This is chapter 4 of my audiobook The Forever All: A philosophical and Spiritual Guide titled, The Physical vs The Non-Physical. I discuss and explain my views on pantheism and how the entire universe is made up of the physical and the non-physical. I believe everything in the universe is a combination of something and nothing and are ultimately unknowable. Most philosophers agree, myself included, that it’s impossible for something to ever come from nothing and for something to ever become nothing. Therefore, all the somethingness and all the nothingness has always existed and always will.
Chapter 4: The Physical vs The Non-Physical
When most people say “the physical world” they are referring to all the physical objects in the universe, big and small, as well as all that emptiness in between. When most say “the non-physical” they are usually referring to concepts beyond the physical world, such as our thoughts and feelings and ideas, like humor, mathematics, or love. In this chapter, I have chosen to mainly discuss the nature of substance and the relative emptiness of space. However, I will be discussing the non-physical, in the truest abstract sense, at great length, in the next chapter.
Everything in the universe is a combination of something and nothing. Something has been given many names like the physical, matter, substance, solid, object, material, element, and stuff. Nothing has also been given many names like the non-physical, vacuum, space, emptiness, and void. Unfortunately, something and nothing, or if you prefer matter and space, are ultimately unknowable. Even most scientists will now testify to this.
Most philosophers agree, myself included, that it’s impossible for something to ever come from nothing and for something to ever become nothing. The ancient Greek philosopher Parmenides was one of the first ever known to announce this particular view. So in my opinion, all the somethingness and all the nothingness must have always existed and always will. Modern scientists seem to agree and now hold the view that matter can not be created nor destroyed as stated by the law of conservation. It can only change its form or go from one state to another, such as a solid, liquid, gas, or plasma. So it can only be broken and divided up into many pieces or grouped up and united.
At a very early age, we are usually taught that everything is made up of atoms—particles of matter which were once believed to be the most fundamental building blocks of all things. It was also once believed that atoms were undividable. Now, physicists know better. They have since divided the atom into smaller charged particles, called electrons, protons, and neutrons, which are theorized to be made up of even smaller particles with only a fraction of charge called quarks. Where does it all end, you might ask. Perhaps it doesn’t.
Imagine any object, let’s say a block of wood. Then ask yourself, how may times can a block of wood that size be divided? Now imagine a carpenter cutting that block of wood in half, resulting in two smaller blocks of wood. Again, imagine a carpenter cutting the two smaller blocks in half, and then cutting those even smaller blocks of wood in half, and so on. Can a carpenter continuously divide the blocks of wood any number of times? In a real life situation, no carpenter has a blade sharp enough, nor a life-span long enough to continuously cut a block of wood into smaller pieces. Also, the blocks of wood would eventually be divided to a point beyond their chemical make-up that defines them as wood. The same could be said for any basic element of matter, such as gold, which has a certain atomic arrangement. If continuously divided, the atomic arrangement that creates gold would eventually be broken, thus, destroying the defining properties of gold. But fortunately, the mind is sharper than any blade, and one can reason that any object can be mathematically divided any number of times into smaller units. An object’s defining properties may be lost to infinite divisions, but the object can still be divided infinitely into smaller units in concept.
So, again, where does it all end? The answer, in my opinion, is nowhere, because there is no such thing as the smallest particle or unit of pure somethingness that makes up everything, regardless of what mainstream science tells us. Each time a physicist finds what appears to be the smallest particle of matter, it is eventually learned that it too is made up of even smaller units of somethingness, divided by areas of nothingness. The latest fundamental unit of all matter, and the most convenient, are the theoretical, multidimensional, sub-atomic, vibrating superstrings, said to vibrate in a number of ways as to create all other particles—an inevitable idea meant to address all the odd behavior of particles, which appear to miraculously appear, multiply, or turn into other particles. Scientists have almost exhausted themselves when it comes to peering into the fabric of the universe, and many would like to put a stop to the seemingly endless cataloging of new found particles young physicists continue to discover. This attempt to tease apart the universal fabric, in hopes of understanding it, has lead to quantum theories and quantum mechanics, a science that somewhat erroneously gives the impression that things are neither here nor there and that things only come into existence or out of existence the very moment we perceivers make an observation. This “uncertainty principle” has lead scientists to develop new mathematical equations to help us best predict the probable behavior of these mysterious particles of somethingness and these deceiving areas of apparent nothingness. To a large extent, we can mathematically describe tiny particles of matter and the space between them, and, to some degree, we can observe their interactions. But when you get right down to it, what is matter and what is space?
