3 ms·
Ask HN: Simulation vs. Game
Many who are supposed to be serious people insist our universe must be a simulation. (The argument seems, as far as I have been able to discover, to be "because how could it not be?")
My question is, is there any meaningful difference between a simulation and a video game? I can't discern any. So when somebody says we are in a simulation, what I hear that we are all NPCs in somebody's game.
Because, how could we not be?
To the Greeks, the world was the gods' playground. To (certain) Elizabethans, the world was a stage. To the Victorians, the universe was a clock. Every culture imagines the universe is whatever the hell they think they invented.
Are we NPCs?
- keiferski 5y agoMost philosophers don’t think the simulation argument is a particularly good one. It’s more of a Twitter meme, not a serious metaphysical theory. Furthermore, the problems posed by the simulation argument are not significantly different than similar things in the past, e.g. Descartes’ demon. I think Baudrillard’s work is a far more fruitful approach to this topic, as it addresses the media/entertainment nature of our “simulated” reality. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation
- muzani 5y agoGames are really just abstractions. Play is an abstraction. Stages are definitely abstractions. A painting is an abstraction. A simulation is also an abstraction, but a different kind. A flight simulation might simulate wind, but not a crew member getting drunk. It's there to abstract things towards a goal. Plays are often a reduction of a story - often unimportant characters and scenes get cut out. Games are a reduction to give the player maximum agency, a form of empathy, or practicing certain skills in a more controlled environment (e.g. Football Manager). But the universe? What would it be abstracting?