Do you believe in God? Why/Why not?

[HylianSwordsman]

Yes, I do believe in God. I also believe in everything science says. I find no contradiction in that. If I had to boil down why, it's just that the alternatives just seem so stupid to me.

Possibility 1: The one observable universe is all there is. We must simply accept this as a brute fact. I reject the existence of brute facts because I find them intellectually unsatisfying. I can't just accept something as fact. Luckily science and philosophy have grown beyond this and have better possibilities to explain the universe.

Possibility 2: There are an infinitely infinite number for universes for every possible permutation of every combination of concepts that could make up a universe, and ours is just one of them. Essentially, if it could be imagined, regardless of how incredible a being you'd have to be, or not, to imagine it, it exists. Nothing doesn't exist, so our existence isn't anything special. My mind rejects this possibility. It's not just intellectually unsatisfying, it's downright distasteful. It's stupid. People describe this possibility as "every time I eat breakfast, there's a universe where I eat waffles and one where I eat pancakes" or some other simple decision. Not only would this possibility mean that is true, it goes so much deeper than that. It means that there are universes for every imaginable set of laws, including universes where the laws don't make sense, or have tons of brute facts that simply have to be accepted (example: a universe where hamburgers appear in random locations for no reason other than it's just a law of that universe). This possibility means that for every universe, including ours, there's a version of it with and without a God, but the exact same things happened in that universe. There would be infinite versions of each universe that had a God but where He interacted with the universe in different ways and had different characteristics, or had the same characteristics but had a different subjective opinion about various things. We in our universe could never prove the existence of any of these universes but would have to accept them all as brute facts. Infinitely infinite brute facts. Also, consider that if nothing doesn't exist, then there is no meaning to existence. You can't find your own meaning to it either, as any meaning you derive from it would be an illusion. Ignorance would be the only path to bliss, something which I reject.

Possibility 3: Not all possible universes exist, but there is a multiverse from which all universes arise according to laws of the multiverse, and theoretically infinite universes could arise according to these laws, and if a universe could be created by these laws, then after a sufficient amount of time, it eventually will be created, and ours was one such universe. This solves the brute fact of possibility 1 and avoids the infinitely infinite brute facts of possibility 2, but creates its own brute fact. It's certainly better than the first two, in that the brute fact is less immediately obvious, but I still don't find it satisfying. It really only adds a step before you reach the brute fact. Sure, laws exist that explain our universe, but we still have to accept this multiverse and its laws as a brute fact. In this sense it is no more satisfying to me than possibility 1

Possibilty 4: There is sort of a multiverse, in the sense that our universe is a bubble of space-time that exists on a plane of nothingness where there are no laws and any number of universes can arise with any set of laws. Since there are no laws, thus no reason for a universe not to arise, an infinite number do, and ours is just one. This is no different from possibility 2, because if there's no reason for a universe not to arise, and no laws to determine which ones do and what laws they have, then infinitely infinite universes arise in the exact way as described in possibility 2. We just gave it a setting.

Ultimately, though, what seems in possibilities 1 and 3 to be one brute fact is also infinitely many. For the question isn't simply why does the universe exist, but why does it continue to exist? Why don't the laws collapse? They could simply change at any moment. Is there a law that says the laws don't change? Where does that law come from and why doesn't it change? Another law that says it doesn't change? Here again, you must accept infinitely many brute facts.

God solves all this. If the universe exists because of Him, it can be sustained by Him. If there were a multiverse, its laws could be sustained by him. All of existence could be sustained by Him continuing to will it to be. Everything that exists is contingent upon something for its existence, and accepting that a contingent thing exists as a brute fact is something I cannot do. God transcends this by being a being that exists necessarily, not contingent upon anything, and to ask why such a being exists would be a category error, though at this point I delve into philosophical terms, which would take more time than I have to explain, and go on longer than anyone on a gaming forum would read.