Are we living in a simulation?

All of this is old wine in a new bottle with a trashier label.

new ship in an old bottle

meh sage in a bottle

you could use the fact that the universe is NOT governed by "discoverable natural laws" as evidence that there was a Creator too! "we can't explain why things operate the ways in which they do...clearly there is someone or some thing behind the scenes pulling the strings"

^ tbf, that was the main reason why so many primitive religions projected their deities as being driven by human-like emotions like jealousy, anger or lust.

this doesn't really belong here but i wanted to share it somewhere and it kinda does belong here?

https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-if-true-this-could-be-one-of-the-greatest-discoveries-in-human-history-1.6828318

Wow—have to say, i felt relieved when they said that thing was moving out of our solar system.

This thread reminded me of this:

https://entertainment.theonion.com/video-game-character-wondering-why-heartless-god-always-1819566102?utm_medium=sharefromsite&utm_source=theonion_copy&utm_campaign=top

have to say, i felt relieved when they said that thing was moving out of our solar system.

https://i.imgur.com/sjLTPre.png

i was listening to a podcast episode on the simulation argument and they briefly mentioned a ongoing experiment/research that could be relevant because it could potentially prove that we live in a simulation (maybe? in case anyone did not know, i am not a scientist and this is my first day here, hello everyone).

the argument goes something like this: if the universe were a simulation, then one could expect to find a certain limit of "granularity" in measurements. As an example, when you look at a computer screen, the smallest unit of measure is a pixel. so in that little computer screen universe, the smallest unit of granularity would be a pixel. in other words, if you want to draw a line from one side of the screen to the other, you have to travel along the pixels - you can't travel in between pixels or split them in half, so if you zoom in far enough, diagonal lines are actually on a grid.

similarly, one could build a really cpu-intensive particle physics simulation, designed to simulate the movements of objects a tiiiiiiiiny scale - but at some point, there would be a limit as to how small you could go, because every additional smaller level of scale would require even more computing resources to model.

so the idea is that maybe there's a limit in our universe, a limit on how small things could get. in order to test this, (if i remember correctly..it's been a few weeks since i heard this episode), research is being conducted (maybe one very small component of the large hadron collider stuff?) to measure the paths of particles after they collide. one would think that the paths of these particles wouldn't ever align with any sort of granular grid - it's kind of like if you measure the amount of time it takes you to sneeze, you should very very very rarely get the same exact amount of time, because even if two sneezes both take 1.05 seconds, if you "zoomed" in far enough you'd see that one takes 1.0500000000000001 seconds and the other takes 1.050000000000000000000001 seconds. in the same way, if you measure the paths of collided particles, you should see that an incredibly tiny scale, they all follow slightly different paths, their angles always just a little different from each other. UNLESS we live in a simulated universe. in that case, maybe we're only simulated down to the 40th power (or whatever). if that was the case, and we had the ability to measure distance down to the 45th power, then we be able to see the point that particles fall into a "grid" (kind of like the pixel example i mentioned several thousand words ago)

sorry if this makes no sense

the obvious counterpoint to all this is that if there was a being (organic or artificial) that had enough computing power to simulate our entire universe to the degree that we experience it, they would probably be able to simulate to a level of granularity that we're not yet able measure (e.g., meter to the negative 500th power), so we wouldn't be able to identify the level of granularity where of the simulated "grid".

It seems like it collapses pretty quickly, as a theory, into just vague 'something-ism'. We could make a simulation of a universe that is different from ours, and if that's the case of whatever is supposed to be simulating us, we can't say anything about them. It just becomes 'something is originating/maintaining the universe'. We have no reason to assume their physics would be like ours, so trying to extrapolate from restrictions in our reality to the over-reality seems unsound.

xp They should also not find it hard to trick our measurements, make us think we're seeing bottomless levels of granularity.

that's true, but why would they want to trick us? i agree with dowd (xp) that there's no way you could ever infer anything about the simulators. but i do think that one possibility is just that computing power continues to grow exponentially for several thousand years, to the point where some kid can open up Civilization MMMCDLXIV and say "simulate humans for 4 million years with X set of genetic base code and Y level of mutations, using the Resource Wars geology template" or whatever. and here we are, halfway through it, and the stupid kid is off doing whatever

Why do I feel so strongly that we are, in fact, not in a simulation? It's not things are too "real", future tech could hypothetically create and environment a million times richer than what I experience. I don't think it's because I'm emotionally invested in not being in a dream world. But while I can intellectually concede the possibility, in my gut I know it's not true.

