Philosophy Now Forum

Elon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think? Is it probable or plausible? And if we are living in a simulation, then what is the "reality" that the simulation is running within? For example, if we use the game Grand Theft Auto as an example of a simulation, then we would say that "reality" is me playing the game on a computer screen. The "simulation" is inside the processor and is viewed on the screen. Me looking at the computer screen while I play is "reality." Does a simulation presume a "reality" that it must be running in? And if so, then is it a violation of Occam's Razor to assume that we live in a simulation? Because, if we live in a simulation then we need to postulate the existence of a second world called "reality" within which the simulation is running.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... imulation/

What is the "simulation" supposed to be "simulating"?

A "simulated" apple is something that looks like a (real) apple. A "simulated" experience is one that convinces you that it's a real experience. There are always, then, two apples or two experiences, in any situation that implicates a "simulation": the real, and the simulated one.

But if there is only the "simulation," then it's not "simulating" anything. And then, it's not a "simulation."

If the "simulation" is the only reality, then there's nothing for it to "simulate." So even using the word "simulation" assumes the existence of two realms, not one: one reality being the original, and the "simulation" being the copy.

So the question you're asking is not if we live merely in a "simulated" reality, but also, where is the other reality, the real one it (supposedly) "simulates"?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am What is the "simulation" supposed to be "simulating"?

A "simulated" apple is something that looks like a (real) apple. A "simulated" experience is one that convinces you that it's a real experience. There are always, then, two apples or two experiences, in any situation that implicates a "simulation": the real, and the simulated one.

But if there is only the "simulation," then it's not "simulating" anything. And then, it's not a "simulation."

If the "simulation" is the only reality, then there's nothing for it to "simulate." So even using the word "simulation" assumes the existence of two realms, not one: one reality being the original, and the "simulation" being the copy.

So the question you're asking is not if we live merely in a "simulated" reality, but also, where is the other reality, the real one it (supposedly) "simulates"?

That's my take on it. A simulation is going to be running within a "reality." So for example without the "real" world, there can be no simulated reality called Grand Theft Auto. There would be no "place" for the simulation to be running.

Another question I think it brings up is can a character in a simulation be conscious? If we're purely characters in a simulation with no other reality than that, then how can we be conscious? How does a wannabe simulator create consciousness? Consciousness cannot be seen, felt, heard, etc. by an outside observer. So how does a would-be simulation creator knowingly create consciousness? Presumably, if there is a God, then only God could do something like that. So if we are in any simulation at all, then it could (perhaps) only be a divinely created one--I would think.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 4:20 am There would be no "place" for the simulation to be running.

Yep. That's another way to put it. That's the main problem.

Another question I think it brings up is can a character in a simulation be conscious? If we're purely characters in a simulation with no other reality than that, then how can we be conscious?

Yes, well said. "Consciousness" then would mean no more than "believing what you see," meaning the so-called "simulation." There would be no other reality to "wake up to."

How does a wannabe simulator create consciousness? Consciousness cannot be seen, felt, heard, etc. by an outside observer. So how does a would-be simulation creator knowingly create consciousness?

Yes, that's an additional problem. What's the creator's frame of reference for this "consciousness"?

Presumably, if there is a God, then only God could do something like that. So if we are in any simulation at all, then it could (perhaps) only be a divinely created one--I would think.

There is a biblical take on this. It's that there is a seen world, and an unseen one. The one most of us presently see is the "simulation," though you and I would probably assume it was the basic reality. But the unseen world -- at least, the one most people don't yet see -- is the ultimately real and eternal world.

There's talk of this in books like Job, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and Revelation, among other places. In fact, one could well say it's a running theme throughout the entire Bible, being referred to fairly frequently by indirect means; but is only manifested and described adequately in specific passages.

When John, for example, is faced with seeing the usually-unseen world for the first time, he lapses into metaphor and symbol immediately. It seems he has a great deal of difficulty finding references to things from the seen world to illuminate adequately what he is perceiving in his vision. The result is a set of descriptions that are often composites or collages of imagery:

"From the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder. In front of the throne, seven lamps were blazing. These are the seven spirits of God. Also in front of the throne there was what looked like a sea of glass, clear as crystal. In the center, around the throne, were four living creatures, and they were covered with eyes, in front and in back. The first living creature was like a lion, the second was like an ox, the third had a face like a man, the fourth was like a flying eagle..." (Rev. 4:5-7)

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:38 amElon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think? Is it probable or plausible?

