A simulation from nothing?

[Cockadoodledoo]

Did future human beings, from within the simulation, find a way to bring the simulation into existence?
Or do the creators of the simulation have to be external to the simulation?

 

[George-ananda]

Did future beings, from within the simulation, find a way to bring the simulation into existence?

I think ultimately there is only One simulator; God/Brahman.

Or do the creators of the simulation have to be external to the simulation?

I am thinking 'external' as in the basis, the foundation, upon which all this occurs. The basis is what I call real and the simulation is the play/drama of the real.

 

[Cockadoodledoo]

In the past, science seemed to promote an atheistic world view, but now seem to be promoting a simulation world view. Is this the progress of science? Or is there something else going on?

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

In the past, science seemed to promote an atheistic world view, but now seem to be promoting a simulation world view. Is this the progress of science? Or is there something else going on?

uhhh...can you specify who is 'promoting a simulation worldview?' And what exactly this worldview is?

And how science overall, across all fields, would be doing this?

 

[Cockadoodledoo]

uhhh...can you specify who is 'promoting a simulation worldview?' And what exactly this worldview is?

And how science overall, across all fields, would be doing this?

I spent the weekend watching YouTube videos on the simulation hypothesis/argument where various scientists (computer/physics) talked about how the universe could be a simulation which is run in the original reality.

If there are 2000 simulations and 1 original reality, then there is a 2000 to 1 chance we're in the original reality!

Max Tegmark was amongst the scientists. I don't remember the other names. There was one professor who discovered a specific type of error correcting computer code in the equations of string theory, that was invented by a computer scientist in the 1950's.

Professor Nick Bostrom has promoted his 'simulation argument'.

I viewed how physicists were now under the impression that the universe is pixelated. Space, Time, Matter is apparently pixelated, which could be evidence of a simulated reality.

Even Professor Richard Dawkins said he conceded that the universe could be run on a teenager's computer in his father's garage!

 

[Nakosis]

Did future human beings, from within the simulation, find a way to bring the simulation into existence?
Or do the creators of the simulation have to be external to the simulation?

A simulation of what? Existence?

That would presume there was a real existence to be had. So I think by implication, this would have to be external to what we are experiencing.

 

[McBell]

I spent the weekend watching YouTube videos on the simulation hypothesis/argument where various scientists (computer/physics) talked about how the universe could be a simulation which is run in the original reality.

If there are 2000 simulations and 1 original reality, then there is a 2000 to 1 chance we're in the original reality!

Max Tegmark was amongst the scientists. I don't remember the other names. There was one professor who discovered a specific type of error correcting computer code in the equations of string theory, that was invented by a computer scientist in the 1950's.

Professor Nick Bostrom has promoted his 'simulation argument'.

I viewed how physicists were now under the impression that the universe is pixelated. Space, Time, Matter is apparently pixelated, which could be evidence of a simulated reality.

Even Professor Richard Dawkins said he conceded that the universe could be run on a teenager's computer in his father's garage!

 

[Cockadoodledoo]

A simulation of what? Existence?

That would presume there was a real existence to be had. So I think by implication, this would have to be external to what we are experiencing.

A simulation of what? Existence?

That would presume there was a real existence to be had. So I think by implication, this would have to be external to what we are experiencing.

I suppose what I'm saying is.......
Could the universe be designed by scientists within the universe?
There would have to be a kind of feedback loop created....time travel.
Then the cosmological constants could be twiddled with,
And set just right for life,
Resulting in the creation of the universe and life,
Including the very same scientists.

Question........why, possibly, could scientists create accurate simulations of this universe, but be unable to design this universe? What 'law' forbids them to do this? Why does the supposed designer have to be external to this universe?

 

[Nakosis]

I suppose what I'm saying is.......
Could the universe be designed by scientists within the universe?
There would have to be a kind of feedback loop created....time travel.
Then the cosmological constants could be twiddled with,
And set just right for life,
Resulting in the creation of the universe and life,
Including the very same scientists.

