Is the suggestion that chairs are illusions because they appear solid but are not in fact? It would be more reasonable to say that chairs _are_ solid, and many solid objects, like chairs, are mostly empty space when considered at the atomic scale.
No, I believe the suggestion of illusion was to convey the fundamental point that the world doesn't exist in the classical objective sense as we are brought up to understand.
"Mostly empty space" isn't related, but is a valid point when considering the different matter (pun intended) of the solidity and physical character of macroscopic things like chairs.
Just pointing out two different things: chair mostly space (true) vs chair existing as an object "out there" in the
clearly definable way we normally understand (false).
"Illusion" in its usage here referred to the latter.
That bit doesn’t add to the assertion that something isn’t real, or that there isn’t an underlying objective reality.
If something doesn’t exist in the classical objective sense, then it means that something doesn’t exist or have meaning outside of an observer. It’s not empirical nor measurable.
That’s not the same as saying that the building blocks are quite different from everyday experience. It’s still measurable, real, and well-defined. Just not in the ways that are intuitive.
I didn’t misquote you.
That bit doesn’t add to the assertion that something isn’t real, or that there isn’t an underlying objective reality
Of course it adds to the assertion, I was careful to add it for that reason.
Again, assuming good faith (despite your original unnecessary "strawman" tone), I will assume you were just mistaken in your omission or misreading of it.
Not mostly empty space, entirely empty space. All fundamental particles are point like and have no physical size.
Except ..... that's not the right way to measure size, you measure the size of a particle by the forces interacting with it.
By that measure an electron has an infinite size (since an electric field is infinite), and a chair has exactly the size it appears to have, because that's the size measured when you interact with it electromagnetically.
Objects don't have one single size, their size varies depending on what tool you use to measure them.
And if they're not, then eventually they're going to be made of something (that is going to be made of something and so on) that is pointlike. Very probably. If not, which will be a surprising result, then it's still going to be empty space.
Models are not measurable.