Question about space and distance

[Qoeleth]

Space is nothingness, right? Imagine object A and object B, both somewhere space, with no other medium (gas or ether) between them. How can we have a distance between object A and object B, if there is only space (nothingness) between them.

If only space sperates object A and object B, isn’t that the same as saying ‘nothing’ separates the two objects? And if nothing separates them, therefore there is no distance between them?

Is space nothingness? How do distances in space exist?

Does space actually exist, or is it only the matter in space which exists?

P.S. I am not a physicist…

 

[SweetVerda]

Space is not nothingness. The entire universe is sort of made up of this four dimensional ‘fabric’ called space-time. The four dimensions are length, width, height, and time, or from your perspective: what’s in front of you, to the side of you, above you, and when objects are where they are.

On Earth, we have a high concentration of these small particles, atoms, that make up matter, or everything you see and feel and breathe. The atoms reside in space-time, but they are not made of space-time, nor is space-time made up of atoms. In outer space, there are fewer atoms per unit of space-time than here on Earth. However, space-time remains mostly uniform, except in places of high gravity.

 

[Alberti_Devoveo]

Space is nothingness, right? Imagine object A and object B, both somewhere space, with no other medium (gas or ether) between them. How can we have a distance between object A and object B, if there is only space (nothingness) between them.

If only space sperates object A and object B, isn’t that the same as saying ‘nothing’ separates the two objects? And if nothing separates them, therefore there is no distance between them?

Is space nothingness? How do distances in space exist?

Does space actually exist, or is it only the matter in space which exists?

P.S. I am not a physicist…

What you are suggesting is saying that if you sucked out all the air in a 20 m[sup]3[/sup] room, then the distance between the walls is zero because there is nothing between them. Obviously this is not true. Just because there is ‘nothing’ between two objects does not mean there is no distance between the two objects.

 

[ThinkingSapien]

Space is nothingness, right? Imagine object A and object B, both somewhere space, with no other medium (gas or ether) between them. How can we have a distance between object A and object B, if there is only space (nothingness) between them.

Objects A and B could still have a gravitational (or some other type of) interaction with each other.

If only space sperates object A and object B, isn’t that the same as saying ‘nothing’ separates the two objects?

Not per se, especially if “nothing” is being used to describe a perceptual concept in which case perception and reality can differ.

And if nothing separates them, therefore there is no distance between them?

There’s distance, and that distance will influence the amount of interaction that object A and object B can have on each other.

Is space nothingness? How do distances in space exist?
Does space actually exist, or is it only the matter in space which exists?

There’s matter (electrons, protons, neutrons, photons, neutrinos), fields (electromagnetic fields, gravity fields) and possibly other substances that we have yet to begin to understand.

What may interest you is the meaning of “Observable Universe..” If you had object A and object B that were moving apart from each other faster than light due to the expansion of space time then from the perspective of A object B would not be said to be in the same observable universe.