What Happens When You Compress Nothing?

[Wave!]

Hi all,

I was wondering what would happen if one had a whole lot of nothing, and he would try to compress that. So, you have a space with nothing, you reduce the space, but keep the contents. What contents would emerge from that? And how much space would you need to get something?

Kind regards.

 

[dicerandom]

Your question made my head explode. I'm going to cheat and say that unless someone invents something akin to a Faraday cage for gravitational waves it's impossible to have a box with "nothing" in it.

 

[Tide]

So, you have a space with nothing, you reduce the space, but keep the contents.

That is non sequitur. If the space is empty then it has no contents.

 

[Wave!]

Your question made my head explode. I'm going to cheat and say that unless someone invents something akin to a Faraday cage for gravitational waves it's impossible to have a box with "nothing" in it.

Well, then make it a thought experiment Well, maybe a related question would be 'what can emerge from nothing'?

 

[Wave!]

That is non sequitur. If the space is empty then it has no contents.

That would imply, I think, that 'nothing' has no contents, nothing can emerge from 'nothing', and that compressing it has completely no influence on anything in its environment?

And furthermore, if you would have a place A with nothing, and a place B with compressed nothing, would you notice anything difference if you go from A to B?

And, the last one, what would happen if you would continue compressing?

Just a few thoughts, maybe I'm way off

 

[Wizardsblade]

The only thing i know that can emerge from nothing are some very small sub atomic particles and only for an instant. I would have to say that when you compress a vacuum the only thing acomplished is filling the vacuum.

 

[Q_Goest]

If you put a compressor or vacuum pump of some sort into outer space and turned it on, it would just spin. It would not create any pressure unless a stray molecule or atom happened by and went into it. I suppose if enough molecules went it it might eventually build up some pressure, but you need some sort of matter to do that. Without matter, pressure can't increase.

 

[HallsofIvy]

This is not a "thought experiment", it is just playing with words. What did you mean by "nothing" and "content" in the original post?

 

[Tx]

Holy Smokes that is a difficult one. How can you already compress a vortex?

 

[Danger]

You also can't have a vortex unless something is there, and that something has to have angular momentum to form one.
The only way that I can make any sense of the initial question is to think that Wave! wants to force the vacuum fluctuations of a large volume into a smaller one, to create a 'denser' cloud of virtual particles. I don't think that it can be done. If it could, though, you'd have yourself one awesome little spontaneous antimatter bomb.

 

[.:JimmY:.]

If "nothing" implies the space then compressing it would be like something happeneing at the center of a black hole as it is believed "churning the space time"- if i am not mistaken. You can expect to see some gravitation related effects may be some anti-particle ...
But if the "nothing" just means nothing, you might have NOTHING