About
null definitions | null interpretations
This is the personal blog of Jon Meek, Web Programmer, Graphic Designer, Musician, Composer, Poet, Teacher, Programmer, Qabalist, Internet Entrepreneur, Mystic, and husband.
Definitions
Null comes from the Latin word nullus, meaning none.
Common understanding of the concept of null is insignificant, nil, of no value.
In math, null usually means zero, of no value, or empty. For example a set with no elements would be the empty set or null set. There is some ambiguity here. Sometimes the symbol Ø is used to differentiate null from the concept of 0 or zero. In this case null relates more to nothingness, non-existence than it does to the zero value.
In law, null means not legally binding, as in null and void.
In computer programming, if something has a null value it means that it has an unknown or undefined value. Also, in UNIX operating systems there is a thing called a null device. If you have a process with some output that you want to dump, you can send it to this device. Therefore, it is sometimes called the Black Hole.
Interpretations
From a more abstract or metaphysical viewpoint, null can be used to refer to a cosmic state of un-differentiation such as the Buddhist Void, the Taoist Uncarved Block, the Kabbalistic Ain Soph (sometimes called negative existence) , or the Unmanifest. In this sense null is pointing to a sea of infinite possibilities. It is from this Sea of Possibilities that all things manifest. It is this Sea that can be tapped for the purpose of creating the world as we imagine it. From this Divine Source rises the Quantum state of uncertainty (the Heisenberg Principal) and all that it implies.
