There are a lot of similarities here with Ancient Greek traditional cosmology, especially the description of chaos being the beginning state of the world (Desire, too, is an early arrival in both traditions). From Hesiod’s Theogony: “Start at the beginning, Muses with homes on Olympus, and tell me: who was born first? First there was Chaos, then broad-chested Gaia, the steadfast seat of all immortals who live upon the snowy peaks of Olympus, then murky Tartarus in the depths of the wide earth, and Eros, most beautiful of the immortal gods, who weakens the limbs and overwhelms the minds and wise counsel in the breasts of all gods and humans.” https://archive.org/details/hesiods-theogony-translated-by-michael-heumann/mode/2up

This is such an interesting question to ask in the implications it brings. How does someone prove how the world was created, with the scientific knowledge and technology of an ancient culture? The subsequent line appears to discredit religious explanations by saying that creation predated deities. This leaves the Vedics in a position where anyone can say what they believe about creation, but no one can prove themselves correct or disprove another theory.

I like these opening lines, as it seems like a very natural sequence of thoughts to have when describing the complete absence of everything. In pondering over both air and water, it gives a similar impression to our phrase “glass half full.”