{"id":6039,"date":"2019-02-04T09:57:41","date_gmt":"2019-02-04T14:57:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/?p=6039"},"modified":"2019-02-04T14:39:58","modified_gmt":"2019-02-04T19:39:58","slug":"why-is-there-something-instead-of-nothing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/2019\/02\/04\/why-is-there-something-instead-of-nothing\/","title":{"rendered":"Why is there something instead of nothing?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"320\" height=\"316\" src=\"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/aw020419-9.jpg\" alt=\"Why is there something instead of nothing? Can this be answered by science? By philosophy? Is philosophy being &quot;killed&quot; by science?\" class=\"wp-image-6021\" srcset=\"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/aw020419-9.jpg 320w, https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/aw020419-9-300x296.jpg 300w, https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/aw020419-9-100x100.jpg 100w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 320px) 100vw, 320px\" \/><figcaption>Why is there something instead of nothing? Can this be answered by science? By philosophy? Is philosophy being &#8220;killed&#8221; by science?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>In the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the philosopher Roy Sorensen says, sensibly, &#8220;No experiment could support the hypothesis \u2018There is nothing\u2019 because any observation obviously implies the existence of an observer.&#8221; (For less empirical arguments, <g class=\"gr_ gr_7 gr-alert gr_gramm gr_inline_cards gr_disable_anim_appear Punctuation only-del replaceWithoutSep\" id=\"7\" data-gr-id=\"7\">see:<\/g> <a href=\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/stanford-nothing\">bit.ly\/stanford-nothing<\/a>.) BTW, philosophy is thriving. 700-1200 new academic jobs in philosophy have been posted annually in the US over the last 10 years <g class=\"gr_ gr_58 gr-alert gr_gramm gr_inline_cards gr_run_anim Grammar only-ins replaceWithoutSep\" id=\"58\" data-gr-id=\"58\">according<\/g> to the American Philosophical Association.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the philosopher Roy Sorensen says, sensibly, &#8220;No experiment could support the hypothesis \u2018There is nothing\u2019 because any observation obviously implies the existence of an observer.&#8221; (For less empirical arguments, see: bit.ly\/stanford-nothing.) BTW, philosophy is thriving. 700-1200 new academic jobs in philosophy have been posted annually in the US over &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/2019\/02\/04\/why-is-there-something-instead-of-nothing\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Why is there something instead of nothing?&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-big-questions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6039"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6039\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6050,"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6039\/revisions\/6050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.bc.edu\/answerwall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}