For Berdyaev, the void inherent in accepting the universe as accidental is interwoven with the acceptance of the universe as created by some external “other.” Both the accidental universe and the creator represent non-being. And, as Berdyaev indicates, that which is non-being, by its very nature, does not exist. Yet, the interweaving of being and nonbeing plays out in our everyday life, as I have proposed in previous essays.
The Big Silence
We must also pause for a moment and consider another dimension of nothingness and non-being. This is inevitable end of our universe. Beginning with formulation of the second law of thermal dynamics, we have become fully aware that the universe will eventually “run out of steam.” The energy that was rapidly dispersed with the Big Bang will eventually dissipate through a process called entropy. Unlike many other processes in nature, energy (and heat in particular) only moves in one direction. There is no recovery of energy once it is engaged. In essence, our universe is slowly cooling down.
More recently, there is another reason to believe that nothingness will become more prevalent over many centuries. A major force in our universe, called dark energy, is pushing all celestial bodies outward. Our universe is expanding, resulting in greater distances between the stars. With this expansion outward, there is a growing amount of “nothingness” between the constellation of “somethings” in our universe. Residents of Mother Earth in the very distant future will be gazing out at a nighttime sky that will contain few is any visible stars.
We might speak of this ultimate state as the Big Silence, to bookend it with the Big Bang. At a more personal and relatively short-term level, we must also face our own non-being. We will die and our presence will be replaced not by nothingness, but rather by a distribution (dissipation) of the molecules that constitute our body. While some of us believe that there is an afterlife, we would all agree that our physical body will cease to be a viable entity.
With the capacity of transcendence, we are aware of this shift from something to nothing regarding our own physical existence; however, in this transcendence, we are capable of awareness regarding the remarkable gift of life that has been bestowed on us. With such a great amount of nothingness (vacuum) in the universe, it is something of a “miracle” to find the something that is each of us as living beings. As the astrophysicists remind us, our hand is constituted of matter that was once part of a star located somewhere in our vast galaxy. Our head and heart are composed of stardust. For this we should be eternally grateful.
The Personal Challenges
When put side by side, the curiosity about being, the fear of nonbeing, and the gratitude regarding being alive right now inevitably lead to a state of personal bewilderment—perhaps a human form of chaos. So, for a moment, it might be advisable for us to set aside our search for an external source or eternal reason that brings about something out of nothingness or that brings about nothingness out of something. We can, instead, look at the ways in which we “mere” humans do our own creative work by bringing something out of nothingness, and the ways in which we confront the prospect of nothingness replacing something.
