I can attest to this. In my younger days when I was more cocky and had less "important" responsibility, I often literally did what you described instead of set

I can attest to this. In my younger days when I was more cocky and had less "important" responsibility, I often literally did what you described instead of setting an alarm clock. (It didn't always work shrug) These days even when I set an alarm, I often wake up a couple minutes before the set timer (though sometimes it varies with error up to 1+ hour, so it isn't that precise). --- Aaronson's story (the original article) is a bit more spooky than that though. If this world was a simulation and if there was a way to glitch out, a lot of his work on computability and computational complexity do seem like prime candidates for a theoretical foundation for breaking out of the simulation. The presentation software censoring his work would be a very mild way to warn him about the dangers of spreading the knowledge to the unwashed masses :P