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This is silly. If the universe is deterministic, any representation of matter can be locally simulated based on algorithmic calculation. This includes people, o

This is silly. If the universe is deterministic, any representation of matter can be locally simulated based on algorithmic calculation. This includes people, objects, everything. I don't need to simulate everything constantly because I know where it will be when I _need_ to simulate it. So, any smart simulation would only be simulating a small very percentage of itself at any given time -- that part of itself being viewed or interacted with by observers. And we would have absolutely no idea how many of those observers actually reside in any given simulation. 10? 100? 1m? Who knows! But we could take this even further and suggest that it is only the _experience_ of the universe by ourselves that is being simulated. In that case, we're not actually interacting with anything, we're only gaining the memory of having interacted with it (in 'real time'). In this case there's no physical reality at all! We're living in a large shared hallucination, that once again only 'exists' where and when we're interacting with it. Finally, we have no idea of the time scale. The time scale in the simulation could be much slower than the outside universe. This would lower the energy required to simulate it even further. So, no, it's totally possible we live in a simulation!

ffitch 1y ago
> So, any smart simulation would only be simulating a small very percentage of itself at any given time does a falling tree make a sound if the simulation is not running? : )
daedrdev 1y ago
Isn't it not really deterministic because you cannot know both the exact position and exact velocity of particle? (along with the other pairs of physical properties that also follow the uncertainty principle)
socalgal2 1y ago
Any part of the universe you look at requires simuilating too much of the entire universe to get it from the state you last observed to the state it's supposed to be in now. Time is important, if it takes too long no one is going to run the simulation. The entire point of the simulation argument is they are fast and easy and therefore common. If simulations are common then it's likely we're in one. If you keep adding requirements that likely make them slow and hard then they are likely uncommon and the argument for us being in one disappears.
wmf 1y ago
I thought chaos doesn't allow that kind of selective simulation, although maybe no one would notice that the butterfly effect only happens in places people are watching. Ken MacLeod used a similar argument in The Corporation Wars.

ffitch 1y ago

> So, any smart simulation would only be simulating a small very percentage of itself at any given time does a falling tree make a sound if the simulation is not running? : )

daedrdev 1y ago

Isn't it not really deterministic because you cannot know both the exact position and exact velocity of particle? (along with the other pairs of physical properties that also follow the uncertainty principle)

socalgal2 1y ago

Any part of the universe you look at requires simuilating too much of the entire universe to get it from the state you last observed to the state it's supposed to be in now. Time is important, if it takes too long no one is going to run the simulation. The entire point of the simulation argument is they are fast and easy and therefore common. If simulations are common then it's likely we're in one. If you keep adding requirements that likely make them slow and hard then they are likely uncommon and the argument for us being in one disappears.

wmf 1y ago

I thought chaos doesn't allow that kind of selective simulation, although maybe no one would notice that the butterfly effect only happens in places people are watching. Ken MacLeod used a similar argument in The Corporation Wars.