We experience presence and absence, emptiness and fullness of things,
events, facts and causes. It is we, human beings, who make statements about
things, ourselves and others. Why is there Something instead of Nothing?
The obvious answer is there might have been `something', `everything' or
`nothing'. Nothingness represents conceptual and numerical zero as empty
placeholder in decimal system of mathematics. It also represents vacuum in
science where the fluctuating energy in the vacuum is the same
thing as the fluctuating amount of the mass as Albert Einstein put it E
(energy) = m (mass) c2 (speed of the light squared). Nothingness is a
symbol, a concept, and a numeral (0) as a constitutive reality which
represents and participates in the wholeness of reality. Reality is both
presence and absence, paradoxical and relational as in our direct judgment
we say two kinds of things about something: WHAT (essence) it is and THAT
(existence) it is but when something is NOT, the concept 0 as a number
represents what is `not there'. The numerical zero fills the empty position
in the decimal numeration whereas the vacuum points to fullness and
wholeness in interdisciplinary disciplines of physical or social sciences.
The book is comprised of four chapters. The first chapter deals with the
mathematical zero and its philosophical applications. The second chapter
deals with the quantum reality and Big Bang cosmology. It deals with the
quantum zero and the origin of the Universe. The third chapter deals with
the philosophicotheological appraisal of the nothingness. Its linguistic,
numerical, physical and inner nothingness is appreciated. The final chapter
four provides a general critique and evaluation.
Lameswar Kanhor is a Catholic Priest in the Archdiocese of
Cuttack-Bhubaneswar, and is currently the Staff of the St. Paul's Regional
Institute of Spirituality at Padanpur, Odisha, where he was a staff member
from 2001 to 2006. After that he went to Jnana-Deepa Vidyapeeth (JDV), Pune
for Masters and Doctoral study in Philosophy of Science and Religion from
2006 to 2012. He was in Raikia Parish for three years after his ordination
on 29th May 1992. He was then given to look after Kattingia Parish for one
year which he bifurcated into Salima Gochha Parish.
He was given Pobingia and Betticola Parish for three years each before
going to St. Paul's Regional Institute of Spirituality. He has been going
to St. Albert's College, Ranchi, as a visiting professor for Philosophical
Hermeneutics from 2012 onwards. St. Aquinas College, Gopalpur-on-Sea, has
invited him to teach Nastika or Non-Vedic Philosophy from 2013 onwards.
|