
We might live in a computer program but it may not matter - gyre007
http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160901-we-might-live-in-a-computer-program-but-it-may-not-matter
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_nalply
This thought is similar to solipsism. René Descartes was afraid that he is
truly alone because all his experiences are just imaginations. He said «Cogito
ergo sum», but this was not enough to prove that others exist. The similarity
to the simulation argument originates from the problem that we can't be sure
that our perception is truthful.

However there is a counter-argument from Ludwig Wittgenstein. In a summary we
have language. Language is too complex a construct to be invented alone.
Because we speak we know we are not alone.

This is of special importance to me, being born profoundly Deaf. There exist
poor deaf children who were isolated from language and never learned the
basics. I had the misfortune to meet some of them. This drove the nail home
that language cannot emerge in complete aloneness.

Now this doesn't apply to the simulation argument, because language might be
provided from outside by the simulators.

~~~
nanny
>However there is a counter-argument from Ludwig Wittgenstein. In a summary we
have language. Language is too complex a construct to be invented alone.
Because we speak we know we are not alone.

I'm not familiar with that argument, so I'm just going based off your summary,
but to me that sounds eerily similar to people who claim that life cannot
evolve because it is too complex.

~~~
_nalply
Good point. However it's different. There were billions of molecules to evolve
to life. But a single molecule can't evolve to life. Of course this argument
is hyperbolic but you know...

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syphilis2
I figure that if we did live in a computer simulation it's been 13.8 billion
years since the last downtime. I'm skeptical software could run for so long
without any catastrophic bugs.

~~~
noonespecial
13.8 billion years _in_ the sim might only be 12 seconds _on_ the sim.

Plus the whole mess seems pretty glitchy to me. I'm guessing undergraduate
work at best.

~~~
majewsky
Honestly, we hacked most of it together in Perl.
[https://xkcd.com/224/](https://xkcd.com/224/)

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fallingfrog
We don't live in a computer simulation. Here's why: No matter how efficient
your computer is, the total state space of all the simulations in the universe
is less than the total state space of the containing universe. In fact even if
you dedicate the total energy output of the universe to running simulations,
the total simulated state space is much _much_ less than the state space of
the containing universe. And that applies recursively- all simulations
contained in the simulations can't possibly add up to more than a tiny portion
of the volume of the containing universe. So, you're incredibly more likely to
be in a real universe.

~~~
dwrowe
I've never understood this argument in the context of this discussion. Why
would the constraints of the simulation apply to that which is running the
simulation?

~~~
fallingfrog
You can't write a virtual machine with 20 GB of memory running on a real
machine with only 10. Simulation isn't magic.

~~~
greendesk
I have another counter-example. Why not simulate a smaller part of the
universe, not the whole experience?

Suppose you have a real machine with 10 GB. You simulate a world of 1 GB.
Inside the world, the universe is contained in 1 GB (say, a smaller version of
the universe, simplified physics, etc). Inside the virtual machine, in the
simulation world, the perceived universe is 1 GB. They simulation agents don't
perceive a short-coming because they have never been exposed to the out-the-
simulation experiences.

~~~
fallingfrog
Right. But if you were randomly spawned somewhere, you'd be 10 times more
likely to be in the 10GB than the 1GB.

~~~
majewsky
Except we are anything but randomly spawned, on the scale of the universe.

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aikah
> Similarly, Google's machine-intelligence guru Ray Kurzweil has suggested
> that "maybe our whole universe is a science experiment of some junior high-
> school student in another universe".

And for the other universe, who's experiment is it? I don't think the question
matters. What matters is to acknowledge that we don't know and we have no way
of knowing, it's the most urgent thing to do, in order for humanity to reach
its "golden age". We'll get here eventually, since it's about the very
survival of mankind. It's our "golden path", for those who get the reference.

~~~
alanwatts
>To know that you do not know is the best. To pretend to know when you do not
know is a disease.

-Lao Tzu

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drivingmenuts
Unless we can get out of the simulation and start kicking someone in the
upper-dimensionals about all the crap we're put through in their test-to-
destruction, all the philosophical theory don't really matter, does it?

If it turns out there is an afterlife, I seriously hope to haul management out
into a back alley for some discussion about a few things.

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kushti
A great read on so-called modern society living in a simulation is Jean
Baudrillard's "Simulacra and Simulation".

~~~
jasonkostempski
Also a good place to store cash and MiniDisc.

~~~
GFischer
I had to look that up :)

[http://matrix.wikia.com/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation](http://matrix.wikia.com/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation)

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majewsky
Maybe our universe is just a microverse within another universe, and energy is
extracted from our microverse to charge someone's car battery.

~~~
baccredited
[http://www.adultswim.com/videos/rick-and-morty/the-ricks-
mus...](http://www.adultswim.com/videos/rick-and-morty/the-ricks-must-be-
crazy/)

------
FuNe
[http://www.simulation-argument.com/](http://www.simulation-argument.com/)

~~~
drjesusphd
As far as I can tell, this is just a rehash of the Boltzmann Brain paradox.
Instead of random fluctuations in the heat death, it's intentional simulations
run by our descendants.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boltzmann_brain](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boltzmann_brain)

------
joeyspn
BigBang --> GRUB v12039.0.0-beta

~~~
majewsky
Nah, the universe is definitely running on UEFI. Why else would it take
hundreds of thousands of years after the big bang for the first stable atoms
to form?

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sickbeard
And rain could be a giant's pee? There's no evidence we do live in a computer
so why bother

~~~
dublinben
>There's no evidence

It's also an unfalsifiable claim, since there is no way to prove we are or are
not. As such, it's a waste of time to think about, since it doesn't matter.

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jlebrech
could this explain meditation, maybe you're not just rewiring your brain but
the universe too.

~~~
xyzzy4
So people who are bored on airplanes because they forgot to bring reading
material are rewiring the universe?

~~~
jlebrech
being bored isn't meditation

~~~
xyzzy4
It's very similar to unfocused meditation.