The best way to define matter is to say it is the resistant portion of the All from the perceiver’s point-of-view at any given moment in time, and the best way to define space is to say it is the seemingly non resistant portion of the All from the perceiver’s point-of-view at any given moment in time. Some areas of the All are very resistant, while other areas are practically non resistant. And it’s important to know that there’s no such thing as complete resistance or absolute somethingness. There’s no such object that can ever be one hundred percent solid. It must be filled with some space or, rather, degrees of nothingness. And just as there is no such thing as pure somethingness, there is also no such thing as pure nothingness. There is no area of space which is completely empty and free of resistance, including the areas we call empty space, which are thought to be completely void of any substance, because they too are not entirely empty and can never be. There are only relative degrees of emptiness. It was theorized during the nineteenth century that an ether, a very thin medium which could not be seen or felt in the traditional sense, transmitted gravitational forces, as well as light, even through what appeared to be a vacuum. Many scientists have tried to detect its presence ever since but to no avail. Though, there have been a few who have claimed to have successfully detected such an ether. It’s all still quite controversial and is still widely debated. To this day, however, most assume an ether does not exist. But I promise you, an ether does exist. Not that it’s necessarily responsible for the propagation of light and gravity—and I’m not saying it’s entirely not responsible either—but an ether to some degree does exist. Scientists have also explained in recent years that roughly eighty-five percent of all the matter in the universe appears to be invisible to us. They theorize that a type of matter may exist which can’t be seen or felt by our current detection methods. They call this mysterious and invisible portion of the universe “dark matter.” For now, it serves as a temporary fix to help explain the unusual and unpredictable behavior observed between objects in space. Other experiments have indicated that the universe is somehow seamless and whole without any true divisions, meaning it is all completely connected and unified. It’s true there is a type of wholeness to the universe, but paradoxically, at the same time, it is also divided. It is usually best to describe the All in terms of degrees instead of absoluteness. So there is no absolute somethingness, no absolute nothingness, no absolute wholeness, and no absolute dividedness. The All is in a type of quasi state, a back-and-forth tug-of-war between the opposites. So there are areas of space which are relatively empty and degrees of emptiness in between and within the atoms. There are degrees of emptiness within the even smaller sub-atomic particles, within the theoretical quarks, within the theoretical superstrings, and so on. It too has no end. Any and all areas of space, no matter how empty they may appear, contain degrees of somethingness. Matter and space have always been and will forever be intertwined.
The scientists have tried and tried with their instruments of measure to “see” and understand the mysterious somethingness and the enigmatic nothingness in hopes of describing it. Try as they may, but they will never come to fully measure it, understand it, nor define it, for it is ultimately undefinable and ultimately unknowable. When you get right down to it, no matter how one tries to slice it or break it down to be analyzed, it is all truly mysterious and beyond our full reach and understanding. But no matter what “something” and “nothing” actually are or what they are called, just know that they are the opposite of one another and together they make up the universe, or as I often call it, the All.
Matter shapes space and space shapes matter. To illustrate my meaning, imagine a large white dot. In order to do so, you must imagine that which is not the white dot, such as a surrounding blackness. If you alter the shape of the white dot, you will simultaneously alter the black shape. The same can be said for the relationship between matter and space or somethingness and nothingness. It’s impossible to have one without the other or to change one without affecting the other. Both work in concert to constantly provide the All, and, overall, one never dominates the other.
Most have the natural-born tendency to believe we are all strictly of the physical. Others hold to the idea that we are all truly of the non-physical and that we will somehow separate from the physical after death. But in my view, we are not strictly of the physical, nor are we strictly of the non-physical but a combination of the two. If spirits and ghosts truly exist, whether they are mere echoes of the past, nature’s recordings, or real perceiving beings, they too must have at least some substance and, therefore, are of the physical and the non-physical. Each of us are the duality of the two. This duality is you. You may call it your spirit, your soul, your body, or your mind, for all are equally valid. There was never a time when this marriage between the physical and the non-physical did not exist, and there will never be a time when the two will ever become divorced. And always remember, as I briefly discussed, the physical and the non-physical were never created and can never be destroyed. They are eternal.
My Book: Here you can review my book, The Forever All: A Philosophical and Spiritual Guide, and read several excerpts and chapters for free with the option of buying if you wish to read more. https://guyuseye.commy-ebook
My Art: I will create custom art for you or paint or draw a portrait of you, your loved ones, or of your adorable pets using your own photo(s) for a good price. To view samples of my artwork, please visit my site https://www.guyusart.com
My Instagram site: https://www.instagram.com/guyusart
My Facebook Page, Panmeism: https://www.facebook.com/panmeism
My Facebook Page, The United Citizens of the World: https://www.facebook.com/TheUnitedCitizensoftheWorld.Guyus
