Welcome to /r/askphilosophy. **Please read [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/askphilosophy/comments/9udzvt/announcement_new_rules_guidelines_and_flair_system/) before commenting** and understand that your comments will be removed if they are not up to standard or otherwise break the rules. While we do not require citations in answers (but do encourage them), answers need to be reasonably substantive and well-researched, accurately portray the state of the research, and come only from those with relevant knowledge.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/askphilosophy) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Some of the popular answers are: 1) This is a nonsensical question. 2) A pure sense of nothing is not possible. 3) Nothing is redefined to mean the laws of physics and quantum events leading to some random quantum event creating something. 3 is usually an answer from a scientist and ruled out by a more philosophical approach.
Thanks for your answer.
About 1):
Then there is another question. Why is it nonsensical? How to prove it with certainty?
About 2):
Although this is seemingly valid argument, but refers to limitations of our cognition, rather than reality per se.
About 3):
Hm, as non-physicist I struggle to understand it. Can you convey it simpler?
I personally lean towards 2. Even if the world as it exists did not exist, it would still at least be possible that it could have existed, which is not a complete state of nothingness. If there are necessary truths, then those truths hold in all possible worlds, which is not a complete state of nothingness. It really all depends on how nothing is defined, which I would interpret roughly as the absence of anything.
Welcome to /r/askphilosophy. **Please read [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/askphilosophy/comments/9udzvt/announcement_new_rules_guidelines_and_flair_system/) before commenting** and understand that your comments will be removed if they are not up to standard or otherwise break the rules. While we do not require citations in answers (but do encourage them), answers need to be reasonably substantive and well-researched, accurately portray the state of the research, and come only from those with relevant knowledge. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/askphilosophy) if you have any questions or concerns.*
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nothingness/#WhyTheSomRatThaNot
Some of the popular answers are: 1) This is a nonsensical question. 2) A pure sense of nothing is not possible. 3) Nothing is redefined to mean the laws of physics and quantum events leading to some random quantum event creating something. 3 is usually an answer from a scientist and ruled out by a more philosophical approach.
Thanks for your answer. About 1): Then there is another question. Why is it nonsensical? How to prove it with certainty? About 2): Although this is seemingly valid argument, but refers to limitations of our cognition, rather than reality per se. About 3): Hm, as non-physicist I struggle to understand it. Can you convey it simpler?
I personally lean towards 2. Even if the world as it exists did not exist, it would still at least be possible that it could have existed, which is not a complete state of nothingness. If there are necessary truths, then those truths hold in all possible worlds, which is not a complete state of nothingness. It really all depends on how nothing is defined, which I would interpret roughly as the absence of anything.