Is the answer to how did something come out of nothing that it is still nothing?

 
We think of creation where 0 meaning literally no-thing, not-anything, nothing becomes something.  Religion says only God can achieve that and has made all things from no pre-existent ingredient or material.  Clever people say that this teaching is based on the notion that there not being anything is no reason why there cannot be something.  God is able to do it. 

The atheist may argue in relation to how the universe came to be is that nothing becomes something. He may even say that the universe still adds up to nothing or something just a hair's breadth from nothing.  The universe is virtually still nothing.  If that is true it would refute the idea of a creator as in a loving God for nothing by default is meaningless.  It is would be that than which a more meaningless cannot be possible.

On Being, Peter Atkins, Oxford, New York, 2011 page 12 says, "The total electrical charge of the universe is zero, but there are positively charged and negatively charged entities within it. We know that the total charge is zero, for otherwise the enormous strength of the interaction between unbalanced charges would have blasted it apart as soon as it had formed. For charges to exist and for the overall charge to be zero, there must be an equal number of positive and negative charges."
 
Page 17 tells us that "the initial endowment of energy at the creation was exactly zero, and the total energy has remained fixed at that value for all time...What we see around us is in fact nothing, but Nothing that has been separated into opposites to give, thereby the appearance of something". Atkins shows that the question, "Why is there something rather than nothing?" contradicts physics. It should be, "Why is there the appearance of something when there is nothing?" One thing is for sure, the answer cannot be God. An honest God would not put us into the middle of all that false appearance. To worship a deceiving God is to commit yourself to deception. There was no creation - only a separation. That is the bottom line.
 
Religion may take comfort however in Atkins statement that, "No one knows whether the total of all the contributions to the total energy of the universe is in fact exactly zero, but the near cancellation of the positive contributions by the negative (gravitational) contribution is highly suggestive" (page 16, ibid). He means how the material things around us become 0 if they meet dark matter. It is two opposite charges meeting and the result is 0 or non-existence. But if it is not exactly zero but almost zero, does it really make much of a difference? If something can come from almost nothing then surely it might come from nothing too? To come from a nothing that is a something means that if anything comes from it then it partly comes from nothing.
 
"Why is there something rather than nothing?" is a fundamentalist anti-science and pro-theology question. It should be, "Why is there the appearance of something when there is nothing?" The popularity of the something rather than nothing question is a clear sign of how religion keeps people out of touch with science and truth.
 
The question is fundamentalist for it is the wrong question. It opposes the fact that science demonstrates that God is unnecessary as a physical explanation for why things exist. It asks why there are physical things when there might have been none of them to try and force a person into thinking there is a non-physical explanation. But that assumes the non-physical can make the physical and nobody knows that. The question at best promotes agnosticism. It's use by religion to promote God is an abuse.
 
"Why is there something rather than nothing?" asks what the purpose of life is and is guilty of assuming that there must be an overall purpose. It offends against the scientific rule, "Question all things and doubt all things." The universe developed its own purposes. But there is no overall purpose.
 
Atkins, P. On Being (Oxford, New York) 2011

 
Bibliography
 
Atkins, P. On Being (Oxford, New York) 2011
 
Griffiths, R. Ed. Hitchens vs Blair, Is Religion a Force for Good in the World? (Black Swan, 2011)
McGrath, A. Bridge-Building (Inter-Varsity Press, 1954) 
Newman, R. Questioning Evangelism (Kregel Publications, 2007)
 
Reid, A. Apologetics (Moore Theological College, 1996)
 
Stannard, R. Science & Belief, The Big Issues (Lion, 2012)
 
Vernon, M. The Big Questions, God (Quercus, 2012)
 
Warfield, B B, On the Antiquity and the Unity of the Human Race (The Princeton Theological Review, 1911)