This idea that reality is not what it seems has been a feature of philosophy since Plato's allegory of the cave. Basically Plato likened our experience of the world to watching shadows on the wall of a cave. The shadows are cast by 'the real world' as it passes between the mouth of the cave and the true source of light. It was Descartes who pointed out that the only thing we can be sure of is that we are having experiences and that frankly, any hypothesis that accounts for those experiences could be true: dreaming, deception by an evil dæmon, idealism, brain in a vat, the Matrix, you name it; all of them could cause identical experiences and there is no way to tell which is 'The Truth'. John Locke divided objects into their primary and secondary properties - primary qualities being the things need to be 'an object': shape, motion, solidity (in a very loose sense), while secondary qualities are the experiences we have: colour, smell, taste and so on. Kant calls essentially the same qualities 'noumena' and 'phenomena' and for practical purposes, physicists stopped caring about what the world is really made of and decided to concentrate on the numbers. Contemporary hypotheses don't make the situation any clearer. According to the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, any reality you happen to find yourself in is like a single frame from a movie, where reality is every film ever made. There's the multiverse hypothesis based on the idea that the universe we find ourselves in is one of who knows how many others?
Anyway, long story short: Do we live in a simulation? Dunno. Anyone who insists they do know is a crank or a religious nut.

What if I have a computer which can simulate things which have never exist, and could never exist in this world. Why must the things which exist in the “external world” exactly match the thing in the simulated world? It isn’t a necessary thing.

But, I think it’s the case that, our experience captures some structural information from that reality, I suppose, the primary qualities, like shape, size, position etc. Furthermore, secondary qualities, like colour or taste, are constructed based on its survival value.

Imagine if salty actually tasted sweet. We would continue to eat salty things until our bodily sodium content became critical and we died.

Imagine if pain actually felt pleasant. We wouldn’t last long, that’s for sure. And in fact, some people have such a condition which means they don’t feel pain, a rare genetic disorder, and such people tend not to have long lives. It seems an anthropic principle would explain why our experiences are as they are. Because if we didn’t have such experiences, we would likely not exist. This set of experiences under certain external conditions, results in behaviour which improves ones survival and reproductive odds.

So getting back to the question, do we live in a simulation. If your definition of simulation is, the thing that is being simulated must have an exact referent possessing all the same qualities as that which is simulated, absolutely not, that is absurd. But if what we mean by simulation is, there is something external which “informs” the experience, which is separate from the experience, yes. We have vision which is informed by light waves external to the eye. We have hearing which is informed by pressure waves which are external to our ear drums.

But, what is important to note is, without that external signal, the sensory organs do NOT have adequate information to convincingly simulate an experience.

Though, the mind IS capable of generating highly detailed environments completely separate from any external influence. An example is, lucid dreaming. There is NO external signal from the outside, yet, a detailed inner world is generated, along with a dream body, which can interact with that inner world.

If the brain did not do something akin to a simulation (or if you don’t like that word, a construction), the only explanation which follows the other line of reasoning is that of “astral projection”. Now, I find that hard to believe, so I’ll take the construction/simulation hypothesis.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:38 am Elon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think? Is it probable or plausible?

It would certainly explain time dilation/relativistic phenomena. The inability of the underlying hardware to handle infinite precision/infinite values would cause exactly the kind of behaviour we are observing at the extremities as we start over-flowing buffers.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 2:43 pm

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:38 am Elon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think? Is it probable or plausible?

It would certainly explain time dilation/relativistic phenomena. The inability of the underlying hardware to handle infinite precision/infinite values would cause exactly the kind of behaviour we are observing at the extremities as we start over-flowing buffers.

If we are in a simulation, then I wonder what "reality" is? Is it Newtonian physics? Is relativistic physics simply the processing system showing its limits, then?

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 4:20 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am What is the "simulation" supposed to be "simulating"?

A "simulated" apple is something that looks like a (real) apple. A "simulated" experience is one that convinces you that it's a real experience. There are always, then, two apples or two experiences, in any situation that implicates a "simulation": the real, and the simulated one.

But if there is only the "simulation," then it's not "simulating" anything. And then, it's not a "simulation."

If the "simulation" is the only reality, then there's nothing for it to "simulate." So even using the word "simulation" assumes the existence of two realms, not one: one reality being the original, and the "simulation" being the copy.

So the question you're asking is not if we live merely in a "simulated" reality, but also, where is the other reality, the real one it (supposedly) "simulates"?

That's my take on it. A simulation is going to be running within a "reality." So for example without the "real" world, there can be no simulated reality called Grand Theft Auto. There would be no "place" for the simulation to be running.

I agree with both of you.

Furthermore, if there were a reality and any number of simulated realities, the only one we could be aware of is the one we exist in. There would be no way for us to recognize that we are living in a simulation.

It would be a whole different matter if we were able to travel between, or exist in, multiple universes of reality and simulation.

uwot wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 9:22 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:38 amElon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think? Is it probable or plausible?

This idea that reality is not what it seems has been a feature of philosophy since Plato's allegory of the cave. Basically Plato likened our experience of the world to watching shadows on the wall of a cave. The shadows are cast by 'the real world' as it passes between the mouth of the cave and the true source of light. It was Descartes who pointed out that the only thing we can be sure of is that we are having experiences and that frankly, any hypothesis that accounts for those experiences could be true: dreaming, deception by an evil dæmon, idealism, brain in a vat, the Matrix, you name it; all of them could cause identical experiences and there is no way to tell which is 'The Truth'. John Locke divided objects into their primary and secondary properties - primary qualities being the things need to be 'an object': shape, motion, solidity (in a very loose sense), while secondary qualities are the experiences we have: colour, smell, taste and so on. Kant calls essentially the same qualities 'noumena' and 'phenomena' and for practical purposes, physicists stopped caring about what the world is really made of and decided to concentrate on the numbers. Contemporary hypotheses don't make the situation any clearer. According to the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, any reality you happen to find yourself in is like a single frame from a movie, where reality is every film ever made. There's the multiverse hypothesis based on the idea that the universe we find ourselves in is one of who knows how many others?
Anyway, long story short: Do we live in a simulation? Dunno. Anyone who insists they do know is a crank or a religious nut.

