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I am not sure what to make of the whole universe-is-a-simulation argument. The problem is that, this is as far as I know, not an hypothesis we could ever hope to prove. Not any more than we can proof that a diety exists outside of this world.

I highly doubt that there is a higher creature, whether that would be a God of some kind, or a whole civilization outside of our universe that somehow simulates us.

But let's for entertainment suppose that we are in fact a simulation. Would that not immediatly raise the question "why"? If we are a simulation I would really like to know the reason for being simulated. What do they hope to reach with simulating a life like ours?

I fear we could never find a satisfactory answer to these questions. I also agree with the statement that this brings us back to a more mythological explanation of the universe and life around us. It'd make more sense to try and explain our universe without that hypothesis to me.

Another argument that I'd like to raise against the universe-simulation hypothesis is the following. Humans like to see the world around them in terms of the technology that, at that moment, is considered modern and which they like. For example, Freud compared the human brain to the steam engine, which at that point was modern technology. Today, we compare the brain to a computer, and we even go as far as to consider the whole universe might be similated in one. Maybe just because that is what we consider 'modern' at the moment?

In 1000 years from now, humans might think it's silly to think of the brain as a computer and rather think of it in terms of technology X, and the universe is technology Y.

6 comments

> But let's for entertainment suppose that we are in fact a simulation. Would that not immediatly raise the question "why"? If we are a simulation I would really like to know the reason for being simulated. What do they hope to reach with simulating a life like ours?

The actual simulation argument already covers this. It's very accessible [1].

Consider whether, if we could, we would run simulations to test population growth dynamics of early hunter gatherers, or of medieval England suffering from the black death.

> Today, we compare the brain to a computer, and we even go as far as to consider the whole universe might be similated in one.

Except a computer isn't a technology, it's a mathematical construct. As such, it's fully general and not replaceable in the sense you describe.

[1] http://www.simulation-argument.com/simulation.html

Fair point about the computer being a mathematical construct. But is it the ideal one? (To be honest, I do think that there is a high chance we can model the brain like this).

Thank you for the link!

They would hope to reach the exact same answers that we do when we simulate things inside our own computers. To understand our own reality better.

Imagine for a second you are that "external" (to us) God or civilization. You simulate this whole other universe (ours) to find out if it's possible that your own reality is a simulation.

That's mighty egotistical of you, assuming that the simulation exists to simulate us. We might just be a byproduct that pops out of the laws of physics.

I think it's interesting to speculate what the simulation argument means for religion. The existence of a simulation creator doesn't actually disprove the existence of an ultimate god, after all the beings running the simulation might have a divine creator, so it just pushes the question up a level. But it does pose a problem for imminent religions that believe that god intervenes in the world to cause miracles. How do you know that any given miracle was caused by the ultimate god and not the simulation sysadmins editing the simulation? The whole question of miracles and divine providence becomes deeply problematic.

> I think it's interesting to speculate what the simulation argument means for religion.

Not much; from the perspective of anyone in our universe, someone running the simulation is a god, and could quite reasonably have many of the specific attributes of gods envisioned by particular religions (including running "after-dinner" with different attributes from the universe someone to which intelligences from the universe someone are transferred after death.)

OTOH, the situation the ultimate "ground" physical universe may or may not be the creation of a dod, who may or may not have the attributes attributed to God by existing religions.

More to the point, the existence of the argument doesn't do anything to religion because religion can simply dismiss the argument; were it a testable hypotheses, it might be more challenging to deny (but then, religions deny empirical results all the time, too.)

> How do you know that any given miracle was caused by the ultimate god and not the simulation sysadmins editing the simulation?

Attribution of alleged miracles is not a new problem for religions, or one that they fail to acknowledge; after all, many don't hold one God out as the sole supernatural entity, and they often believe that one or more of the others are decievers.

More problematic than it already is. But should we perhaps see these sysadmins as 'divine sysadmins'. In essence, they could fulfill the job that our God today does (not do).

But here we once again hit the problem that it would be incredibly hard to prove, if not impossible. So I don't think religion has something immediate to fear. Maybe some people will start taking it 'on faith' that there are divine sysadmins interfering with our lives, whilst others take it on faith that there is a God interfering with our lives.

