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> If we live in a simulation, all evidence suggests that there's no information coming into the simulation from the outside. Which evidence suggests that? At b

by shkkmo 2y ago

> If we live in a simulation, all evidence suggests that there's no information coming into the simulation from the outside. Which evidence suggests that? At best we have no evidence that proves extra-simulational information. I would argue that most forms of such information would be extremely hard to identify as such. > The point being: if they can simulate our entire universe, they can also simulate just a mind (in the same way that we are) that's literally infinitely more powerful (which is to say, backed by the computing resources that we consider to be "the infinite") which can out-think whatever we shout out of the simulation. I think you are making some assumptions about the nature and lack of limits on intelligence here. We don't know how far you can scale intelligent systems. Perhaps intelligence can't scale much past what we have. Perhaps that limit is much higher but still low enough to put the simulator and simulatee on equal potential footing. Perhaps there is no hard limit but only an exponential increase in the difficulty of producing increasingly intelligent systems. Perhaps 'outsmarting' the simulators isn't even required and our entire simulated universe is just an egg designed to birth super AIs.

bastawhiz 2y ago
> At best we have no evidence that proves extra-simulational information Yes, this is what I mean. I've phrased it poorly, clearly. > Perhaps intelligence can't scale much past what we have. Perhaps that limit is much higher but still low enough to put the simulator and simulatee on equal potential footing. Perhaps there is no hard limit but only an exponential increase in the difficulty of producing increasingly intelligent systems. Intelligence doesn't necessarily mean sentience, it just means the ability to process information. It seems intuitive to me that something that can simulate our universe could, for instance, quickly compute every possible chess game. Our about to build one super intelligence is matched by the external entities' ability to build infinite numbers of "equal" super intelligences. > Perhaps 'outsmarting' the simulators isn't even required and our entire simulated universe is just an egg designed to birth super AIs. What a depressing thought!
- shkkmo 2y ago
  > It seems intuitive to me that something that can simulate our universe could, for instance, quickly compute every possible chess game Some quick googling gives me an estimate of 10^123 possible chess games and only 10^82 atoms in the observable universe. Our intuition about how large numbers get is poor at best. While your example of chess is a small enough that you may be correct, the way that the number of possibilities grow for more complex system means it is quite plausible to simulate a system you can't predict without running the simulation. > Intelligence doesn't necessarily mean sentience, it just means the ability to process information. "Intelligence" is a loose term, but it is more that just processing throughput. If super intelligent AI were to develop inside a simulation, it could easily be the kind of chaotic and emergently complex system that could only be predicted by actually running that simulation. Thus, to protect against an such an AI escaping would require knowing a set of detectable necessary milestones and halting the simulation if those are reached. In deed, I would argue that some of our LLMs are direct evidence that you can create and run complex models that have opaque inner workings.

by shkkmo 2y ago

bastawhiz 2y ago

> At best we have no evidence that proves extra-simulational information Yes, this is what I mean. I've phrased it poorly, clearly. > Perhaps intelligence can't scale much past what we have. Perhaps that limit is much higher but still low enough to put the simulator and simulatee on equal potential footing. Perhaps there is no hard limit but only an exponential increase in the difficulty of producing increasingly intelligent systems. Intelligence doesn't necessarily mean sentience, it just means the ability to process information. It seems intuitive to me that something that can simulate our universe could, for instance, quickly compute every possible chess game. Our about to build one super intelligence is matched by the external entities' ability to build infinite numbers of "equal" super intelligences. > Perhaps 'outsmarting' the simulators isn't even required and our entire simulated universe is just an egg designed to birth super AIs. What a depressing thought!

shkkmo 2y ago
> It seems intuitive to me that something that can simulate our universe could, for instance, quickly compute every possible chess game Some quick googling gives me an estimate of 10^123 possible chess games and only 10^82 atoms in the observable universe. Our intuition about how large numbers get is poor at best. While your example of chess is a small enough that you may be correct, the way that the number of possibilities grow for more complex system means it is quite plausible to simulate a system you can't predict without running the simulation. > Intelligence doesn't necessarily mean sentience, it just means the ability to process information. "Intelligence" is a loose term, but it is more that just processing throughput. If super intelligent AI were to develop inside a simulation, it could easily be the kind of chaotic and emergently complex system that could only be predicted by actually running that simulation. Thus, to protect against an such an AI escaping would require knowing a set of detectable necessary milestones and halting the simulation if those are reached. In deed, I would argue that some of our LLMs are direct evidence that you can create and run complex models that have opaque inner workings.