What's a simulation? If it's all a simulation, where did the idea of a simulation come from?

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:38 am Elon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think?

I think that the only reason the universe seems like some kind of "simulation" is because its quantum underpinning appears to be "software-like" in nature.

However, that doesn't mean that the universe is "simulating" something.

No, it just means that there is something similar going on between the workings of computer software and that of the workings of quantum "software."
_______

RCSaunders wrote: ↑Tue May 04, 2021 9:07 pmWhat's a simulation? If it's all a simulation, where did the idea of a simulation come from?

Could be anything. All we know is all we can see; there's a ton of scientific evidence that we have to create an explanation for. Even our most widely held 'scientific' story implies that reality is in some sense simulated. According to the big bang/relativity/quantum mechanical mash up, solid matter is a product of forces and patterns in immaterial 'fields'. However good that story is for explaining what we see, it doesn't tell us anything about how those fields came to be. You are pretty much free to make up your own creation myth.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:38 am Elon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think? Is it probable or plausible? And if we are living in a simulation, then what is the "reality" that the simulation is running within? For example, if we use the game Grand Theft Auto as an example of a simulation, then we would say that "reality" is me playing the game on a computer screen. The "simulation" is inside the processor and is viewed on the screen. Me looking at the computer screen while I play is "reality." Does a simulation presume a "reality" that it must be running in? And if so, then is it a violation of Occam's Razor to assume that we live in a simulation? Because, if we live in a simulation then we need to postulate the existence of a second world called "reality" within which the simulation is running.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... imulation/

EVERY 'thing' happens in 'reality'. So, even if you are living in a simulation, then you, and the simulation, are happening in 'reality'.

Is there anything else that you want to learn, understand, and know here?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am What is the "simulation" supposed to be "simulating"?

A "simulated" apple is something that looks like a (real) apple.

But how would 'you' know if 'you' are in a simulation?

The one who is making/creating the simulation may have made you think that a "simulated" apple is something that looks like a (real) apple, but in actuality, a (real) apple may look like an orange, for example.

If one is in a simulation, then they could not know what a, so called, "real thing" actually looks like.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am A "simulated" experience is one that convinces you that it's a real experience.

But this is obviously false. If one is convinced that they are in a simulation, then that experience has obviously proven that they are NOT convinced that it is a real experience.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am There are always, then, two apples or two experiences, in any situation that implicates a "simulation": the real, and the simulated one.

Did you mean to say, 'at least'. Because there could be countless simulated experiences, plus the, so called, "real experience".

Also, one could very easily create a simulated experience in which the ones within that simulated experience experience dragons, for example, but, in reality, there are NO real dragons AT ALL.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am But if there is only the "simulation," then it's not "simulating" anything. And then, it's not a "simulation."

Your, so called, "logic" does NOT follow 100% accurately.

Also, thee ACTUAL Truth is just far simpler.

There could NEVER be just a "simulation". There could be NO 'if' here and so there is NO 'if' here. Therefore, the rest of what you wrote and said here is just moot, anyway.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am If the "simulation" is the only reality,

This is just NONSENSICAL.

How could the "simulation" be the only reality. This is just not even a possibility in imagination, let alone possible in the Real and True "world".

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am then there's nothing for it to "simulate."

Again this is just moot. There is NO 'if' here, also.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am So even using the word "simulation" assumes the existence of two realms, not one: one reality being the original, and the "simulation" being the copy.

Is this an 'assumption' or just a FACT.

The word "simulation" in the context of what is being talked about here is in relation to 'a life' or 'a world'. But this in NO WAY infers NOR assumes that the "simulated" 'life' or 'world' is an EXACT REPLICATE of the Real 'Life' or 'world'.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:59 am So the question you're asking is not if we live merely in a "simulated" reality, but also, where is the other reality, the real one it (supposedly) "simulates"?

The question is ACTUALLY asking what the writer/poster of the question ACTUALLY INTENDED, and, 'shock', ONLY the one who wrote/posted the question KNOWS what the question is REALLY asking.

AND, the ONLY True way that ANY one else can obtain this KNOWING is by just asking the writer/poster A CLARIFYING QUESTION, or more.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:38 am Elon Musk and others think we may live in a simulation. What do you think?

I think that it's some silly SciFi fantasizing.

It's not that it's impossible. It's that there's no particular reason to believe that it would be the case. Just like countless other SciFi/fantasy scenarios we could come up with. It's like the sort of thing you think of when you're really high and that seems really profound until the buzz wears off. And then it seems embarrassing that it seemed really profound when you were stoned.