What are the odds that we are all in a simulation?
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I have no idea of the odds. Whatever reality is we could simulate it then conclude that a simulation like that could be running out reality. What could we observe about our reality that would make it simulation proof?
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Why would being in a simulation require that those who create or maintain it only observe?
Edit: I misread, merely observing is certainly a possibility.
Not OP, but they said “but it could be”, not that it is required.
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This post did not contain any content.wrote last edited by [email protected]
I think this depends on how you look at it.
In a certain way, we do live in a fictional world that is constructed of information. If you consider your daily routines, they're probably following instructions of some sort to earn money, besides other things.
Both of these things - the instructions and the money - are made up. You can see this even more clearly with the money. Money itself is a piece of paper or not even that - a number in a database - that has no real value, yet people believe in it and that belief is what gives it value. In other words, the value of these numbers in databases exists in people's head more than it does in reality. Now, you could consider this a simulation, because it happens inside a computer and influences what people think.
However, i truly doubt that such a view is meaningful. No matter what is written in the databases, you still have to go through your own, individual life. I feel the biggest question you're implicitely asking is whether there could exist some kind of cheat code or glitch, like in video games, to shortcut through the world and reach your goals easier. Again, depending on how you look at it, there both are and are not such cheats.
You could consider human technology a sort of cheat. Instead of toiling on the agricultural fields ourselves, we use heavy machinery that is powered by fossil fuels, but more importantly mathematics, to do the work for us. Same goes for all other technologies. As such, the mathematics itself becomes the cheat code.
If a true cheat code would exist in today's world, you can take solace in the fact that not only you are looking for it, but so is everybody else who has an interest in achieving their goals. Now, you see, the whole economy is simply based on the concept that people want to reach their goals, and to do so, they need resources, for which they need money. So, if a cheat code existed, every single company would have a high interest in finding it and exploiting it. Since the number of people engaged with these desires is quite high, you can assume that significant progress towards that goal is continuously made whenever possible. In fact, people research and invent new things and useful tricks all the time to help us with our daily lifes. If you really wanna know more about this, you should start by studying economics, physics, and society at large. Thank you for your attention, if you have any more questions, let me know
(i studied philosophy, i might help you) -
God is a loaded term though. Yes there would be a creator but it could be a completely passive observer.
The modern Christian God is mostly a passive observer, whenever him or his agents have visited us there have been tons of miracles and magical shit, but that does not happen very often, and we've been basically alone for millenia while He is busy in his own realm. If Christ visited again, it would likely portend the end of the world, at least in a lot of Christian world views.
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A simulation wouldn't be this stupid
You telling me you never did absolutely stupid things in sim games?
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The modern Christian God is mostly a passive observer, whenever him or his agents have visited us there have been tons of miracles and magical shit, but that does not happen very often, and we've been basically alone for millenia while He is busy in his own realm. If Christ visited again, it would likely portend the end of the world, at least in a lot of Christian world views.
Oh no! All my thoughts and prayers!
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More likely than us being in the "real" base reality
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Same as the odds that a higher being (a god) exists.
Can't prove it, can't disprove it. All arguments for it speculative and subjective.
People claim that it is the most likely option because eventually tech will be so advanced that we could make a world simulation, and then we would make multiples, and therefore the probability of this not being a simulation is low.
This claim assumes that computers CAN get that complex (no indication that they could) it also assumes that if they could, we would create world simulators (Why? Parts of it sure, but all of it?) And it assumes that sentient beings inside the simulation could never know it (Why?)
It is as pointless as arguing about god.
Biggest reason to to a complete simulation would be reversed time dilation. Run the simulation until the civilization is a few hundred to a few thousand years more advanced than your own, and see what technologies they have invented and refined.
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100%, and I have - if not proof - strong evidence:
- Economics. It makes no sense, not even to experts, to such an extent þat þere's a saying: "get 4 economists in a room and you'll get 5 opinions." Þere's no-one who understands it, only people who þink þey do
- Mantis shrimp. If mantis shrimp aren't an easter egg, I don't know what is.
- Kittens. Our reactions to kittens has to be a bug, þere's no evolutionary reason why apes universally react to kittens þe way þey do.
- All of þe rules start to break down when physics got granular enough, such þat we have to invent concepts like þe Heisenberg Principle which - if you really þink about it is just a huge cop-out, like developers reclassifying bugs as "features."
