In a message dated 30/09/2004 23:17:03 GMT Standard Time, janstr@xxxxxxx
writes:
Jud wrote:
>Nothing can arrive in a vacuum for neither nothing nor a vacuum
>can exist.
Leaving aside for the moment the question concerning the existence
of "nothing", but my dear Jud, of course "a vacuum can exist", have
you never heard of the experiments of Toricelli and Pascal???
yours,
Jan
Jud:
Hello Jan.
I have not read Toricelli and Pascal - I have been too busy reading
Heidegger as usual ;-)
Unless the two chaps you mention have accomplished a revolutionary
scientific triumph, [which I haven't seen reported in the media]
to create a true vacuum is impossible, for it is not possible to stop even
if one molecule from detaching itself from the wall of the container.
Because this happens it negates the definition of a vacuum, which [if you
look at your dictionary] is an area or region empty of matter.
Your three question marks suggest you have hot information to the contrary?
To look at it from an ontological point of view — if you can prove [with the
help of Toricelli and Pascal] that it is possible to suck all of the
gas/matter/energy from a flask and there is absolutely no matter/energy whatsoever,
well then there are other considerations. As you know the Americans have
utilised huge, deep caverns filled with water in order to trap particles from
space. These particles penetrate the earth to an amazing depth. These
particles are apparently quite capable of penetrating the casing of any flask. If
we rule out detached particles and these penetrative cosmic particles and we
are actually left with an area completely free of any matter, then we must ask
ourselves if that space exists? If it is virtually nothing it cannot exist,
for if it existed it would be something, and therefore the vacuum wouldn't
be a vacuum. The *empty* flask would exist, but not that which wasn't inside
it.
According to John D. Barrow whose: *The Book of Nothing* I happen to have on
my shelves:
"We can no longer sustain the simple idea that a vacuum is an empty box. If
we could say that there were no particles in a box, that it was completely
empty of all mass and energy, then we would have to violate the Uncertainty
Principle because we would require perfect information about motion at every
point and about the energy of the system at any given time."
Obviously [if what you claim is true] Toricelli and Pascal have constructed
some fantastic equipment which is able to monitor every square centimetre of
the internal walls of the flask ANd terminate the heat radiation equilibrium
and report that the basic irreducible energy had been reduced. According to
Planck the irreducible energy present could never be removed — the system
would not permit all of its energy to be extracted by any possible cooling
process governed by the known laws of physics.
So I leave you with two questions:
(a) Have Toricelli and Pascal rebutted one of the known laws of physics?
(b) If they have, and they have created a true vacuum — does the
*nothingness* which doesn't exist in the flask exist?
Regards,
Jud
Personal Website:
_http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/index.htm_
(http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/index.htm)
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