This week on the Space.com forums: Defining nothing, spin in space and a fun quiz!

Welcome back to your weekly wrap-up of all the happenings in the Space.com forums. The community has been abuzz with theoretical discussions, trying to nail down some abstract definitions. We also test our space knowledge in one community member’s challenging quiz!

What is nothing?

Image of the Deep 3 'empty' field observed with the telescope at La Silla. The image is the combination of 714 frames for a total exposure time of 64.5 hours covering a total area larger than one square degree. — Image of the Deep 3 ’empty’ field observed with the telescope at La Silla. The image is the combination of 714 frames for a total exposure time of 64.5 hours covering a total area larger than one square degree. (Image credit: ESO)

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It’s a deceptively simple question. However, DrWhoopsyDaisy raises a fantastic point when they say, “It’s like if someone walked into an empty room and said nothing is there but in reality there is space there which is something.” So, what exactly is nothingness? Here are some attempts at answering that question:

Nothing means nothing. No thing. Total absence of anything, including mental constructs like coordinate systems. Nothing more to be said. – Catastrophe

Space between a Quanta orbits is (nothing), exists nd has properties held up by energy levels of fluctuation. Don’t break your brain thinking about it 🙂 – voidpotentialenergy

Check out the whole conversation here.

Does everything in space spin?

These illustrations of Pluto’s moon Nix show how the orientation of the moon changes unpredictably while it orbits the Pluto-Charon system. (Image credit: NASA, ESA, M. Showalter (SETI Inst.), G. Bacon (STScI))

Another fascinating question, posed this time by DOGGDADD. It’s a bit of a puzzler, so it’s helpful to have so many eager community members to offer up some answers:

Rotation requires a reference frame, so sitting still I’m still rotating because the Earth is rotating me with it. – Helio

Yes. Relative to something. – Catastrophe