Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing
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Review
Bede Rundle's brief and often forceful book is a wonderful stimulus to reflect on the ways in which philosophy can and cannot identify the excesses of attempted thought. (Thomas Nagel, Times Literary Supplement )
The question "Why is there something rather than nothing?" is a good candidate for being philosophy's most profound and disturbing question. Is it not a complete and utter mystery that there should be anything at all? That there should be nothing seems prima facie more plausible than that there should be something in view of the greater simplicity and naturalness of nothingness as compared to somethingness. And yet there is something. In this stimulating and well-written book, Oxford philosopher Bede Rundle tries to make likely that the problem of existence does have a reasonably clear solution and, moreover, that this solution is of a distinctively philosophical, as opposed to a physical or theological, kind. . . . a valuable and, as far as I can judge, original contribution to metaphysics as a whole and, above all, a welcome contrast to much recent work of a more speculative nature. (Erik J. Olsson, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews )
The question "Why is there something rather than nothing?" is a good candidate for being philosophy's most profound and disturbing question. Is it not a complete and utter mystery that there should be anything at all? That there should be nothing seems prima facie more plausible than that there should be something in view of the greater simplicity and naturalness of nothingness as compared to somethingness. And yet there is something. In this stimulating and well-written book, Oxford philosopher Bede Rundle tries to make likely that the problem of existence does have a reasonably clear solution and, moreover, that this solution is of a distinctively philosophical, as opposed to a physical or theological, kind. . . . a valuable and, as far as I can judge, original contribution to metaphysics as a whole and, above all, a welcome contrast to much recent work of a more speculative nature. (Erik J. Olsson, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews )
Product Description
Why should there be anything at all? Why, in particular, should a material world exist? Bede Rundle advances clear, non-technical answers to these perplexing questions. If, as the theist maintains, God is a being who cannot but exist, his existence explains why there is something rather than nothing. However, this can also be explained on the basis of a weaker claim. Not that there is some particular being that has to be, but simply that there has to be something or other. Rundle proffers arguments for thinking that that is indeed how the question is to be put to rest. Traditionally, the existence of the physical universe is held to depend on God, but the theist faces a major difficulty in making clear how a being outside space and time, as God is customarily conceived to be, could stand in an intelligible relation to the world, whether as its creator or as the author of events within it. Rundle argues that a creator of physical reality is not required, since there is no alternative to its existence. There has to be something, and a physical universe is the only real possibility. He supports this claim by eliminating rival contenders; he dismisses the supernatural, and argues that, while other forms of being, notably the abstract and the mental, are not reducible to the physical, they presuppose its existence. The question whether ultimate explanations can ever be given is forever in the background, and the book concludes with an investigation of this issue and of the possibility that the universe could have existed for an infinite time. Other topics discussed include causality, space, verifiability, essence, existence, necessity, spirit, fine tuning, and laws of Nature. Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing offers an explanation of fundamental facts of existence in purely philosophical terms, without appeal either to theology or cosmology. It will provoke and intrigue anyone who wonders about these questions.
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Our starting point is the theist's attempt to account for the existence of the universe. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
Our starting point is the theist's attempt to account for the existence of the universe. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I ordered this book having recently re-read Anthony Flew's review of it in the TLS in 2004. I had kept the review as it was interesting in itself.
The book is denser than I had expected, and I felt at times he was too much labouring to make a point. However it is a comprehensive work, and I am glad to have read (nearly finished) it. I cannot get beyond his argument that there could not have been nothing, which is intriguing. Our language and our concepts may be getting in the way. So it is a thought-provoking book as well.
The book is denser than I had expected, and I felt at times he was too much labouring to make a point. However it is a comprehensive work, and I am glad to have read (nearly finished) it. I cannot get beyond his argument that there could not have been nothing, which is intriguing. Our language and our concepts may be getting in the way. So it is a thought-provoking book as well.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
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2 reviews
2 of 11 people found the following review helpful
A confused and silly argument
3 April 2011
Format:Paperback
A question-begging, circular, and ultimately confused argument. What a waste of paper. Trying to prove logically that the question is nonsensical, the author proves only that he does not understand the question. Dreary and silly.
