I like using this same line of thought to "prove" that we were Intelligently Designed: we are always trying to create something "alive" whether bioengineered or AI. We get more advanced all the time, so sooner or later we will succeed and become Intelligent Designers of life. This means we could easily be the result of such an Intelligent Design ourselves. And by the logic of Musk et al, the "probability" of this is zero. So, we are in a simulation AND were Intelligently Designed. QED
You can use this ridiculous line of thinking to "prove" anything. And because of the language they use ("odds", "probability") these smart folk confuse people into thinking it's a near scientific certainty that we're a simulation.
I would love to get these people in a room and roll out your "proof" of I.D. above. See what happens.
One more observation: Consciousness itself is a simulation. We don't experience reality directly. Like Plato's cave, we get sensations that are renderings of something "out there," with no direct access to that reality. Reality might as well be a spinning disc, while our mind sits in a theater. "Base reality" is the cold, dead world with no observer. We are in a simulation no matter what.
But since our senses do such a functional job of allowing us to "perceive" the world and act within it and upon it, I'm not willing to crap on them just because they are "indirect".
We may never know what base reality is, but our senses and our reason tells us some very useful things about it.
And as for consciousness itself? I dunno if we will ever understand it.
We're not really saying different things. I'm just saying that base reality doesn't "look like" anything, the same way that ones and zeros on a disc don't, or that grooves in a vinyl record don't sound like anything. You have to run base reality, or a disc, or an LP, through a simulator to turn them into experiences. The simulator through which we run base reality is our body, which brings the experience to our mind or consciousness or whatever.
The fact that base reality is consistent and permanent does not affect this, in the same way that the disc and the LP are consistent and permanent. And all of these simulators discard way more information than they process. Every physical attribute of the discs is ignored except the parts that give rise to the ones and zeros, and base reality is full of electromagnetic waves and ultrasound, gravitational fluctuations, etc. that don't make a dent on our senses.
People like to go from this to "Nothing is real," which is absurd (and I think is what you're objecting to), but it doesn't stop us living in a simulation. Every simulation is real, and every reality is a simulation. The alternative is a dead, uncaused world without an observer of any kind, a truly pointless construction, whose pointlessness would go completely unknown and unappreciated. I think this is really about observers. I think I'm saying that if you have an observer, you have a simulation. Because the observer has to observe *something*, and reality doesn't have a look or a feel or a touch or anything of its own to observe. You have to observe it *with* something, whether a camera or your eye or your foot, or a radio telescope. I.e., there has to be an interface through which you observe, and that interface *is* a simulator.
NUMBERS DON'T LIE! :D
because only people do that... with numbers
I like using this same line of thought to "prove" that we were Intelligently Designed: we are always trying to create something "alive" whether bioengineered or AI. We get more advanced all the time, so sooner or later we will succeed and become Intelligent Designers of life. This means we could easily be the result of such an Intelligent Design ourselves. And by the logic of Musk et al, the "probability" of this is zero. So, we are in a simulation AND were Intelligently Designed. QED
Precisely!
You can use this ridiculous line of thinking to "prove" anything. And because of the language they use ("odds", "probability") these smart folk confuse people into thinking it's a near scientific certainty that we're a simulation.
I would love to get these people in a room and roll out your "proof" of I.D. above. See what happens.
That would be a hoot!
One more observation: Consciousness itself is a simulation. We don't experience reality directly. Like Plato's cave, we get sensations that are renderings of something "out there," with no direct access to that reality. Reality might as well be a spinning disc, while our mind sits in a theater. "Base reality" is the cold, dead world with no observer. We are in a simulation no matter what.
You're right, of course, technically.
But since our senses do such a functional job of allowing us to "perceive" the world and act within it and upon it, I'm not willing to crap on them just because they are "indirect".
We may never know what base reality is, but our senses and our reason tells us some very useful things about it.
And as for consciousness itself? I dunno if we will ever understand it.
We're not really saying different things. I'm just saying that base reality doesn't "look like" anything, the same way that ones and zeros on a disc don't, or that grooves in a vinyl record don't sound like anything. You have to run base reality, or a disc, or an LP, through a simulator to turn them into experiences. The simulator through which we run base reality is our body, which brings the experience to our mind or consciousness or whatever.
The fact that base reality is consistent and permanent does not affect this, in the same way that the disc and the LP are consistent and permanent. And all of these simulators discard way more information than they process. Every physical attribute of the discs is ignored except the parts that give rise to the ones and zeros, and base reality is full of electromagnetic waves and ultrasound, gravitational fluctuations, etc. that don't make a dent on our senses.
People like to go from this to "Nothing is real," which is absurd (and I think is what you're objecting to), but it doesn't stop us living in a simulation. Every simulation is real, and every reality is a simulation. The alternative is a dead, uncaused world without an observer of any kind, a truly pointless construction, whose pointlessness would go completely unknown and unappreciated. I think this is really about observers. I think I'm saying that if you have an observer, you have a simulation. Because the observer has to observe *something*, and reality doesn't have a look or a feel or a touch or anything of its own to observe. You have to observe it *with* something, whether a camera or your eye or your foot, or a radio telescope. I.e., there has to be an interface through which you observe, and that interface *is* a simulator.
That was very well stated, sir. Kudos!
Small piles of male bovine elimination.