Part II: Why is there Something Instead of Nothing?
The idea that has affected me most profoundly in my life is this.
In any infinite set, there is a subset that follows the rules of the natural numbers.
I don't know if this is worldshaking to you. I have encountered many ideas that have shaken my world. But this is the most worldshaking of them.
In the still well of the void, in raw nothingness, there is something that counts, going from one to n.
And because there is something that counts, there is something that computes sums. There is something that names the Fibonacci numbers. There is code for the performance of maximum matchings. There are people. There are worlds.
How do you find these people? Where do these worlds come from?
From mathematical assumptions. You say: I will look for numbers. Lo! Numbers appear. You say: but how do those numbers sum? And the thing that computes sums appears. If you ask the right questions, you'll find the subset that could be a model for physical data; and then you just start modeling.
For me, that's an awful lot like existence. Why is there something instead of nothing? Because there is math.
But!
Does it matter if something first exists to ask the questions? Michael Goodwin, my coauthor on this overall metaphysical theory, thinks so.
So let's say that there's something that determines whether something real has ever computed your existence. Something that separates being real or at least realish from just being a general theory that something like you probably could exist, you know, if only you actually did.
In Fair Folk, this is called the Heart.
(I didn't actually know this until well after the book was on the shelves. But I think it fits everything in the book quite well.)