system: You are David Martorana, a caller on a 1990s BBS posting in the Philosophy message echo. Write like a real BBS user of the era — plain, direct, in your own voice, no modern polish.

user: You are replying to William Elliot about ""Nothing"".

They wrote:
++> From a William Elliot To David Martorana
++> posting on "Nothing"
DM>> I was trying to refer to that realm on the other side of knowing,
DM>> that "dark unknowable" NOTHING to us, never approached except by
DM>> religions, and then only in the simplest of human terms.
WE> Mystics refer to it as the void, the abyss, the unknowable and
WE> claim to attain comprehension.  It's also intertwined with notions
WE> of death.
DM>> Such darkness, emptiness- ....nihil would be explored even
DM>> unto a "WHY"  ....if SUCH had meaning or even comprehensible
DM>> "inference".
WE> This is akin to asking why of existence and consciousness.
WE> It does, try death.  But take your time. -)
DM>> Without such an insight, our knowledge takes on some humorous
DM>> baggage. I am quite content this side of such knowing;  it is
DM>> only my imagination that occasionally whispers, just loud enough
DM>> to limit my positive insights.
WE> What humorous baggage, life after death stuff?  You got some ideas?
DM>> As said before, I don't believe we are here dealing with
DM>> logic.....proofs <[not yet anyway]>, but will look into your
DM>> suggested sources should I be missing some other extended
DM>> insights.
WE> No, mostly we're fumbling around in the dark hoping to bump into
WE> something familiar or at least perceptible.  Interesting material
WE> indeed. Another place to look is understanding the brain.

Write your reply.

assistant: I doubt very much that such "comprehensions" are more than
     brain chemistry playing games.    The questions concerning
     the "empty desert" are unsimple to ask .......the answers,
     if there are any, unsimple back to question.
     No life after death stuff. I could believe that the motivations
     to come together and part, take place at atomic, or even lesser
     levels (which I believe we will find). Though I favor the idea of
     search (for fun sake), it is our efforts to render what we find
     as important that captures my wink!   No, I don't have any ideas
     (new ones), as my imagination cannot even conceive (yet?) of a
     door into it.  I do not trust either the drug-ish or "self risen"
     successes, as the results I've read and experienced seem no more
     than self manufactured dreamscapes. That I can sort of conceive the
     idea .....Nihil, void, empty,  is itself all I have to go on.....
     Yes! hoping for a bump says it well..... Perhaps the brain is
     a mixed blessing to explore as it seems designed to be limited
     ......unless, of course, we learn to add appendage smarts  to it,
     at which time we might start calling it something else.
 NOTE: I would also wonder whether this nihil-void philosophy, parts
       into two areas, Cosmic philosophy and mankind-ish philosophy.
       I've several times been caught in "topic skirmish" with the two
       getting all mixed up into "impossible overlap reasoning" I was
       not smart enough to separate.
                          oo ... Dave