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What's amazing to me is that this question of a simulated reality would not have even been possible to comprehend 150 years ago. Without our understanding of c

What's amazing to me is that this question of a simulated reality would not have even been possible to comprehend 150 years ago. Without our understanding of computers, networks, and virtual reality, a simulated universe theory would be very difficult to come about (not sure if someone actually did theorize this back then, but even if they did, the vast majority would have no idea what they were talking about). That being said, what possibilities are we neglecting now due to our limited knowledge? In 200 years, it may be obvious we're living in a totally different type of universe. In my opinion, we really won't have good idea of what kind of universe we're living in for hundreds, if not thousands of years. There will be many cycles of scientific consensus overthrown in the coming centuries as we discover new layers of reality and technology.

charles-salvia 10y ago
A Turing-machine based simulated reality certainly would have been incomprehensible, but pre-20th century philosophers have thought about the idea of the world not being "real" in some sense. I would even conjecture that the universal experience of dreaming, and the fact that we often can't tell when we're dreaming, would have probably inspired this line of thought going back possibly even pre-homo sapiens. Of course, Plato's cave is the most famous writing about the idea of a "simulated" reality from antiquity, in the sense that it discusses the idea that prisoners who spent their entire lives in a cave would assume that the cave they see is the only reality.
- tryrall 10y ago
  Indeed, what I find much more fascinating is that these ideas are not new at all, but each generation frames it in a new technological light. It's like how the brain used to be an ocean, then it was a windmill, then it was a steam engine, then it was a computer, and now it's a GPU cloud. I wonder what will come first: humans finally understanding what a brain is, or making one.
- sixQuarks 10y ago
  True, the dream world makes sense as an analogy. They just wouldn't know how it was technically possible to create a "virtual dream" world.
- CuriouslyC 10y ago
  The Hindu cosmology with its concept of Brahman has Plato lapped.
deleted 10y ago
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iainmerrick 10y ago
What's amazing to me is that this question of a simulated reality would not have even been possible to comprehend 150 years ago. I don't think you're giving enough credit to thinkers of the past. They didn't have the technology that lets us play with some of these ideas more directly, but they were still very capable of thinking through the philosophical ramifications. Descartes' Meditations comes to mind: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-epistemology/#3.2 https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-epistemology/#3...
- diminish 10y ago
  I remember in one Plato dialogue a reference to the dream in a dream in a .. concept. I m sure it goes back to earlier religious thoughts too especially Asian ones.
psyc 10y ago
Descartes pretty much got it.
RangerScience 10y ago
Given my bad knowledge of history, it seems - Back in Tesla's day - which was also Einstein's, and so many others - the dominate paradigm was of waves and resonance, and we got physics made of waves and resonances. Nowadays, it seems like the dominate paradigm is one of information and computation, and so we get lots of physics - and weird, have-baked speculations - considering the world from those perspectives. No clue what the next paradigm will be, but if I had to bet, I'd bet one whatever comes out of quantum computing (probabilities and ???? ?).
ibgib 10y ago
> What's amazing to me is that this question of a simulated reality would not have even been possible to comprehend 150 years ago. I love this, but I would rather phrase it that it would have been much more expensive to communicate the ideas as efficiently back in the day. This both captures the essence of what you're saying (which is something I totally agree with and was just thinking of yesterday when thinking of the idiom "shave the yak"), as well as speaks to some of the critics of your statement that say you're not giving enough props to philosophers of old. Btw, I don't want to be pushy or start a flame war, but actually reading the Bible and thinking in exactly this mindset of "what if I were a hyperdimensional population planting seeds for training 'simulacra'/AI characters" is incredible. I was never religious before a couple years ago, and let me tell you, the logic in the actual Bible (not the dogmatic interpretations still memetically floating around today) is awesome. I'll give one example, and again I ask forbearance and patience of anyone who get their hackles raised: God's name. When he's speaking to Moses, Moses says "Who should I tell them is giving me this message to lead them out of Egypt?" God replies "I am who I am" (which is also a multi-layered phrase "I am what I am", and "I will be who/what I will be"). Yahweh ("LORD") is actually "I am". So this is the fundamental, recursively self-defining "Name" of God. When reading it, it just seems weird and out of place. But when reading it in context of today's understandings of the magnitude of the size of the "Universe" (vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big) combined with the prospects of computation and "What if I were to program a universe that is designed to itself program universes?" (and many other reasons), I've done a 180. The hard part is 1) Getting over existing, dogmatic interpretations and all of the negative connotations associated with them. and 2) Actually believing it. The interesting thing is, the actual Bible repeatedly talks about the practitioners of the religions not understanding and not getting it. It's a theme both in the Old and New Testaments (It's why the Jews crucified Jesus, after all).

