http://plus.maths.org/content/laws-nature
SNIP ...Not only are the laws independent of us: they also appear to sit over and above all other objects to which they apply. "In some sense [the laws of nature] are not part of the Universe," says George Ellis, a mathematician and cosmologist at the University of Cape Town. "They underlie the Universe because they control how matter behaves, but they are not themselves made of matter. Laws of physics aren't made of lead or uranium or something." So it appears that the laws of nature exist in some abstract realm of their own. Through some mysterious mechanism we have access to this Platonic realm and can piece some of those laws together....
SNIP ...Not only are the laws independent of us: they also appear to sit over and above all other objects to which they apply. "In some sense [the laws of nature] are not part of the Universe," says George Ellis, a mathematician and cosmologist at the University of Cape Town. "They underlie the Universe because they control how matter behaves, but they are not themselves made of matter. Laws of physics aren't made of lead or uranium or something." So it appears that the laws of nature exist in some abstract realm of their own. Through some mysterious mechanism we have access to this Platonic realm and can piece some of those laws together....