The Simulation Argument - Page 2

Will we create a simulation inside this simulation? How many simulations deep are we? Infinite?

I think its important to actually look at his paper then to just watch the video to understand the full argument. In his paper there are several premises that are unstated in the video. One being the assumption of substrate-independence and the physical limitations of building a "computer" powerful enough to run a simulation that would be indistinguishable for a real reality.

http://www.simulation-argument.com/simulation.pdf

After looking into computational power there seems to be physical limitations in making say a "planet sized" computer that would be capable of running a simulation. However these principles are simply way to complex form my understanding of physics to make a judgement on if a "planet sized" computer would be possible or even effective.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landauer%27s_principle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bekenstein_bound
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bremermann%27s_limit

This Limit is actually very close to what Bostrom estimated for the amount of computational power needed
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margolus%E2%80%93Levitin_theorem

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-cloning_theorem

I think it would be easier for a civilization that reached this level to just send some seed dna to a habitable planet and watched what happened.

On June 10 2016 10:30 Nazgul wrote: Will we create a simulation inside this simulation? How many simulations deep are we? Infinite?

Well I can see two logical ways to get to the one in a billion number. Unless there is evidence presented that this is actually one of the simulations, then there obviously need to be 1 billion simulations. Otherwise the odds would be bigger.
Or we need to loop the simulations, our simulation will simulate the simulation that is going to simulate us. Everything is a simulation and there is just a 1 billionth chance it not being true.

^ I read the first paper.

One of the biggest problems and it's glaringly obvious, is that we don't actually understand very well how the universe works, especially anything that is more complex than maths and physics. We would need to understand all of this before creating a simulation of it. He didn't address this, his argument went off the assumption that post humanism is possible in the next 100,000 years.

I'm not sure how well he knows mathematics but you would need a computer bigger than the universe to calculate very basic problems, like examining weather a 100 long conjuction of propositions if its true or not would take 2^100 calculations. His earth sized computer only does 10^42. Not that i think this particular objection is an important one.

Our lives are computers games programmed by other future super people? Gtfo.

The other two parts of this 'theory' is what? We will get advanced enough to make our lives a computer simulation but wont care to do so? So its possible! Lets talk about what else is possible when we use our imaginations.

Third, civilizations die before they can makes simulation worlds? Wow what eye opening logic.

No offense, but this sounds like science nerds trying to make their own religion in explaining how the world was made.

Apparently when you are a genius billionaire you don't have to adhere to math or logic. Also think his certainty shows a level of psychopathy: he is trivializing the thoughts, feelings, and emotions of other people on this planet and is projecting his lack of empathy on the world.

But my answer to this is generally the same as it is to free will arguments: we can't know and from our perspective it does not matter.

The way I see us eventually running this kind of simulation is not some cartoonish way like video games but the way most practical simulations are run, you program in some laws, enter in some inputs/parameters, hit go and observe/collect data.

In this case it's just much more complex. The laws of the simulations are more or less the laws of the universe (they don't necessarily need to be the exact same as the laws of the universe, they could be an abstraction to simplify and/or save computational resources) obviously we are not there yet but I don't see any reason that our computational ability would just hit a wall that we'd never get passed.

The parameters could be slightly changing some of the physics compared our reality (or the simulators reality) and seeing how it effects things. On a smaller scale maybe changing some event in history and running the simulation from that point on, what would it change? On a larger scale what if we ran things from the big bang with more or less of certain elements/particles, would intelligent life form more or less often?

On June 10 2016 16:22 Daut wrote: Apparently when you are a genius billionaire you don't have to adhere to math or logic. Also think his certainty shows a level of psychopathy: he is trivializing the thoughts, feelings, and emotions of other people on this planet and is projecting his lack of empathy on the world. But my answer to this is generally the same as it is to free will arguments: we can't know and from our perspective it does not matter.

won't our human thoughts, feelings, and emotions be trivilialized one day?

I can't think of any recent relevant examples of advances in psychology or neuroscience atm but we've come pretty far haven't we? Where will our understanding be in 100 or 1000 years if that rate of advancement continues?

I don't particularly care about elon musk, but this Nick Bostrom is quite interesting.

I'd probably feel like I was living in a video game too if I was a billionaire.

On June 10 2016 17:57 ReSpOnSe wrote: I'd probably feel like I was living in a video game too if I was a billionaire.

lol +1

Try to be in the moment for once, and be aware of all your faculties. It does feel so much like a game when you really remove everything else distracting you. It really feels weird and at times growing up I felt uncomfortable thinking about it and just choose to distract myself lol
Life feels like one big movie because everybody else dies off to some weird event yet you feel so safe almost always

On June 10 2016 17:57 ReSpOnSe wrote: I'd probably feel like I was living in a video game too if I was a billionaire.

Haha, bink

So how makes this sim? Some version of humanity that didn't kill itself off? Unlikely. Would have to be some other entities with knowledge of the entire universe which means they would have to observe space beyond the limits of our observable universe, which would take a lot of time and through evolution similar to ours it is unlikely they get there before the expansion of space itself causes heat death etc. So we again arrive to super deities and godlike beings i.e. intelligent design

This premise is similar to Frank Herbert's Destination Void and the next 3 books in the Pandora series. With the godship and multiple rewrites of history

The sim would have to map more than neurons in the brain to create consciousness. Like in theories of quantum entanglement teleportation it would have to map down to the subatomic level (plank lengths even) and get every quantum spin correct etc. Just an unfathomable amount of data to do this for the entire universe (of which we can only observe a part of the whole, maybe an infinitely small fraction, that bit from which light has travelled to our position since the big bang). Think these guys are over estimating computers especially as we know them.

this is one of the few things he says that i think is not that grounded

the first thing i thought is that even though there should be many simulations, intelligent life might be so stupefyingly rare that nobody ever makes it that far. we don't know.

the second thing i thought is that well, going from "crysis looks good" to simulating universes is actually not that obvious. and is it supposed to be autonomous or is someone interfaced with it, like maybe my life was someone playing a game on his google glass for 5 minutes in the next level up simulation and the rest of you are NPCs. leaves the door open for solipsism.

On June 10 2016 16:22 Daut wrote: Apparently when you are a genius billionaire you don't have to adhere to math or logic. Also think his certainty shows a level of psychopathy: he is trivializing the thoughts, feelings, and emotions of other people on this planet and is projecting his lack of empathy on the world. But my answer to this is generally the same as it is to free will arguments: we can't know and from our perspective it does not matter.

Also its easy to believe its all a simulation arguing it like a game type of thing from the perspective of a a billionare wizard having a great time, lets see how a starving family in africa feel their life is a simulated game.... worst game ever... probably EA published it.

lol true. But what if my simulation is independent from yours and those starving people in africa are just holograms to keep me from being depressed about my own existence?