I don't see how the essentially magical appearance of an incredibly complex set of axioms from nothing at all is a plausible answer to the 'Why something instead of nothing?" question.
To be clear, I have absolutely no idea how to answer that question. I'm certainly not a closet theist. My best guess is that a useful answer is currently some way beyond our pay grade as a species.
So I don't find "Because math" to be any more convincing as an answer than suggesting god did it.
> any more convincing as an answer than suggesting god did it.
Doesn't have the problem of 1) asserting that no other gods exist other than this specific god or group of gods and 2) the issue of who created god.
We don't ask, who put pi about 14% of the way between 3 and 4; that's almost silly.
:)
It would make sense to me that reality, encapsulating all that exists, "is" because "it must be", like Math.
You presume it was created. It might be as valid a question as "who created erosion", aka math is a natural extension of our universe.
Or, more likely IMO, our universe is a natural extension of math.
I get it, but I can't quite wrap my head around a mathematical universe with no substrate. As though any internally consistent ontology with self-aware structures (and, it seems to me, also those without) just "exists" apropos of nothing. What's doing the math?