I asked Jon about 'Nothing' in June 2006 and he said that he was just not feeling it and he wanted songs on the album that he would be happy to sing live of which 'Nothing' was not one.
My guess is the lyric or idea came from Richie due to his personal love problems at the time .....
It is also a similar sounding song to 'I am' but he said that it was just he could n't relate to the lyrics - I told him I thought it was a great track of which he replied - ' I make mistakes maybe - I'm not an A n R guy and I wanted to not put 'Prayer' on Slippery ....
Hope this helps.
Karl