Is Nothing actually imaginable?

Question

It's possible to imagine something, for example a table, we see one everyday and can bring it in front of our minds eye (although it's a moot point whether we can *see* it - I certainly don't). But of course this is a real object so we have a referent. But we need not have a referent: to imagine a unicorn means we are hybridising our referents. But to imagine nothing in its proper sense (ie not the lack of something or just space) seems impossible to me, we cannot avoid our sense of ourselves.

Answer 1

This is why emptiness and nirvana in Buddhism, and similar concepts in other religions and philosophies, are often described in negative terms — it is not this; not that — rather than by making claims about what it is. This kind of language is called apophatic. These ideas are also often said to be ineffable (incapable of being described through language).

However it is critical to note that, at least in the religions where such terms are sometimes thought of as nothingness, that is usually a misunderstanding of the philosophy. They are not nothing; it’s just that the states must be experienced, not only understood through knowledge. Again using Buddhism as an example, the Buddha never claimed that nirvana was nothingness — he said it was unconditioned and neither existed nor didn’t exist. And emptiness also doesn’t mean nothingness; it’s more of a predicate adjective. When we say everything is emptiness, that’s not a claim that there’s not really anything; it’s a claim that the manner in which things exist is empty of inherent existence. In other words, they’re interdependent (‘dependent arising’ is one common translation). Hence the heart sutra’s famous lines: form is emptiness; emptiness is form…etc.