Since religion seems to not be constrained by 'logic' as much, they could probably find a way around it.

Going with the idea of a God one level higher does raise some other problems in my opinion. First of all, if there is a God one level up, then that means that we have no idea what that God would be like, invalidating all religions of today. Or, one would argue, that the ones creating our simulation have given us the word of _their_ God. Which would mean that either there is one true God, given to us by the supreme programmers. Thus the other Gods we have are wrong and are an invention from within our simulation, but it's impossible to find out which one the correct one is (or was, maybe it was Zeus and our simulation denied that). Alternatively, maybe they have many Gods and they added all their Gods to our simulation and instead of accepting all of them, we refused to do that...

I don't think a convincing argument can be given for any of the scenarios.

Though, it's something interesting to think about!

Who is to say that God and the sim operators aren't one and the same?

The sim operators would be gods. It is gods all the way up, but not the sort of gods that most religions imagine.

Perhaps- but most Christian sects consider God to be 'incomprehensible" or something similar- so it would not surprise them if God was different from what they imagined.

I don't think it is a stretch to say that all Christian sects have some definite ideas of what God is like. For some, the 'God is incomprehensible' claim is their motte in a motte-and-bailey fallacy, to which they temporarily retreat when faced with questions like "if God is omniscient, omnipotent and loving, why was there smallpox?"

Sure, but within those 'definite ideas' there is usually a wide path for imagination to feel in details. See my reply to another comment for an example.

If you want to have a more personal theological discussion, including a possible answer or two to the question about disease you pose above, feel free to reach out to me, my contact info can be found via my profile. :)

Religious believers believe certain things about god and the human-divine relationship. Anything that isn't consistent with those beliefs simply isn't god, from their perspective.

I think you are painting with too broad a brush.

But even within that framework, there is room to have things that one 'imagines' about God, that one doesn't necessarily 'believe' as a part of ones core beliefs about God. Certainly various religious sects have core beliefs about the human-divine relationship- however, within most belief systems, there remains a great deal of speculation and room for 'imagination'. For example, within the LDS(Mormon) sect, a core belief is that this life is a testing grounds- and a place to learn. That would fit very well within the context of this life being a simulation, of sorts.

But in what way would it be like the sort of simulation being discussed here?

> Not any more than we can proof that a diety exists outside of this world.

Why can't this be proven? Make no mistake, I'm not well versed on arguments for God, though it has been attempted in the past to prove with logic that a God or God-like being must exist. Are you saying that such arguments are always fallacious? Or only the ones you've seen?

> > Not any more than we can proof that a diety exists outside of this world.

> Why can't this be proven?

How would it be?

Aquinas' cosmological argument, or the ontological argument have been attempts to do so. Some such as Edward Feser still uphold that the cosmological argument is valid (I'm not well versed enough to say either way myself).

I'm unclear as to whether you are dismissing the very idea of whether God's existence can be proven, or whether you are rejecting arguments made hitherto on a case-by-case basis.

I'm not familiar with his argument - some quick googling boils it down to this;

> 1. The cosmos or universe exists.

> 2. The existence of the cosmos has a cause.

> 3. That cause is God.

And that seems more like playing a "pin a word on a concept" than proving the existence of a deity.

Anyway, I'm positing that if God exists, it is by very nature outside space and time, and not really within the realm of provability.

Sure enough there have been arguments made for God (and against God) by philosophers, but that does not make any of these testable nor sufficient proof as we would understand it in science.

I didn't mean to say that the proof could be used in science, but neither can the proofs of pure mathematical theorems, either, such as the ones involving infinity. You don't have to test something for it to exist logically.

>Would that not immediatly raise the question "why"? If we are a simulation I would really like to know the reason for being simulated. What do they hope to reach with simulating a life like ours?

It's the holy grail of the scientific method. Anything becomes testable and observable, the "why" seems obvious.

But what precisely are they testing? Which hypothesis of theirs? It does of course seem obvious that thay simulate it to test _something_.

To me, that does not really satisfy the "Why" question, though to a certain degree it does answer it, albeit without being specific.

It's akin to asking someone "Why do you need a particle collider?" -> "To test something". I assume you'd like to know what they are testing :-)