Let us look at the great metaphysical question of “How does Nothing become Something?” Or if we were to translate it into a more pragmatic phrasing, we can say: “How does one go from not writing into completing a written thing?”
At the moment, two ways of going about this case comes to mind. The first seeks to ask other questions first, primarily inquiring about how or why one would not write in the first place. As one sits down with their pen and paper (or keyboard and writing processor), what would not allow one to, first, sit down, and then, next, to put out letter after letter and word after word, so as, instead, to write nothing yet? Before we answer that, let us bring to attention the most subtle yet salient assumption of this idea: that to write is such an inclination that one is ‘stopped’ from doing so, like any matter falling to the ground by gravity. What stops, as though a fall caught midway, someone who writes? What could possibly be that something that can break a continuous motion, one that could go on and on if it were not for its interference?
There again is another assumption: that it is a motion and not merely a continuous inertness. Both are inertia, but they are not at all the same, especially if they are to be used as analogies for something with which a particular ends—the going from nothing to something complete—is expected. Yet let us look at these two perspectives as simply one way of going about this case.
The other way is to start from a different end—“what is the point of the question?”—and then from such answers we might find the means that would get us back to our main question.
The aforementioned are two general ways of answering just about anything, but perhaps in this case, we can see that it is most significant for those questions that are both urgent and important. We might utilise the first way for those enquiries that are more pressing, diving straight into the problem points and their solutions to things back to either action or inaction, whichever one is needed. Alternatively, we might go with the second way if it is the importance of the object of question that needs to be highlighted.
Following this logic then, we can say that though these are two different ways, they are mutually inclusive in that both ways can be applied concurrently. Both urgency and importance can be worked out at the same time and using similar methods.
More importantly, however, is this insight: that while those two are valid ways of answering a question, for matters of ‘questioning’ itself, they can also be considered ways of escaping the question itself. Perhaps we can think about this suggestion in that regard: is not any attempt at answering but a means of escaping, or ‘getting rid of’, a question?
This idea can be seen more clearly in the first way: when we look at a question with urgency, it becomes a problem that needs to be transformed into a ‘solved situation’. We go from nothing to something, such that there no longer is any nothingness, we have gotten rid of it, we have escaped it by acquiring something else to replace that used to be its void. There is no longer a problem but a situation which was fixed or solved.
However, even in looking for the significance of something, we still are escaping that something. Foremost reason is that typically significance is something external, or at least the objectives or motivations that are outside of the primary object of concern are usually what comes out of this means of answering. “A is important because it leads to B.” However, it is not improbable that an answering goes back to the question and brings about significances that are more intrinsic to the question itself. Yet even this manner escapes the question still and gets rid of it, piece by piece: “A is important because of this one part it is composed of, and then another, and another.” A letter becomes important by its mere lines in this manner of reflexive questioning. Hence, we may get to a significance and from one questioning come a number of other fruitful things, but the risk is in losing the question itself to its parts.
How then can we approach a question such that we do not lose it? First we ask if it is a question that warrants perpetuity. Next, I propose that we approach questions that warrants such with a way of questioning that needs not an answer, only the questioning itself. This also means that it is a questioning that has no other purpose but to question. It would look the same as one jumping to feel gravity for no other purpose other than to be objected to its force—once in this fall, the one who chose to jump can no longer stop the descent on their own (to an extent, superpowers and parachutes are some possible caveats), they have let gravity, or the environment, take over. The fall is then able to reach its natural end and becomes a true fall as opposed to any other form of descent.
In the same way, when we let a question (noun) ‘question’ (verb), we no longer limit it to being a mere means to a particular answer, urgent matter or concern, or apparent significance. We let it become what it is—a question, a seeking—and we acknowledge the fulfilment in that very process that has naturally an end of its own without having to induce that end [likely] prematurely.
Of course, not all questions are questions of questioning. Some questions do not warrant perpetuity and, more so, some might even be questions that we ought to be rid of once and for all. However, for questions about writing, like the one we began with—“How does one go from not writing into completing a written thing?”—we might be better off continually asking, especially if in doing so, we get to the fulfilment of both the question and its answer at the same time, not to be rid of the question, but to maintain it while allowing something else, the answer, or answers, flourish as well. Hence, Nothing becomes Something, while still remaining truly Nothing.