[extropy-chat] The world as a Sim ? Irrelevant

[Eliezer S. Yudkowsky]

Brett Paatsch wrote:

> Eliezer S. Yudkowsky writes:
> 
>>This world could easily be a computer simulation, but if so
>>it is a simulation of a  world without ESP.
> 
> I reckon (without believing) that it is NOT a sim and could 
> NOT easily be a sim. 

I used to have a very strong intuition that the world was not a sim. 
Eventually it went away, and in retrospect I think it was based on nothing 
but wishful thinking.

As Lee Corbin pointed out with respect to the Tegmark bubble duplication, 
there is no *particular* you, only the *set* of yous.  It seems to me 
likely, on my current model, that at least some of you are living in a 
computer simulation.  The question is whether almost all of you are 
simulated, or almost all of you are real.

> I think that to entertain the notion that it is is to run the risk of
> repeating (now dead) Pascal's wager and betting the same
> wrong way.  Of betting that there is a super-natural being that
> is going to come to the rescue like Santa Claus. I prefer to
> work with friends and the resources that I have, rather than
> fret over the resources I don't have. I am not malicious and 
> I will deal with maliciousness if I must with resolution and
> ferocity of my own.  

That some people may be inclined to abuse the simulation hypothesis in 
predictable ways, does not bear on the simulation hypothesis's *actual 
truth or falsity*.

> I can see no advantage or change in my habits that I would
> make if I thought the world was a sim. I would probably have
> more allies and friends if less people entertained the sim 
> hypothesis so much but so be it.   

Okay, so most actions are the same on the simulation hypothesis.  Again 
this does not bear on the simulation hypothesis's actual truth or falsity.

> I think that if no-one can come up with a reliable test, (group
> test - science or solitary test - pure reason) to see if the world
> is a sim then it would be better to step around what looks like 
> an iteration of the same old mindfuk, to put away childish 
> things and to concentrate minds and energies on the tasks 
> at hand. 

If you can't come up with any experimental observation that differs on the 
world being a sim, then you don't need to know how much of your measure 
lies in sims, because it won't make any difference to subjective 
probabilities.  The problem is in dealing with questions like "Would my 
measure sharply decrease after a Singularity, and if so, what would that 
look like?", where the triggering event lies in the future, is important, 
and there is no obvious way to test different hypotheses in advance.

-- 
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky                          http://singinst.org/
Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence