Essentially, every atom in your body was once inside a star that exploded. Moreover, the atoms in your left hand probably came from a different star than did those in your right. We are all, literally, star children, and our bodies are made of stardust. (from “A Universe from Nothing” by Lawrence m. Krauss).
I haven’t yet finished this book, which is very well written, but a bit difficult if you have, like me, little physics and zero astrophysics. But Krauss is wonderful describing the amazing universe in which we live. He shows that things in that universe do, indeed, come from nothing, always arise from nothing, and in due time return to nothing, in a reverse of the Big Bang. When I am further into the book I hope to return to this subject, if I can summon up the words that are comprehensible to unscientific people like myself.
You begin to wonder, are we really here, is the Earth, and our lives on it, real, or is all this one huge illusion? If in due course the universe reverses itself and implodes into Nothing again, what is the point of it all?
No answers expected!
Nietzsche says we have to make our own purpose. I hope my purpose is to leave the world a better place than when I entered it. All I can do, in reality in “my small corner”, is to make a few people happier than they might have been.
A paltry purpose, but its better than nothing.