Simulation Theory – MY VOICE. MY THOUGHTS. MY BLOG.

In my last post I touched on a view, one which has gained much traction in recent years, that we could be living in a simulated reality i.e. a sceptical epistemological view. Epistemology is a major branch of philosophy that deals with the theory of knowledge, especially with regard to its methods, validity, and scope, and the distinction between justified belief and opinion (Oxford Languages, google.com).

The essential point being that subscribers to Simulation Theory (or rather, the hypothesis thereof – abbreviated to SRH) believe that the observable universe, from what you are seeing in front of you right now, to the furthest investigated objects billions of light years from our planet, have been engineered by an unspecified superintelligence, using an unfathomably powerful computer. It should be obvious why this is only a hypothesis, and begets various questions, such as –

What sort of computer is this?
Where is the CPU located?
What are the bits and bytes being computed?
And, most critically for me, what is the temporal and spatial relationship between the Creator (read, Superintelligence) and us, the created?

The basis of the SR view is a logical argument, one which is firmly anthropocentric in its fundaments. It goes like this: at current rates of technological advancement the execution of computer programs which aim to simulate some part of our lived and experienced reality (think The Sims franchise, Grand Theft Auto etc) will become indistinguishable from our ACTUAL reality. Conceivably, entities living within these simulations, humans included, will become sophisticated enough to develop consciousness and self-awareness. These entities will not know that they are in a simulation unless we choose to inform them, ergo we ourselves are most likely living in a simulation generated by superintelligent beings (relatively speaking) one rung higher in the hierarchy of realities. Because such simulations may be recursive, there could be an infinite number of hierarchies following some kind of exponential or geometric function. (see links at the end for further reading).

The SRH rests on the premise that computer simulations will become more and more realistic, will develop the ability to simulate matter at an incredibly high fidelity (think quantum level particle physics and phenomena like entanglement) and that human level consciousness will itself be simulated. I don’t believe in the argument/hypothesis for reasons that I will come to, but I can see the allure of it. From a logical perspective, its main strength is the observation that we humans are developing increasingly lifelike simulations of the world we observe, empirically speaking. In an age where conventional and traditional religious beliefs are in decline in most parts of the world it also gives adherents a sense of place and purpose. Whilst we might not live in Base Reality, as Elon Musk and others think incredibly unlikely, we are just as likely to be able to one day figure out who the simulators are and ‘break out of the Matrix.’

To my mind the SRH compliments the human ego, much as the Victorian view of the world did in the 19th century, whereby the belief that mankind was ordained by God to manipulate nature to his advantage, was ascendant. This is expressed in an emotive scene in the film The Heart of the Sea where the captain of a 19th century whaling ship, The Essex, proclaims:

“We are supreme creatures made in God’s own likeness. Earthly kings, whose business it is to circumnavigate the planet bestowed to us. To bend nature to our will.”
BENJAMIN WALKER as Captain George Pollard

I argue that conflating the exponential growth in human knowledge and understanding of our universe and the basic laws which govern it DOES NOT inevitably translate into the ability to fully and comprehensively re-create the lived experience of one human being, let alone the entire collective species. Let me break that down:

As I understand it the heart of a classical computer is the CPU or Central Processing Unit. It contains a semi-conductor chip imprinted with millions of logic gates which can be switched on and off connected by channels along which electrons whizz at incredible speeds (close to or at a significant fraction of the speed of light). The digital output of the chip is then translated via a user interface, through our speakers or our screens, using light or sound as an output. Based on the nature of the output the user can then interact accordingly using various devices (keyboard, mouse, touchpad, joystick etc) creating a responsive system capable of manipulation within certain limits as determined by the hardware.

My question to the SR believers is this: ‘How do you manipulate the smallest levels of our observed reality – the subatomic particles and forces like bosons and gluons, quarks and antiquarks? What is the architecture of the CPU which can do this?

For this reason I will stick with the empirical universe, the one that is measurable. After all it yields the simplest and, to me, the most logical explanation, one that has compelling mathematical and theoretical rigour. I refer of course to the theory of the Big Bang whereby our universe emerged from a singularity, a infinitely tiny, infinitely dense, region of spacetime which detonated some 14+ billion years ago. Cosmologists have pushed the mathematics of of this creative event back to within a miniscule fraction of time since the Big Bang singularity. Something of the order of the Planck constant (10⁻⁴³ s).

Without further evidence of an external superintelligence manipulating our observed reality we must conclude that we are living in a universe that came into being at a finite time in the past. The computer (or going a step further, the CPU) that the SR believers hypothesize IS nothing more or less than the universe itself and the bits and bytes with which it computes are the fundamental particles and forces as described by the Standard Model of particle physics.

Thus, to summarise, Simulated Reality is an interesting philosophical conjecture and metaphysical question but not one that can be assessed scientifically. It is both stimulating and exciting to take such hypotheses seriously but at the same time to see them for what they are – hypotheses. It seems to me from the buzz around the whole idea of SR in recent decades that it has also been conflated with worries over the existential threats perceived to emanate from advanced AI. Hence the self-proclaimed Technoking of Tesla, Elon Musk, has allegedly been spending millions on contingencies should a post-AI apocalypse come to pass.

Anyway, I digress. Serious science will be dealing with the search for a unifying theory of physics whilst serious philosophy won’t. But the latter could provide fertile ground for the next generation of cosmologists, physicists and mathematicians to develop robust models and experiments to further our scientific knowledge and understanding of the universe and our place in it.

The YouTube presentation by Sabine Hossenfelder below which I watched only AFTER writing up this post, gives an excellent and more detailed critique of SRH, reiterating my core argument and expanding on it an eloquent and accessible way. It’s definitely worth watching! Links to further reading below.

In my next post I will return to the philosophical realm with a riff on the anthropic principle and some of the many possibilities which it throws up regarding the nature of us and the universe we inhabit, both now, and FOREVER 😎

Links:

Tag: Simulation Theory

The Allure of the Simulation Hypothesis