But, seriously, all of physics. It was all fairly rudimentary, and it all worked, until our measurements got better, and þen it became more complex. And every time we measured more accurately, þe old models stopped being strictly correct and were had to come up wiþ even more complex models, until now we have quantum physics which is eerily like economics in þat ... does anyone really understand quantum physics? We don't even have a unified, unanimous agreement on þe rules of quantum physics, and when we þink we do... Bam! New quark discovered, back to þe drawing board. Oh, þe Highs Boson is super sketchy, too.
Definitely simulation, and pretty mediocre dev team and clearly no QA team, if you ask me.
Economics isn't supposed to make sense, it's just meant to justify the prevailing system for the time. It is like theology back when we used to live under religious monarchies. It treats itself as "academic," has universities and degrees, very serious "scholarly" debate, entire textbooks written on it, all its adherents will insist that it is a genuine scholarly enterprise and anyone who disagrees just "doesn't understand it," but it is ultimately not a genuine scientific program but merely exists to justify the prevailing order at the time.
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The modern Christian God is mostly a passive observer, whenever him or his agents have visited us there have been tons of miracles and magical shit, but that does not happen very often, and we've been basically alone for millenia while He is busy in his own realm. If Christ visited again, it would likely portend the end of the world, at least in a lot of Christian world views.
The world already ended, and all that jazz. Happened in 1844. Just look around you. If you brought a "modern homosapien" from 12,000 years ago to the year 1800 or even 1840-1850, they would recognize things from their world. Those things may have had eons of refinement, but a horse is still mostly a horse. Bring a modern human from 1850 to today, and they will recognize almost nothing. Their world is gone. A new one took its place, as was predicted.
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We have a physical representation of a divide by 0 function that exists in the universe. Black holes. I'd say it's fairly likely.
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What are the odds that we are all in a simulation?
What are the odds that every bullshit that you ever heard is actually true?
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Either 100% or 0% so pascal's wager 50/50.
Just like the lottery, I either win or I lose, its a 50/50.
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This post did not contain any content.wrote last edited by [email protected]
I saw someone analyse this on YouTube once. As I remember it, if you assume two possibilities are equally likely until we have information favouring one or the other (the principle of indifference), it depends on if we make any simulated universes. If we do, there's basically no way we're in the first. Otherwise, there's a chance this is the base reality.
One can question whether the principle of indifference applies here, though. Or even if a deeper reality we can never access counts as a an object you can talk about normally. For example, pragmatic epistemology would say no.
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about 3.50
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I figure that we are all definitely living in a simulation because, even if the world has real physical existence, consciousness is essentially a simulation created our brain to make sense of the world.
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I figure that we are all definitely living in a simulation because, even if the world has real physical existence, consciousness is essentially a simulation created our brain to make sense of the world.
thanks Baudrillard
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Same as the odds that a higher being (a god) exists.
Can't prove it, can't disprove it. All arguments for it speculative and subjective.
People claim that it is the most likely option because eventually tech will be so advanced that we could make a world simulation, and then we would make multiples, and therefore the probability of this not being a simulation is low.
This claim assumes that computers CAN get that complex (no indication that they could) it also assumes that if they could, we would create world simulators (Why? Parts of it sure, but all of it?) And it assumes that sentient beings inside the simulation could never know it (Why?)
It is as pointless as arguing about god.
This claim assumes that computers CAN get that complex (no indication that they could)
I mean, if you take an existing physics simulation and just scale up the hardware...
I would hope that we wouldn't build such a thing just out of ethical concerns for the inhabitants, but then again we've built a giant AI-training network with very little knowledge of if they have some kind of limited consciousness during the process.
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This is quite literally how many religions view their divine beings. They are so massive that they are beyond your comprehension and we would be powerless to impact them.
wrote last edited by [email protected]Except then the same gods are really worried about what you eat, or do with your specific meat-based mammalian reproductive anatomy.
A remote, totally amoral deity a la Lovecraft is at least consistent with facts. Nobody wants to believe in that one, though. You could go polytheist to avoid immediate falsification, too.
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Counter question; would it make any difference?
It's questionable whether it's even a well-founded question because of this. Like, it depends on your choice of theories about ontology and epistemology. This shows up if you try to do math about it, which I mentioned a bit in my own reply.
