[ExI] simulation stat goofiness

[Will Steinberg]

Typo, meant to say "WHAT'S MORE, if those worlds are infinite" not
"sufficiently large"

On Sat, Sep 19, 2020 at 3:07 PM Will Steinberg <steinberg.will at gmail.com>
wrote:

> The assumption is that there are physical limits.  Here is why I'd assume
> so:
>
> Di lemma:
>
> A) the simulator's universe is the same as ours
>
> B) the simulator's universe allows for computation greater than ours
>
> If A, eventually there will be a limit that we can conceive
>
> if B, there has to be some reason the universe allows greater computation.
>
> Staying on B, now apply the simulation argument to that universe, and use
> the same dilemma.  That means the universe is either the same as theirs
> (and will have a limit as each simulation includes trillions of simulations
> which all include trillions of simulations &c.) or their simulator has a
> universe which allows for more computation due to some reason.
>
> I believe these reasons would be subject to some kind of laws of physics,
> and could only accept infinite levels of simulation if the higher universes
> were infinitely large or of infinite duration.  Which may be its own issue.
>
> WHAT'S MORE, if those worlds are sufficiently large, it stands to reason
> that there will be infinite intelligent civilizations in those universes.
> So if the simulations run IN that universe mimic the simulations in the
> above universe, those people would have a good chance at being one of those
> civilizations before simulation is developed, and so no longer can be
> applied Bostrom's trilemma in order to show they must be in a simulation.
>
> In essence, even if your universe is finite, infinite sim levels would
> appear to me to mean that at some point the master universe is infinite,
> but this leads to the fact that if you are in a universe which would
> require an eventual infinite universe of your master, then you are just as
> likely to be a regular, physical civilization in that universe as you are a
> simulation in one of the levels (because that universe is literally
> infinite).
>
> Therefore repeatedly applying the simulation argument with SOME sort of
> laws of physics in every universe leads to a contradiction.
>
> On Sat, Sep 19, 2020 at 2:29 PM Dan TheBookMan via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, Sep 19, 2020 at 2:36 PM Will Steinberg via extropy-chat
>> <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>> > But still, as you keep going up simulation levels, at some point
>> processing power must run out, right?  Unless each higher universe is
>> successively larger and lengthier (...no laughing at that one!)
>>
>> That might be, but I believe John's point was from inside the
>> simulation you couldn't tell... In the same way that say, running a
>> complicated smoke simulation model on one system that runs half as
>> fast as another (because of resources, processor speed, etc.) will
>> still give the same simulation and results as another just at a slower
>> speed from our perspective. But inside the model, step n follows step
>> n-1 regardless of whether that takes one millisecond or two, no? And
>> how from the inside would you know processing power was reaching its
>> limit? You might come up against a wall if you were running a
>> simulation -- adding more complexity into the simulation you're
>> presumably part of. But would that tell you you're in a maxxed out
>> simulation as opposed to telling you that your technology isn't
>> advanced enough (imagine running today's smoke simulation models on
>> 1940s computers) or that there really are physical (non-simulation
>> ones) limits on what you can simulate?
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Dan
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>
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