charles-salvia 10y ago

A Turing-machine based simulated reality certainly would have been incomprehensible, but pre-20th century philosophers have thought about the idea of the world not being "real" in some sense. I would even conjecture that the universal experience of dreaming, and the fact that we often can't tell when we're dreaming, would have probably inspired this line of thought going back possibly even pre-homo sapiens. Of course, Plato's cave is the most famous writing about the idea of a "simulated" reality from antiquity, in the sense that it discusses the idea that prisoners who spent their entire lives in a cave would assume that the cave they see is the only reality.

tryrall 10y ago
Indeed, what I find much more fascinating is that these ideas are not new at all, but each generation frames it in a new technological light. It's like how the brain used to be an ocean, then it was a windmill, then it was a steam engine, then it was a computer, and now it's a GPU cloud. I wonder what will come first: humans finally understanding what a brain is, or making one.
sixQuarks 10y ago
True, the dream world makes sense as an analogy. They just wouldn't know how it was technically possible to create a "virtual dream" world.
CuriouslyC 10y ago
The Hindu cosmology with its concept of Brahman has Plato lapped.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

iainmerrick 10y ago

What's amazing to me is that this question of a simulated reality would not have even been possible to comprehend 150 years ago. I don't think you're giving enough credit to thinkers of the past. They didn't have the technology that lets us play with some of these ideas more directly, but they were still very capable of thinking through the philosophical ramifications. Descartes' Meditations comes to mind: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-epistemology/#3.2 https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-epistemology/#3...

diminish 10y ago
I remember in one Plato dialogue a reference to the dream in a dream in a .. concept. I m sure it goes back to earlier religious thoughts too especially Asian ones.

psyc 10y ago

Descartes pretty much got it.

RangerScience 10y ago

Given my bad knowledge of history, it seems - Back in Tesla's day - which was also Einstein's, and so many others - the dominate paradigm was of waves and resonance, and we got physics made of waves and resonances. Nowadays, it seems like the dominate paradigm is one of information and computation, and so we get lots of physics - and weird, have-baked speculations - considering the world from those perspectives. No clue what the next paradigm will be, but if I had to bet, I'd bet one whatever comes out of quantum computing (probabilities and ???? ?).

ibgib 10y ago

> What's amazing to me is that this question of a simulated reality would not have even been possible to comprehend 150 years ago. I love this, but I would rather phrase it that it would have been much more expensive to communicate the ideas as efficiently back in the day. This both captures the essence of what you're saying (which is something I totally agree with and was just thinking of yesterday when thinking of the idiom "shave the yak"), as well as speaks to some of the critics of your statement that say you're not giving enough props to philosophers of old. Btw, I don't want to be pushy or start a flame war, but actually reading the Bible and thinking in exactly this mindset of "what if I were a hyperdimensional population planting seeds for training 'simulacra'/AI characters" is incredible. I was never religious before a couple years ago, and let me tell you, the logic in the actual Bible (not the dogmatic interpretations still memetically floating around today) is awesome. I'll give one example, and again I ask forbearance and patience of anyone who get their hackles raised: God's name. When he's speaking to Moses, Moses says "Who should I tell them is giving me this message to lead them out of Egypt?" God replies "I am who I am" (which is also a multi-layered phrase "I am what I am", and "I will be who/what I will be"). Yahweh ("LORD") is actually "I am". So this is the fundamental, recursively self-defining "Name" of God. When reading it, it just seems weird and out of place. But when reading it in context of today's understandings of the magnitude of the size of the "Universe" (vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big) combined with the prospects of computation and "What if I were to program a universe that is designed to itself program universes?" (and many other reasons), I've done a 180. The hard part is 1) Getting over existing, dogmatic interpretations and all of the negative connotations associated with them. and 2) Actually believing it. The interesting thing is, the actual Bible repeatedly talks about the practitioners of the religions not understanding and not getting it. It's a theme both in the Old and New Testaments (It's why the Jews crucified Jesus, after all).