The most insulting metaphysical scenario.

xp

btw in case anyone thinks i'm a total idiot, i think the possibility of any of this being true is very tiny. but it makes as likely (if not more) to me than any religion's version of how the universe came to be, and yet everyone politely nods at all of those stories because billions of people believe them.

my partner absolutely HATES all of this with a passion because she really hates deterministic worldviews

I think the over-universes interest will be as much in alternate kinds of universe as much as different hypotheticals of their own universe/society. But even then, I'm assuming something about their motivations that I have no right to, because such motivations would only be valid if they are 'human-like'.

but it makes as likely (if not more) to me than any religion's version of how the universe came to be

this is an indication that the actual content of the question lies somewhere totally aside from its technical details

It seems to able to end up as 'God' anyway, if we can't know anything about their universe, being, motivations, technology etc.

ontological inquiry began
in two thousand and three
(which was rather late for me)
between the second matrix film
and the third w.k. lp

a+

It was a dream. We live inside a dream.

Lynch believes in the unified field of consciousness that he apprehends through transcendental meditation.

Seems not unrelated.

(wins was quoting twin peaks)

but he works in a petrol station

fail to see how eventually coming up against a grid as opposed to a perfect smoothness proves a model even if we managed it. only proves we got good at measuring small enough. if you can theorise a fundamental indivisible then theres cooled things to wonder about it than "we're not real" imo.

but i did enjoy the post which yknow is fitting as a metaphor

nb metaphors are a nett evil

if the universe were a simulation, then one could expect to find a certain limit of "granularity" in measurements.

again, nobody knows that this isn't true for a real-deal universe

Physical 'imperfections' are enough on their own to argue against this being a simulation imo. Like why would you write zits into what's already a ridiculously complex simulation.

emergent content hurts the most while it's emerging

Because it would be programmed by a superpowerful AI that can process information a million times faster or something

I don't think logical inconsistencies are the best line of attack against this unnecessary flight of fancy tbh

you guys what if everything's a board game? no wait. nobody could play it without getting confused. but what if someone could??

World War 2 does bear a crazy similarity to Axis & Allies!

https://i.imgur.com/RePxSM6.jpg

"what if scrimulation?"

you guys sure do know everything about the origins of the universe, enough to rule out one possibility that's just as dumb as anything you believe

salt death of the universe approaching 100%

Karl otm. I’m not a simulation guy but there is no “common sense” alternative explanation. The existence of the universe and consciousness is weird.

ara only if you think about it but sure so's everything

*puff* Sure maaaaaan.

i'm not at all ruling it out karl i'm saying: what do people mean when they say, as they have for some time now, "what if life is a dream?" what they mean is, what if "instead" of "being" "real", what if life is "only" an imagining of life, taking place inside some kind of mind. that mind would have to be pretty big and powerful, to imagine all this! what kind of entity would have such a mind? what would it be like? why would it find itself imagining us? is it doing it on purpose? what does it think of us? does it "think" anything? are we its thoughts? are there others like it? other minds? other worlds? what does all this mean about how i ought to behave? these are the questions and continue to be. putting "you know, like the sims" after them doesn't take us anywhere we haven't already been with dreams, looms, plays, etc. new metaphors are great, because they're teaching tools. but not if-- as i fear is a danger in the Science! culture that reproduces this particular one-- they confuse themselves for new insights. takes bong rip

yeah essentially that

theres not a scale at which it matters to us as we exist

unless we want to make excuses about why we lost a ping pong match with our kid sister. "fuck off, becca, it's all a simulation anyway" *throws paddle* etc.

I agree with dll that the popularity of this theory among elon musk types is really suspicious

The arguments for the universe as a computer simulation are just recapitulations of the centuries-old argument from design, where the apparent interconnection of all parts of the universe into a functional whole is cited as evidence that a greater intelligence (i.e. God) must have designed it. This is yet another instance of the argument from analogy, but it fails miserably to establish its conclusion, because the things analogized from (computer simulations created by humans) have so little in common with the observable universe that they have almost nothing in common, while the argument requires them to be nearly identical.

You guys know about terrence mckenna