# Is "Nothing" something? Need answer fast. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 25, 2014, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554 "2014-03-25T21:27:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Bumbershoot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bumbershoot/32/3428_2.png) [@Bumbershoot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bumbershoot)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2014, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/21 "2014-03-28T22:17:22Z")
… I got nothin’. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2014, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/22 "2014-03-30T15:07:35Z")
_Scientific American_ has on-line archives (for subscribers, but with previews) and [a search engine](http://www.scientificamerican.com/search/?q=nothingness&x=18&y=17&display=search), yielding for examples: [ul][li] The Nothingness of Earth; March 5, 1846 [no preview][/li][li] Martin Gardner Feb 1975, “How the absence of anything leads to thoughts of nothing” [no preview][/li][li] [Is Time an Illusion?](http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-time-an-illusion/)[/li][li] [Physicists Debate the Many Varieties of Nothingness](http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2013/03/22/physicists-debate-the-many-varieties-of-nothingness/)[/li][li] [Thinkers Talk about Nothing](http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/thinkers-talk-about-nothing-13-03-21/)[/li][li] et cetera[/li][/ul] Other than that, I got nuthin’. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2014, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/23 "2014-03-30T20:50:59Z")
I started a GD thread on the topic a few years ago. I’d held that the fact there exists something—anything—means _absolute nothingness_ (zero matter, energy, space, time, virtual particles, etc.: _absolutely nothing_) is impossible. But lately I’m not so sure. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/24 "2014-03-31T15:17:52Z")
> [@Alan\_Smithee](#): > > But of course, there’s lots of nothing. Nothing is simply nonexistence, and as **Scribble** pointed out via Stanslaw Lem, there are plenty of things that don’t exist. Every one of them is a piece of nothing. But is it that simple? Unicorns, tribbles, hobbits, sessile grogs, these things, as far as we know, do not have real, physical form. Yet, they can be described, and people have depicted them verbally, graphically or in sculpture. In that respect, their true non-existence is debatable. Physical absence is not sufficient to define “nothing”. In fact, even quarks may not exist by the standard of having a physical presence, as they are merely a theoretical model used to resolve observed particle behavior. Thus, since we can talk about nothing, it must therefore non-exist, which addresses the question of the thread: “nothing” is indeed (not) something. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/25 "2014-03-31T15:25:35Z")
[Is Nothing Sacred?](http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_UiZRvkBqTqE/SSAwNhqGpxI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/eo7VcRV-x6w/s400/is+nothing+sacred.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/26 "2014-03-31T17:16:57Z")
Here is an [interesting discussion of Nothing](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNh-pY3hJnY) with Neil deGrasse Tyson, Laurence Krause, and some other physicists. Been a while since I saw it, but IIRC there were at least three different kinds of nothing. Forgot to mention – need answer fast? This may not be for you – it’s nearly 2 hours, and all specifically about Nothing. Or perhaps Something pretending to be Nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/27 "2014-03-31T17:38:04Z")
Cheating by re-watching at work – turns out “nothing” is a Christian concept. For example, there is no zero in Roman numerals. Before Christians, the universe was conceived of arising from chaos – disorganized “stuff”. But then the idea arose that God was so powerful he could create something from nothing. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/28 "2014-03-31T19:32:21Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > [Is Nothing Sacred?](http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_UiZRvkBqTqE/SSAwNhqGpxI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/eo7VcRV-x6w/s400/is+nothing+sacred.jpg) Thanks, Clothahump! That Gahan Wilson masterpiece is exactly what I thought of when I saw this thread. ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2014, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/29 "2014-04-01T06:32:27Z")
Rather than bump the eight-year-old [Absence/Emptiness as a theme in art](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=355180) perhaps this link will do to suggest another side to the nothingness issue. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2014, 9:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/30 "2014-04-01T09:26:57Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > You forgot the empty string (a string of length 0). Also empty graph (a graph with no nodes). And let’s see, size zero tuple, null relation, and probably a zillion others. > > . Or you could have seen that they were all tautology with “empty set”,which was given… eg A string is an ordered set ( of characters) - a computer programming concepts. eg a graph is a set of points, that define the line Well then you’d realise you hit something more unique than that. " a zero tuple"- well thats a little more abstract Not only is an empty, it _couldn’t_ have anything in it. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2014, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/31 "2014-04-02T06:22:20Z")
Well, an empty string is not nothing, it is an actual string, but with no content. It is represented either with a length prefix of zero, a terminator character, or a null pointer, but it is nonetheless represented in some way, and it can be meaningful (in a call, it often indicates either that a default value should be used or that a field should be cleared). Similarly, the value 0 is not nothing. It occupies a point on the numeric continuum, has a greater value that -1, and is the crucial limit in the derivative algorithm. When you divide by zero, crazy-ass stuff happens, so it is clearly not nothing. Empty things are merely things which are empty. In C, one often encounters routines that expect \ ***void** , or a pointer to void, which technically points to nothing (literally, points to a theoretical series of bytes) but serves as a sort of placeholder for a pointer that points to something. Things which lack content are not nothing, they are things, and their content is not nothing, it is just stuff that is missing. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2014, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/32 "2014-04-02T07:50:32Z")
All I know is nothing from nothing leaves nothing, and ya gotta have something, if ya wanna be with me, Yeah! ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2014, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/33 "2014-04-02T10:09:37Z")
Here’s a short [film](http://www.rifftrax.com/shorts/what-is-nothing) on the subject of nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Find\_Friends](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@Find\_Friends](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Find_Friends)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2014, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554/34 "2014-04-02T23:23:57Z")
Could you speak up, cmyk? I can’t hear a word you’re saying. 😉 * * * Should I dance, Siam Sam? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nothing-something-need-answer-fast/684554.md?page=1)