Something from Nothing

[Ravenshire]

More precisely, the particles appear from what is known as a false vacuum. This is an actual state of the universe, but a state where there is nothing (no particles, etc) in the universe.

Perhaps the strangest part of this for the ordinary person is to think of 'nothing' as being a state of the universe where the laws of physics apply.

Yes, we need the laws of physics and we need a state of 'nothing'. Some people would claim those constitute 'something' as opposed to 'nothing', but let's face it, God didn't create from 'nothing' since God was supposed to be there.

The main difference is that physics doesn't assume a deity, but does assume laws of physics. But we know laws of physics exist.

It's not hard to think of a place where there is an absence of the laws of physics.
Just like it wasn't impossible to imagine the Higgs Boson before it was verified.

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I'm speaking from foggy memory here, but I remember reading that matter/anti-matter particles are theorized to pop into existence and then subsequently annihilate one another. There is even an experiment involving two metal plates that suggests that this phenomenon may be real. Also, Hawking radiation from black holes is thought to be related to this phenomenon.

I'm not sure how much this relates to the "something from nothing" idea, but it does tend to suggest that there is more to "nothing" than we might immediately intuit.

A few of our elements on the atomic chart are like that, they can appear and disappear, living on the edge of matter so to speak.
Some of the elements discovered by fission are very unstable.

But who says that disappearing matter is no longer there?
It's another topic, but what if it's possible for matter to be spread out into either space or time or both. It could assemble or appear when the conditions are right.
And who is to say that all atoms don't share the same common physical cause, but that some atoms are more likely to dip in and out of that state than others?

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This sounds like something Alan Watts would say. Something and nothing are distinct but of the same essence.... or something like that. 

Taking the eastern approach?

When we talk about nothing we sometimes mean negative energy, or perhaps a vacuum.
Since energy may be defined as a difference in activity or state, negative energy can be a source of actvity, just like a vacuum.

We see both components in matter - as a lot of eastern ideas present - the positive and negative etc.

It is possible that the oscillations of an atom are caused by a wave which bounces back and forth from positive to negative states of energy, and that matter isn't necessarily annihilated by those extremes, but that atoms are specific and varied animations due to the interplay between the two.

(emphasis is mine)

You really have no fucking clue about physics, do you?