Therefore, quantum mechanics does not predict that something can begin to exist without a cause. Rather that, at the extremely small scales of the microscopic quantum world, it is impossible to precisely trace the cause to the effect, because the measurement process does not provide reliable knowledge of both the position and momentum as initial conditions.
It is, therefore, the reality of human limitations expressed in the uncertainty principle that prevents human beings from precisely tracing the cause to the effect in any quantum process.
Therefore, the randomness inherent in quantum mechanics is fundamental. However, this does not mean that something can begin to exist without a cause, from “nothing.”
Universe created from vacuum
Some quantum physicists have also suggested that the universe was created from a vacuum, which they consider to be “nothing”, and, therefore, that there would be something, indeed everything, that began to exist without a cause, from “nothing”.
The total number of protons in the universe is a whole number eighty digits long. The total number of electrons in the universe is also a whole number eighty digits long. Since the total electric charge in the universe is zero, these two numbers must be at least very nearly equal, digit by digit.
A vacuum also has zero electric charge. It is a state of minimum energy where quantum fluctuations can lead to the formation of particle-antiparticle pairs that annihilate one another because there is insufficient energy to maintain permanent existence.
However, as the universe began to expand, particles and antiparticles separated into the observable world. So it could be argued that the universe began to exist from “nothing.”
However, as defined above, a vacuum is not “nothing”; it is still something, because a state of minimum energy is still something.
Therefore again, it is not true that something like the universe can begin to exist from “nothing.”
Since there isn’t anything that begins to exist without an external cause, everything that begins to exist must have an external cause.
The universe began to exist
This premise is false if and only the universe did not begin to exist, and this can only happen in two scenarios:
- The universe does not exist.
- The universe always existed.
The first scenario is false because the universe clearly does exist!
The second scenario is false due to three reasons:
- Infinite regress
- Law of thermodynamics
- Accelerating inflationary big bang theory