Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing?
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With an account, you can revise, criticize, and comment on ideas.I agree that nothingness as an object makes no sense.
Regarding nothingness as a quantifier: if you removed all objects except for the universe itself, then the universe remains as an object. So then the set of all objects wouldn’t be empty. So even as a quantifier, nothingness doesn’t seem to work. At least when it refers to all of existence.
Or am I missing something?
I disagree that the universe would remain an object if we remove all objects, because an object must have properties. If we define “the universe” as the totality of all objects, then removing them leaves only a word with no metaphysical referent, and therefore can’t be thought of as “existing”. So I agree that it doesn’t work when applied to “all of existence”. This is why I think your point about the excluded middle makes nothingness impossible. But generally speaking, “nothingness” as a quantifier typically involves no logical contradictions.