Hi Aletheia Rivers,
Great questions. And worth asking. Here is an interesting quote that I thought of when I read your post. It is about Sting Theory:
"Strings are just curved space. The central riddle of Genesis – how can the universe have come into being, if, as Shakespeare put it, ‘Nothing can be made out of nothing’? – is answered thus: Everything is nothing, in a sense, for all is made of space, which in this context means pure geometry.”
– Timothy Ferris in The Whole Shebang, Simon & Shuster, New York, 1997 pg. 224
I wrote an article about string theory (http://www.ionparadox.homestead.com/files/string.htm) in which I tried to put in layman's terms the basics of this idea, that everything is made up of vibrating strings of curved space.
After considerable thought I have concluded that if this is the case, if everything we see and touch and smell and taste is esentially the vibrations of curved space, then the world is more mysterious than ever.
In a funny way this supports the idea of something coming from nothing. God could be said to have created everything from nothing because of God's excellent grasp of geometry.
I personally do not think spirit exists as anything other than an emergent quality of our existence. Like God, spirit is not open to investigation by my senses. If something can not be measured, is it still real....?
I keep hoping to develop a way of knowing God that is beyond sensory data, but so far my efforts have been fruitless. I hear people talk about their own spirit, about the Holy Spirit, and they seem to know all about these matters in great detail.
What are your thoughts on this matter? Or anyone elses...