Void Quotes

“Nothing is not the absence of stuff; instead, it is just one possible configuration of stuff.”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing

“How we understand nothingness can vary a great deal.... nothing really matters.”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing

“Epilogue WHY NOTHING REALLY MATTERS:
QUANTUM GRAVITY AND BEYOND”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing

“According to Heisenberg, an attendee of Dirac’s own generation, it was these references to God that ultimately provoked an outburst from Dirac. One evening, during a conversation in the hotel lounge between the younger participants at the conference, the ordinarily silent Dirac surprised everyone by announcing, “Religion is a jumble of false assertions, with no basis in reality. The very idea of God is a product of the human imagination.”130 In response, Wolfgang Pauli, another member of the younger set, quipped, “There is no God, and Dirac is his prophet.” Even Dirac laughed.”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing

“Einstein rejected the aether just as Newton rejected the plenum. But in its place, we are left with the electromagnetic field, which also pervades all of space. All indications are that, in fact, the whole universe has a steady, low level of electromagnetic radiation pulsing through it, known as the Cosmic Microwave Background.86 So in a sense, we have left the aether behind but replaced it with a different kind of “aetherial substance” that also pervades all of space, at least in our universe.”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing

“The idea that stuff—stars, books, blue whales—changes the geometry of space and time is a significant shift from Newton’s theory, or anything that came before it. But Einstein’s theory allows even more: it allows for space and time to be curved even when there is nothing present, anywhere or at any time. In fact, space and time can themselves behave in ways that are strikingly similar to electromagnetic radiation, such as light or radio waves. As we will see, this makes defining what it would even mean for there to be “nothing” in the universe extremely subtle.”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing

“The twentieth century was a tumultuous time for physics. Centuries-old theories were overturned, first by Einstein’s discovery of special and general relativity between 1905 and 1915; then by the development, during the mid-1920s, of quantum theory; and again during the 1940s, when these two new theories were combined into what is now known as quantum field theory.5 Little was left unscathed by these revolutions—even the physics of nothing.”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing

“What, according to our best physical theories, is nothing? What would the world be like if there were no electrons, no quarks, no photons?”
― James Owen Weatherall, Void: The Strange Physics of Nothing