Archived How does matter exist? Everything in me says it's impossible.. yet here we are (AskVoat)
submitted ago by TheKid22
Posted by: TheKid22
Posting time: 3.6 years ago on
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Archived on: 8/8/2017 10:00:00 AM
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Archived How does matter exist? Everything in me says it's impossible.. yet here we are (AskVoat)
submitted ago by TheKid22
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[–] Crensch ago
If you're still around, I can possibly help explain more to you.
[–] TheKid22 [S] ago
yeah go for it
[–] Crensch ago
"Nothing" as most like to think of it is fiction. There is never "nothing". Empty space is full of virtual particles popping in and out of existence on timelines so short you can't measure it. Note: Virtual particles pop into existence as positive and negative pairs - they then self-annihilate by smashing into each other.
In physics, "nothing" is unstable, and quantum fluctuations will always cause something to pop into existence.
This alone could be the answer to your question - more on that later, but know that this fact is an axiom. There is no deeper explanation of "why" available.
Reminds me of Sir Arthur Eddington's My Two Tables.
So as a sideline to all this "where did X come from" infinitely, I think a better line of questioning is about the total energy of our universe.
Physicists can calculate that.
The total energy of our universe is 0. Nothing. There's no charge to our universe one way or the other. All the positive energy that everything we experience or know about creates is negated by gravity.
Now pretend that some of our laws of physics and what we know about space-time is flexible, and somehow outside of our universe is an observer. Someone that can see all of our universe within their gaze. What would they see?
Nothing. There would be nothing to see. Why? Because quantum fluctuations of nothing in their dimension/universe caused a rift in their "nothing" and spawned our universe. Our entire universe is essentially nothing. It doesn't exist. It's Horton Hears a Who on a galactic level for us.
All the matter, and everything else "exists" just to offset the negative energy of gravity. We are a (for us) cosmic accident that gets to experience what we do because at the beginning of our quantum-fluctuation nothing-something event, we were lucky enough to have the Higgs field form.