Question........why, possibly, could scientists create accurate simulations of this universe, but be unable to design this universe? What 'law' forbids them to do this?

You can imagine whatever scenario you want. It only becomes a problem when you want to prove the truth of that scenario.

Personally, I think time travel will remain science fiction. There's only now and it's the same now everywhere in the universe.

Though I suppose it wouldn't have to be real time travel, just simulated time travel.

 

[Cockadoodledoo]

You can imagine whatever scenario you want. It only becomes a problem when you want to prove the truth of that scenario.

Personally, I think time travel will remain science fiction. There's only now and it's the same now everywhere in the universe.

Though I suppose it wouldn't have to be real time travel, just simulated time travel.

Could the scientists not design into the universe, time, so that it can be travelled both forwards and backwards? I'm assuming everything about the universe is designed, just like in their simulations.

 

[Cockadoodledoo]

Apparently the double slit experiment and quantum entanglement may suggest this reality is a simulation, as the results seem to violate materialism.

But if this 'simulation' is anything like the original reality, I would like to know could the original programmers not 'program' their own base-reality, or will either a God or natural explanation for their existence be required?

 

[Guy Threepwood]

In the past, science seemed to promote an atheistic world view, but now seem to be promoting a simulation world view. Is this the progress of science? Or is there something else going on?

Absolutely agree, 20 years ago, any form of ID was verboten within the atheist belief system, now more and more atheists are embracing the idea, as long as it's not called 'God' of course!

Andre Linde, principle in modern inflationary theory, considers it 'feasible' that we could one day create our own universe, and that this is how ours may have been created.


It's pretty much come down to either ID, or some form of infinite probability machine (multiverse) which would be required to create the universe without ID..

The problem with the latter, is that it would also be bound to create the very intelligent designer it's meant to replace! oops..
So all roads lead to God it seems (sorry 'simulation programmer')

 

[Sanzbir]

In the past, science seemed to promote an atheistic world view, but now seem to be promoting a simulation world view. Is this the progress of science? Or is there something else going on?

The universe cannot be a simulation.

Here's the reasoning:

Data must be stored in a physical amount of space. The amount of space needed gets smaller and smaller each year, but there is still a finite amount of space needed to store data about things.

There's a ton of stuff in the universe. To store data about every atom in the universe you'd need to store every piece of data on every atom into a database.

Because of size limitations this means you need more than one atom to simulate one atom in a simulated universe.

In other words this world cannot be a simulation of another world, inside that world, because a computer that could simulate a universe must always be, mass wise, bigger than that universe.

Any simulated universe must be much, much, much smaller than the universe that spawned it, due to data limitations, and to simulate a universe our size you'd need a computer much larger than, well, the entirety of our universe, which would collapse into a black hole if you could even get enough materials to build it.

 

[osgart]

maybe the universe is computer like, and builds models, and replicates functions. that implies their is an intelligent force used to make the universe.

mayhaps we live in an awry program of an alternate existence. if our universe is finite, what lies outside of the big bang drive.

who's playing around with space and time too.

the simulation idea implies that we are part of a graphics matrix, projected into the data driven reality. funny we are all searching for ultimate reality, and it's all data on a supercomputer hard drive. that's a God stretch of the imagination.

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

I spent the weekend watching YouTube videos on the simulation hypothesis/argument where various scientists (computer/physics) talked about how the universe could be a simulation which is run in the original reality.

If there are 2000 simulations and 1 original reality, then there is a 2000 to 1 chance we're in the original reality!

Max Tegmark was amongst the scientists. I don't remember the other names. There was one professor who discovered a specific type of error correcting computer code in the equations of string theory, that was invented by a computer scientist in the 1950's.

Professor Nick Bostrom has promoted his 'simulation argument'.

I viewed how physicists were now under the impression that the universe is pixelated. Space, Time, Matter is apparently pixelated, which could be evidence of a simulated reality.

