[ExI] Simulation

Tue Dec 18 20:26:34 UTC 2012

Well we can both claim some prior credit for this old chestnut although I can't say it was something I was seriously considering back in 87. I did certainly put forward the probability factor based upon future simulation before Nicks paper. 
 I also put forward the idea that the "weirdness" of quantum mechanics *could* be a proof of some abstraction layer between our simulation and the reality below/above it.

 The thing I really love about simulation theory above all else is the possibility that absolutely anything is possible in a sim. So we could be in the version where we all sprout wings next week.
Knowing my luck we are in the version where rocks rain from the sky for no reason and against all known laws on the 21st. Perhaps as a result of us proving our reality is artificial thus we corrupt the data for our specific run?
Maybe the dinosaurs were actually great philosophers and did the same.

-----Original Message-----
From: Keith Henson <hkeithhenson at gmail.com>
To: ExI chat list <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
Sent: Tue, 18 Dec 2012 1:49
Subject: [ExI] Simulation

quote:

  Do we live in a computer simulation? How to test the idea.
  December 13, 2012

The concept that we could possibly be living in a computer simulation
comes from a 2003 paper published in Philosophical Quarterly by Nick
Bostrom, a philosophy professor at the University of Oxford. With
current limitations and trends in computing, it will be decades before
researchers will be able to run even primitive simulations of the
universe. But [...]

MORE | http://kurzweilai.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=aad1a7eea269839c7d10845e8&id=b17cb246ee&e=6ccbd62dbf

/quote

http://www.washington.edu/news/2012/12/10/do-we-live-in-a-computer-simulation-uw-researchers-say-idea-can-be-tested/

It's a topic that was discussed on this list in the early days.

So I responded, but the comment might be too long or something.

^^^^^^^^^^^^

The roots of the simulation argument go way back, but the current
speculation may be due to a conversation I had with Hans Moravec at
the first Artificial Life Conference in 1987.

Hans had a manuscript copy of Mind Children and was excitedly talking
about the ever-falling cost of computational resources and what we
could do with them. I stopped him with "Hans, do you realize how
unlikely it is that this the first time we have had this
conversation?"

Hans looked totally blank, a rare expression for one the brightest
people I know. I went on picking up from where Hans had been and
making the point that the future would be able to model the past,
including the whole 20th century. And, like Society for Creative
Anachronism or Civil War reenactments, they would do it many times,
making the chance that this was the first time we had this
conversation nearly zero. Hans later put it this way in an essay "Pigs
in Cyberspace."

"If these minds spend only an infinitesimal fraction of their energy
contemplating the human past, their sheer power should ensure that eventually
our entire history is replayed many times in many places, and in many
variations. The very moment we are now experiencing may actually be
(almost certainly is) such a distributed mental event, and most likely is a
complete fabrication that never happened physically. Alas, there is no
way to sort it out from our perspective: we can only wallow in the
scenery."

http://www.primitivism.com/pig...

At the time, I was just pulling Han's leg. I had no idea it would
start a cottage industry in the philosophy (and physics) departments.

Keith
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