If we’re a simulation, where did the creatures simulating us come from?
All this does is kick everything up a level.
Yeah no theory of science, philosophy or computers is going to save us from the “prime mover” paradox.
But if we can prove that a universe can be “created” via simulation in our own universe, now statistically speaking it becomes clear that simulations are “cheap” and therefore it’s likely we live in one.
The simulation theory is literally rejecting the old gods and creating universal system administrators as the new ones.
My biggest frustration of the simulation theory is the thought that things don’t exist unless you are interacting with them. This means that the universe revolves around the observer. The same thoughts that support simulation theory also support creation theory.
I believe that simulation theory also reinforces the idea that there are people who are NPCs who don’t matter. This is easier for people in power to believe who have people serving their needs.
I think this line of thought is most attractive to self-serving individuals who want to believe that everything in the universe exists for them and everyone else needs to either support them or get out of the way.
When people tell me they they believe that the universe is a simulation, my first thought is that they will treat others poorly because it doesn’t matter. In their perspective, the simulation will sort it out in their favor.
I believe that simulation theory also reinforces the idea that there are people who are NPCs who don’t matter.
Isn’t this part of sociopathic behaviour?
Not to mention the “don’t exist unless I see it” sounds more like a 2yr old’s worldview to me…
The hypothesis is pretty simple, actually.
There’s a reality somewhere. A “physical” universe in which a computer can be created. With enough time, a computer can be created in this “top level” universe that is capable of simulating one universe. Then, assuming computational power and efficiency can be improved, multiple universes can be simulated at one time. You can also achieve better simulation fidelity by slowing down the simulated universe, like 1 second of simulation time taking 1 minute of top level universe time.
If we stop there, the probability that we’re living in a simulated universe instead of the top level universe is already pretty high (or inversely the chance that we’re living in the top level universe is pretty low).
Now, if the computers are powerful enough, the simulated universes can probably have computers in them, and those computers will eventually be able to simulate universes, too. Probably in about the same ratio.
So it’s not simulations ALL the way up, but if those postulates are rational, the chance that any randomly chosen universe in the set of all universes is the top level universe becomes vanishingly small, but non zero.
I think it’s definitely the case that if the top level simulation(s) stop, all the downstream ones would, too.
Now, if the computers are powerful enough, the simulated universes can probably have computers in them, and those computers will eventually be able to simulate universes, too
There’s one minor problem with this step of this idea. Where are those simulated computers running? For example, let’s say I spin up a virtual machine on my computer. Then, inside that machine I spin up a sub-virtual machine. The processing power to run that sub-machine doesn’t just appear out of nowhere. The processing power is still all coming from the top level machine. A bit less efficiently than just running a second VM on the top level machine.
This would be the same for universe simulations. Let’s say Universe A simulates Universe B. Now Universe B tries to simulate universe C. But, in order for Universe B to run that simulation, Universe A actually has to run that simulation. The simulation doesn’t get run for free. If anything, it’s probably less efficient for Universe A to simulate Universe B simulating Universe C. So, Universe A would make better use of resources to just run the Universe C simulation themselves and just let Universe B see the results and think they are the ones running it.
No matter how deep the universes nest, every simulation must be run by the resources of the top level universe. Either directly or at several levels of abstraction. There’s no getting around that. Now, it could be that the top level universe has a lot of resources and can run sub-universes pretty efficiently. But there will never be any more sub-universes than the top level universe can run be itself.