16 of 49 people found the following review helpful
A Critical review
21 Jan 2005
Format:Hardcover
Review of Why There is Something Rather Than Nothing
By Bede Rundle
THE ANSWER
Rundle answers the question on page 125: "...that there simply has to be something or other..."
And again on page 166: "...we can hold that if anything exists, matter exists, on the grounds that it is only in matter that the necessary independent existence is to be found."
And on page 183: "...since continuing in being is not something that requires explanation, the fact that the physical universe exists is not, it would appear, a fact in need of explanation."
THE METHOD
On page 193 [the last page] he says "The resolution of our queries has been seen to come from philosophy rather than from science." And "The kinds of question which physicists address at this level overlap with those which can be reckoned philosophical, questions of meaning being inescapable for cosmologists as well as for philosophers, but showing how presuppositions behind a question have to be abandoned, that the question itself is to be rejected as resting on an illusion, is a distinctively philosophical task."
I cite this last quote to establish that Rundle's solution is based on philosophical reasoning.
Starting on page 96, Rundle covers St. Thomas Aquinas' logical proof of the existence of God. Of course, the theists claim that God created the universe out of nothing.
Rundle spends the rest of his book using logic to prove the theists are wrong. Philosophically [using logic], he covers topics such as math, future and past events, the infinite, grammar, mind, will, force, and equality [=].
MY THOUGHTS
I was fascinated by Rundle's arguments, although many of them are difficult to follow. If you "believe" in logic, you are bound to accept his conclusions. However, I find logic to be a closed system, appropriate to limited applications, such as math. The syllogism:
All men are mortal
John is a man
Therefore John is mortal
The conclusion sounds like a valid one, unless one asks if the major premiss [all men are mortal] is a true statement. I say, along with others, that all men have not yet died, so it is a hypothetical statement.
So my conclusion is a realistic one. There is something rather than nothing because there is something rather than nothing.
By Bede Rundle
THE ANSWER
Rundle answers the question on page 125: "...that there simply has to be something or other..."
And again on page 166: "...we can hold that if anything exists, matter exists, on the grounds that it is only in matter that the necessary independent existence is to be found."
And on page 183: "...since continuing in being is not something that requires explanation, the fact that the physical universe exists is not, it would appear, a fact in need of explanation."
THE METHOD
On page 193 [the last page] he says "The resolution of our queries has been seen to come from philosophy rather than from science." And "The kinds of question which physicists address at this level overlap with those which can be reckoned philosophical, questions of meaning being inescapable for cosmologists as well as for philosophers, but showing how presuppositions behind a question have to be abandoned, that the question itself is to be rejected as resting on an illusion, is a distinctively philosophical task."
I cite this last quote to establish that Rundle's solution is based on philosophical reasoning.
Starting on page 96, Rundle covers St. Thomas Aquinas' logical proof of the existence of God. Of course, the theists claim that God created the universe out of nothing.
Rundle spends the rest of his book using logic to prove the theists are wrong. Philosophically [using logic], he covers topics such as math, future and past events, the infinite, grammar, mind, will, force, and equality [=].
MY THOUGHTS
I was fascinated by Rundle's arguments, although many of them are difficult to follow. If you "believe" in logic, you are bound to accept his conclusions. However, I find logic to be a closed system, appropriate to limited applications, such as math. The syllogism:
All men are mortal
John is a man
Therefore John is mortal
The conclusion sounds like a valid one, unless one asks if the major premiss [all men are mortal] is a true statement. I say, along with others, that all men have not yet died, so it is a hypothetical statement.
So my conclusion is a realistic one. There is something rather than nothing because there is something rather than nothing.
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