Why is there something rather than nothing? (All Roads Lead to Russell)

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References:

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Timestamps:

00:00 The Ultimate Question?
02:02 Closer to Truth
07:06 Non-Answers
11:46 Necessary Being
19:36 Brute Fact

[mvtech]

What a fantastic video once again. I cannot believe that the channel is having a dip in views when it seems to me that the quality of these videos has increased.

[katew.]

This reminds me of the time when my 7-year-old daughter asked me, 'Why am I older than my brother? Why was I born first?' And I told her, 'Well, because that's just the way it happened.' She was not happy with that answer, because she clearly thought that this fascinating fact deserved a better explanation for the 'why'. But honestly, there isn't one. Just because someone can formulate a question with 'why' does not necessarily mean that there is a meaningful answer to that question.

[MilesFazio]

It's an ultimately unintelligible question that arises from humans' appreciation of symmetry.

Perhaps *nothing* is impossible.

Edit: I'm not saying "no_thing is impossible" as in "everything is possible". That's stupid af. I'm saying "**NOTHING** is impossible", as in "the concept of 'nothing' is not objectively/logically possible".

[rapturestudios]

I applaud you Stephen for taking on such a challenging topic head on, and sparing no pause with hammering down on each answer that you've found. This is an impossibly difficult question to answer, but you've given it a mighty shot!

[jursamaj]

1:19 "This is, no doubt, is an extremely unsatisfying response."

Problem is, "existence" is no obligated to satisfy you. But if you think about it, ultimately that is the only possible response. Anything you propose as a reason for everything else must itself either be a brute fact or have a further reason. This must either terminate at a brute fact, or go on either infinitely or circularly, which is itself a brute fact.

As a separate issue, I don't see the metaverse as ontologically expensive. We know universe exist. We really don't know of anything that only one of exist. So it's not expensive to think more universes exist.

[oliverhug]

“Why questions don’t exist in a vacuum; they only make sense within some explanatory context. If we ask “why did the chicken cross the road?”, we understand that there are things called roads with certain properties, and things called chickens with various goals and motivations, and things that might be on the other side of the road, or other beneficial aspects of crossing it. It’s only within that context that a sensible answer to a “why” question can be offered. But the universe, and the laws of physics, aren’t embedded in some bigger context. They are the biggest context that there is, as far as we know. It’s okay to admit that a chain of explanations might end somewhere, and that somewhere might be with the universe and the laws it obeys, and the only further explanation might be “that’s just the way it is.”
Or not, of course. We should be good empiricists and be open to the possibility that what we think of as the universe really does exist within some larger context. But then we could presumably re-define that as the universe, and be stuck with the same questions. As long as you admit that there is more than one conceivable way for the universe to be (and I don’t see how one could not), there will always be some end of the line for explanations. I could be wrong about that, but an insistence that “the universe must explain itself” or some such thing seems like a completely unsupportable a priori assumption. (Not that anyone in this particular brouhaha seems to be taking such a stance.)"
Sean Carroll

[jasonmoquin]

Bertrand Russell was such a badass. I just love listening to him respectfully and systematically dismantle fallacious arguments.

[MarkLitchfield]

Absolutely love the new format!!! It's a master class in how to produce a high quality, well-organized educational short form video.

[roberth]

If there was nothing, there would be nobody to ask the question “why is there something rather than nothing”, but we are here to ask the question so it it follows that there is something.

[peterz]

Was fortunate to stumble upon BR when a teenager. He was one of the few major influences on my life, shaping how I thought and what I believed. Yes, to Sean Carroll.

[eddydorr]

The reason why there is something rather than nothing is because I'm here to experience the something that exists. This is all my fault and I would like to extend my deepest apologies to everyone who has been affected by this unfortunate fact. I would like to thank everyone at Rationality Rules for this and the many other wonderful videos that you have made. You have cleared this burning question from my mind and replaced it with another question. The new burning question that will keep me up at night is 'Where can I buy one of those cool mugs?'

[MrGreensweightHist]

Bertrand Russell is right <Shrug>
"The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you" - Tyson.
I would add, it also does not owe you an answer you find "satisfying"

[ExplodingDarth]

I absolutely love this video, it puts the **right words** to all the things I thought as a child and new adult but never really understood why there was confusion on.

I especially like the "non answers" category, because I *knew* that these things weren't good explanations, but couldn't explain why. (Especially the important distinction between "why is there physical things" and "why is there anything.")

Fantastic work, your recent videos have been very informative and thorough!

[JohnnieHougaardNielsen]

Yeah, I immediately fully agreed with Russell. The "problem" is that "why" is not a relevant question, as this would imply that the universe was caused, which is just an unsupportable claim.

[russellmillar]

Bertrand has been one of my favorite dudes since I was in my mid thirties, about 35 years ago. His statements regarding his the view that we have no reason to believe the universe ever had a beginning nor a reason to think it will end, somehow made me feel secure ( ? ). I had never really bought the idea of a universe-creating being. I realize that the knowledge that I had a beginning and I will have end, could influence my thoughts on how this all began...and it needn't.

[slyrax]

Russell was such an interesting guy. Right now I am working my way through Principia Mathematica (even though it is considered obsolete in favor of ZFC) because I'm just fascinated by the process of building up a world of knowledge from just a few assumptions. At a few points, he and his teacher admit that the assumption that at least one thing ("individual") exists was implicitly snuck in via one of the few axioms of the work. At one point they were explaining why it would be impossible to prove there are two individuals without another axiom, and they say this:

"But very few propositions which we might wish to prove depend upon this assumption, and we have therefore excluded it. It should be observed that many philosophers, being monists, deny this assumption."

Little flourishes like this are a nice touch. I also liked the story about how Aristotle's logic couldn't prove the statement "Because a horse is an animal, the head of a horse is the head of an animal" was actually a good thing because it was missing the assumption that the horse's head exists, but that is less relevant to the topic of this video.

[tech]

I have been a philosophy buff for sometime and this was probably the most informative way to approach up the good work. Love the vids.

[shriggs]

Well done, maestro! No really, it was a fantastic video and it was put together in a way that I've never seen before.Thanks again, man.

[wernerrietveld]

Thanks, mainly for the fragments of my favorite philosopher Russel speaking. I never heard his voice until now. (Which was a bit more squeeky than I expected...)

[speedstone]

I think the answer might hide at 15:52 - NUMBERS. Numbers is a very nice brute fact to have - can you image numbers not being not a valid concept? And it's enough to explain the existence of universe and everything. Once we have numbers, we have computation and we can "simulate" processes from the simplest ones to incredibly complicated. Our universe is a simulation, but it doesn't need to actually be computed by anyone outside. It's just another mathematical being, like the set of natural numbers, or the monster group, or an instance of Conway's Game of Life with a particular starting condition. When we simulate an instance of Game of Life, we don't bring it into existence, it's always out there, computing the simulation is just a way to have a glimpse into it. And our universe is just like that.