Even Professor Richard Dawkins said he conceded that the universe could be run on a teenager's computer in his father's garage!

thanks.

Yes, physicists have a lot of fun with ideas they can't yet test to eliminate from consideration, perhaps untestable even in theory...multiverses, infinity, brain-in-vat/computer simulation, string theory, the existence of deities with volition, and until recently, the Higgs boson...

Just because some physicists are exploring the possibilities doesn't mean that all the scientists in the world, or even a large fraction of them, embrace the computer simulation idea...or the multiverse, or singularities and event horizons, and the like.

Sure, it's possible...it also may be inherently untestable. If you have a model that doesn't make any testable predictions, do you have a theory? Or even a hypothesis? Or is it just a kind of mental titillation so those scientists can make names for themselves by publishing interesting but unresolvable ideas?

Personally, I'm going with the latter option...

 

[Cockadoodledoo]

The universe cannot be a simulation.

Here's the reasoning:

Data must be stored in a physical amount of space. The amount of space needed gets smaller and smaller each year, but there is still a finite amount of space needed to store data about things.

There's a ton of stuff in the universe. To store data about every atom in the universe you'd need to store every piece of data on every atom into a database.

Because of size limitations this means you need more than one atom to simulate one atom in a simulated universe.

In other words this world cannot be a simulation of another world, inside that world, because a computer that could simulate a universe must always be, mass wise, bigger than that universe.

Any simulated universe must be much, much, much smaller than the universe that spawned it, due to data limitations, and to simulate a universe our size you'd need a computer much larger than, well, the entirety of our universe, which would collapse into a black hole if you could even get enough materials to build it.

Suppose a star consists of 50 trillion atoms, and you want to simulate it on your supercomputer. Perhaps there is no need to simulate each and every atom....just an approximation which is detailed enough to fool the Hubble space telescope.

Same with planets and moons, comets and asteroids, etc. Even planet Earth could be simulated by running an approximation.....there would be no need to simulate every atom.....only the atoms that are observed by scientists.

Hence, the computer simulating the universe wouldn't need to be bigger that the Universe, just big enough to run the approximation.

 

[Sanzbir]

Suppose a star consists of 50 trillion atoms, and you want to simulate it on your supercomputer. Perhaps there is no need to simulate each and every atom....just an approximation which is detailed enough to fool the Hubble space telescope.

Same with planets and moons, comets and asteroids, etc. Even planet Earth could be simulated by running an approximation.....there would be no need to simulate every atom.....only the atoms that are observed by scientists.

Hence, the computer simulating the universe wouldn't need to be bigger that the Universe, just big enough to run the approximation.

Then it wouldn't be a very accurate simulation. If not every atom is accounted for, then there would be variables in the "real world" not present in the simulation and variables in the simulation not present in the real world. The two would diverge.

Still, with the observable atoms alone, you'd need a database bigger than a planet.

And why build something like that, why expend that much resources, if it's not going to show you anything useful about the real world, because it is necessarily missing certain variables??

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

well, scientists have been running incomplete and imperfect simulations ever since computers got big enough to be useful back in the 40s-50s. Sure, sometimes the resulting projections have been wrong, but some are often found later to be accurate enough to be useful...and that is all that is required of a simulation...

 

[DavidFirth]

First of all, only nothing comes from nothing.

There had to be a first something. That first something was the great I AM.

 

[Cockadoodledoo]

Then it wouldn't be a very accurate simulation. If not every atom is accounted for, then there would be variables in the "real world" not present in the simulation and variables in the simulation not present in the real world. The two would diverge.

Still, with the observable atoms alone, you'd need a database bigger than a planet.

And why build something like that, why expend that much resources, if it's not going to show you anything useful about the real world, because it is necessarily missing certain variables??

But how do you know for certain that this reality that we find ourselves in is not a simulation. It just needs to be detailed enough to fool the human senses!