I absolutely agree, it got much more interesting as I started fleshing out my thought process. As for the motives, for a simulation to be helpful, it would hav

I absolutely agree, it got much more interesting as I started fleshing out my thought process. As for the motives, for a simulation to be helpful, it would have to run at greater than real time, no? Which.. is surely impossible, at least for a complete 'perfect' simulation. Right? Imperfections (and the limit of a simulation having to be simpler than its host) would infer a finite chain of simulations, which would vastly reduce the likelihood of us existing in a simulation. Also if these wars (etc) exist, the simulation is going to be knocked offline at some point, destroying all descendant universes, shrinking the pool of possible existent universes much further still. So (AFAICT) we have gone from it being almost a certainty we are part of a simulation (only one true universe from infinite similar simulations), to being very unlikely. I may check out the culture series, but i'm not one for reading much fiction, sadly.. impatient internet world that has formed me and all.