Nothing, Zeno Paradoxes and Quantum Physics.

When the concept of Zero is analyzed, it is frequently related to another equally deep and complicated concept -- Nothing. If in science, Zero is closely associated with mathematics, then Nothing is primarily related to the material world. The question of whether Nothing can be found in the real physical world is often discussed in relation to the vacuum which, at some point in the history of the development of physics, is thought about as an empty space. Nevertheless, theories of modern physics have demonstrated that even in a vacuum, when all the matter is evacuated from a certain region of space, and this region is isolated from ordinary fields -- gravitation field, electromagnetic fields etc -- there still remain physical fields called vacuum zero fluctuations that can not be removed in principle. These vacuum fields are properties of space. In this chapter I will analyze another physics theory -- namely, Quantum Physics -- and will consider its less discussed relations to the concept of Nothing. One of the very first Greek philosophers, Thales (624-548 BCE) from Miletus, declared that Something can not appear from Nothing and it can not disappear, turning into Nothing. This idea, in some aspects, was further developed by Zeno from Elea (495-430 BCE) when he created his paradoxes of motion. These paradoxes can be understood as an analysis of the possibility of infinite division of time and space intervals. When we come to Quantum Physics, the very first appearance of the idea of the smallest possible portion of energy, quantum, was stimulated by the analysis of the spectrum of radiation of heated body -- black-body radiation. German physicist Max Planck (1858-1947) demonstrated in 1899 that if we assume that there exists a smallest portion of radiation energy that can not be further divided into smaller parts, we arrive at the description of spectrum of the black-body radiation that perfectly matches the observable reality. In contrast, if we assume that radiation energy can be divided an infinite number of times and there does not exist the smallest possible portion, we arrive at the radiation spectrum which is in a sharp contradiction with observable reality. This contradiction is so strong that it has acquired a special term -- the ultraviolet catastrophe. Certain parallels in Zeno's reasoning and approach used in Quantum Physics can clearly be seen and will be discussed. In the conclusion, I will briefly touch on a similar situation in another field of physics when at the other extreme, departure from the idea of the possibility of the infinitely large quantities, this time velocities of motion, gave birth to another theory of modern physics -- Einstein's theory of special relativity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]