Introduction

Why is there a world? There could be nothing at all. Science and experience explain how the world behaves but not why there is a world. There are tentative explanations from science, philosophy, and common sense. However, there is no well known proof beyond all doubt that there must be a world.

A recent example of a proof from quantum mechanics is that the quantum vacuum must give rise to a manifest universe. However, that assumes that the laws of quantum theory hold and law is more than nothingness.

The being of the world is a puzzle. If you think about it more than in passing you might find it a problem that is both deep and mysterious. In 6.44 of Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus Wittgenstein said ‘Not how the world is, is the mystical, but that it is.’ Heidegger regarded it as the ‘fundamental problem of metaphysics’. Today, in the first quarter of the twenty first century there is fairly widespread interest in the problem. It seems clear that a solution to the problem would be immensely significant.

In essays linked from my website http://www.horizons-2000.org (Journey in Being) I have given a proof that the universe is the realization of all possibility. It then follows that there must be phases of manifest being. However, I have doubts about the proof regarding realization of all possibility.

Here is a proof that does not take the realization of all possibility as a premise.

Proof

The proof begins by considering the assertion:

The universe never has manifest form. (A)

If A is true then the universe is the Void—i.e., the absence of being. However, Laws (e.g. of physics) have being. For the universe to remain Void ‘forever’ would be a Law and thus A entails a self contradiction.

Therefore there is at least one occasion of manifest being.

An interesting corollary

If the universe is the realization of all possibility then all possible states—i.e. all non contradictions of fact and logic—must arise. However, as noted earlier, there is doubt regarding the realization of all possibility.

Suppose that the universe has been in a Void state. It follows that our present state must have emerged from the Void. But since the Void is absence of all being there is no reason to suppose that our state should have been preferred. It follows that all possible states are equally preferred and must ‘have’ arisen (the quotes are used because the Void is tenseless; in the final conclusion below I omit quotes that might have been used to the same end).

That is—if the universe is ever the Void, then all possibility is realized.

The Void may be seen as the complement of any state relative to itself—e.g. the complement of the universe relative to itself. If we regard this as proof of the existence of the Void, it then follows that all possibility is realized.

The range of consequences of the realization of all possibility is immense. Given this premise, it is trivial that (a) all non-contradictory systems of physical law are realized (b) the number of cosmological realizations of each system of law is without limit (c) these systems occur against a Void—Transient background (d) the universe has manifestation and identity in acute, diffuse, and manifest phases (e) the individual realizes these phases of identity and manifestation and so death while real is not absolute but while in limited form realization is endless process in endless variety.

I have named the assertion that all possibility is realized the fundamental principle of metaphysics.

For more on this and related issues visit http://www.horizons-2000.org.