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Ha, remember when those articles [1] came out claiming Musk and some other billionaires were trying to hack the simulation. cough if that was real I'm happy to

Ha, remember when those articles [1] came out claiming Musk and some other billionaires were trying to hack the simulation. cough if that was real I'm happy to work as a janitor or more cough [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-billionaires-want-to-break-humans-out-of-a-computer-simulation-2016-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-billionaires-want-to-br...

SuoDuanDao 7y ago
This is straightforward third century gnosticism. Granted, the Matrix was inspired by that religion, but it's funny to see these old beliefs come back and be taken so literally.
- krapp 7y ago
  The funny thing is, even if the universe was a "simulation" of some sort, there's no reason to assume that simulation is literally code running as software inside a computer as we understand those terms - yet people who believe in simulation theory seem to assume exactly that. It's understandable that the God of the gaps would be replaced by belief in ghosts in the shell in the modern day, but it's also sadly mundane and reductive as philosophies go.
  - rendall 7y ago
    Agreed! Such a succinct way of putting it. That has been my problem with the simulation hypothesis too. It seems like such a failure of imagination. What if the beings who "run" us live in a universe that intersects with 143 spatial dimensions and 23 time dimensions, and their "computer" is actually a by-product of some other process, and they aren't even really aware of it or us, and are not even really sentient in a way that we would understand. Can it really be said to be a "simulation" at that point? How strange would it have to get for the word "simulation" to be meaningless? I have a feeling that whatever is going on is far more bizarre than anything we can possibly imagine.
    - ryanmercer 7y ago
      >and their "computer" is actually a by-product of some other process, and they aren't even really aware of it or us, Wouldn't it be hilarious if we were effectively a random number generator on some kid's toy?
      - rendall 7y ago
        Worthy of Douglas Adams!
    - JohnFen 7y ago
      > Can it really be said to be a "simulation" at that point? Nope. And even if our reality really is a "simulation" in the sense that we're just the result of a program running on a computer, that simulation is so comprehensive that I don't think it could be called a simulation at all. It's just a different layer of reality. If you perfectly simulate something, after all, you haven't simulated it at all -- you've created the real thing.
      - rendall 7y ago
        That's a good point, too.

SuoDuanDao 7y ago

This is straightforward third century gnosticism. Granted, the Matrix was inspired by that religion, but it's funny to see these old beliefs come back and be taken so literally.

krapp 7y ago
The funny thing is, even if the universe was a "simulation" of some sort, there's no reason to assume that simulation is literally code running as software inside a computer as we understand those terms - yet people who believe in simulation theory seem to assume exactly that. It's understandable that the God of the gaps would be replaced by belief in ghosts in the shell in the modern day, but it's also sadly mundane and reductive as philosophies go.
- rendall 7y ago
  Agreed! Such a succinct way of putting it. That has been my problem with the simulation hypothesis too. It seems like such a failure of imagination. What if the beings who "run" us live in a universe that intersects with 143 spatial dimensions and 23 time dimensions, and their "computer" is actually a by-product of some other process, and they aren't even really aware of it or us, and are not even really sentient in a way that we would understand. Can it really be said to be a "simulation" at that point? How strange would it have to get for the word "simulation" to be meaningless? I have a feeling that whatever is going on is far more bizarre than anything we can possibly imagine.
  - ryanmercer 7y ago
    >and their "computer" is actually a by-product of some other process, and they aren't even really aware of it or us, Wouldn't it be hilarious if we were effectively a random number generator on some kid's toy?
    - rendall 7y ago
      Worthy of Douglas Adams!
  - JohnFen 7y ago
    > Can it really be said to be a "simulation" at that point? Nope. And even if our reality really is a "simulation" in the sense that we're just the result of a program running on a computer, that simulation is so comprehensive that I don't think it could be called a simulation at all. It's just a different layer of reality. If you perfectly simulate something, after all, you haven't simulated it at all -- you've created the real thing.
    - rendall 7y ago
      That's a good point, too.