Why Does the World Exist?

This is an issue upon which thousands of philosophers and religious figures have written about over the past 3,000+ years. To answer your questions, I'd first start by realizing the possible answers are vastly more complicated than your two options. I suggest a deep study plan of the history of religion and philosophy, including all world traditions (Chinese, Japanese, Indian subcontinent, Islamic, Christian, Western, and so on.)

Personally, I am drawn, in unequal parts, to Wittgenstein/the inherent limits of language, Nietzsche and Schopenhauer's concept of the will, mysticism, and Indian (Hindu, Buddhist, Jain) concepts of the universe. If I tried to answer your question briefly (but again, I don't think it's nearly that simple), I'd say something like: concepts like "exist", "created" and "god" are all wrapped up in language and a human perspective. Logic and mathematics are patterns viewed through human observation, not things-in-themselves. The idea that the universe is explainable via the extremely limited tool of empirical science seems hopelessly naive to me.

It seems quite likely that we live within a hierarchy of simulations. That means the physics we observe don’t need to be ultimate; they might be whatever the simulators wished them to be.

Maybe some outer layer of simulation involves no technological civilization with intentionality but is just some massive computational process in a dynamic substrate that we can’t imagine.

If time is a feature specific to our simulation then maybe causality itself is kind of like a Kantian category and not a property of the real base universe. So maybe “why” questions only apply locally.

It does seem sensible to assume metaphysically that our observed world of causality somehow supervenes on some structure or energy that transcends causality, some kind of God or higher reality, even if it is a “god of the gaps.” We would be a part of this God’s “creative exploration” or something.

By the way: this wasn't meant to be offensive or a discussion on other beliefs. I'm trying to get a sense of how many people here think 'deeper.' In the god framework, you eliminate causality, since you put attribution to a God who simply avoids all sense of creation and you avoid the sense of causality since you transfer it to being created by this ever lasting presence and he/she simply exists and creates all that is. The other side: In our current scientific framework, we say that we have the mathematical laws, and since they're really complicated, we say that we exist within a universe which embodies all probability lines leading to us - including ones which coincide with an accidental existence. I don't believe that either one of those are true, so I'm trying to write a piece which shows what I think - but prior to doing that, I'd like to get a sense from the HN crowd: what do you think?

These questions are wonderful to ponder.

I view the will of God as the “why” and the physical laws of nature as the “how”. When people say “everything is connected” I interpret that to mean while it’s true that physical causes and effects behave according to natural law, the will for a desired outcome is provided by a higher intelligence.

To answer your question, the universe exists because God wills it to exist.

While we’re on the subject, many believe in a hierarchy of supernatural intelligences (e.g. angels and demons). A scientific explanation for this hierarchy may be living beings that occupy dimensions other than our own (e.g. “higher” dimensions that operate on “lower” dimensions).

See, e.g., https://m.phys.org/news/2014-12-universe-dimensions.html

From my experiences with psychedelics and ketamine I have come to the conclusion that the answer to this question is probably too profound and weird for the current human brain to grasp (if there even is an answer). So I try not to think about this too much and just focus on struggling through my life.

Because your brain likes questions and your brain thinks it exists. The world neither exists or non-exists, it just is , and has allowed the evolution of brains that ask invalid questions such as what is its origin and purpose. Origin and purpose are useful concepts to avoid dying when an arrow comes from an origin and aims to kill you. Our organic neural networks have a tendency to apply these concepts to everything, that's sometimes vaguely useful, other times it's just brain farts.

Makes me think of this talk by Richard Feynman talking about magnets how do they work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36GT2zI8lVA

The take away is to answer a why question you need a framework to provide an acceptable answer. Why the universe exists? We don't have possibility can't contain such a framework.

What if the question itself is ill-posed? That's what Late Prof. Adolf Grunbaum argued for: http://www.stafforini.com/existence/Grunbaum%20-%20Why%20is%...

im mostly party to the 2nd option i believe, but i also see a lot of logic and sense in the simulation argument (which i consider pretty different from the religious one)

Because it has not been fully destroyed yet.

Sometimes it's good not to be modern.