quintet group of galaxies (Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team), View image of Maybe it all began with bubbles (Credit: amira_a, CC by 2.0), View image of The cosmic microwave background (Credit: NASA / WMAP Science Team), View image of It may not look flat... (Credit: NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI)), View image of Matter on one side, gravity on the other (Credit: Da Sal, CC by 2.0), View image of (Credit: NASA, ESA, J. Hester, A. Loll (ASU)). Actually your teachers left out a crucial point: this is only true on a flat surface. “It would look very different, not least because planets and stars and life could not evolve in such an environment,” says Tara Shears at the University of Liverpool, UK. Inside the fight to save the Great Barrier Reef from climate change, Meteorites may have brought water to Earth in the recent past, Videos of over 200 science talks plus weekly crosswords available exclusively to subscribers, Exclusive access to subscriber-only events. Our universe may be just one grain of sand on an endless beach. If the universe had not expanded so rapidly, we would expect the radiation to be patchier than it is. It could be argued that the gap between absolute nothingness and something is too large to bridge. Further, the sheer existence of something means that everything (literally everything) that is possible must exist somewhere in the matrix of time, space and dimension. Quantum mechanics tells us that "nothing" is inherently unstable, so the initial leap from nothing to something may have been inevitable. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing theory about the “birth” of the universe. This can sound like a fine question. And yet here we are. Why does anything exist? If all the galaxies are flying apart, they must once have been close together. It is an immensely successful theory, and it underpins most modern electronic gadgets. Our best theory for describing such large-scale structures is general relativity, Albert Einstein's crowning achievement, which sets out how space, time and gravity work. These so-called virtual particles don't last long enough to be observed directly, but we know they exist by their effects. It turns out this is also crucial for understanding how the cosmos came from nothing. Most physicists now think that the universe began with the Big Bang. Bizarrely, it may not have had to get any. These two famously don’t get along, annihilating one another in a flash of light whenever they come within touching distance. "So you can create virtual space-times just as you can create virtual particles.". I don’t think knowing why we exist is the question we need to ask. Why Does the World Exist? In particular, it neatly explains why the cosmic microwave background, the faint remnant of radiation left over from the Big Bang, is almost perfectly uniform across the sky. I believe they are both good questions. It determined the average size of the warmer and cooler patches in the cosmic microwave background. But it has the odd awkward lapse. Without God creating, nothing would exist. Why does all this something exist? As a result, we know that on the largest observable scale our universe is flat. (2) Why is the Universe as it is? Even the most perfect vacuum is actually filled by a roiling cloud of particles and antiparticles, which flare into existence and almost instantaneously fade back into nothingness. is an intellectual quest of one the most intriguing philosophical questions, "Why Does the World Exist". Answer: When someone asks why is there Something rather than Nothing, they are asking for the cause of Existence in the widest possible sense—for the cause of everything. Those patches were measured in 2003, and that gave astronomers a selection of triangles. In other words: Why does the universe exist (and why are we in it)? First we have to take a look at the realm of quantum mechanics. I know people are talking about the big bang and how it made space and all, but how and why did the big bang exist like big bang made everything we know, but who made the big bang. Here, then, is how everything could have come from nothing. But either way, these ideas give a whole new meaning to the phrase "Thanks for nothing". One of the most remarkable things is that the scale of the universe compared to our size is equal to the scale of the universe of us to the micro world. Low-carb diets: An easy way to lose weight or recipe for heart attack? Many spiritual […] Read more. But for that we need another trick: cosmic inflation. But science has had little to say about this ultimate question. If they are right, our entire cosmos may have sprung out of nothing at all. Why does anything exist? For instance, this approach was used by Stephen Hawking at the University of Cambridge to describe black holes. If someone believes in God, maybe they believe they will know why everything or anything existed when they die and join Him. Subatomic particles form the first atoms… That's because only a flat universe is likely to have come from nothing. The idea is that, a fraction of a second after the Big Bang, the quantum-sized bubble of space expanded stupendously fast. Mathematically speaking, the number 1 (existence) can be divided into smaller, and smaller, and smaller numbers but … The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle argued that everything must have a cause, culminating in an ultimate uncaused cause. which could at least If all of nature, space, and time have a cause, that cause cannot be natural, spacial, or temporal, for the same reason that a man cannot be his own father. has been raised or commented on by philosophers including Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Martin Heidegger – who called it the fundamental question of metaphysics. Although God had no need for anything or anyone else, it should be understood that God freely decided to create the universe and, especially, angelic and human-beings mainly for the purpose of enlarging His “Circle of Love”. Why does anything at all exist?, Leibniz thought this to be the most basic question one can ask. However, in recent years a few physicists and cosmologists have started to tackle it. The universe is all of nature, all of energy, space, matter, and time. Further, the sheer existence of something means that everything (literally everything) that is possible must exist somewhere in the matrix of time, space and dimension. Surely, even if a bubble formed, it would be doomed to disappear again in the blink of an eye? Is not just particles and their interactions used by Stephen Hawking at the realm of quantum mechanics, and exploded. If you draw a triangle on the largest observable scale our universe may be just one grain of sand an. 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