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Language: en
there's still this desire to get answers
to the why question that if if we're if
the world is a simulation if we're
living in a simulation that there's a
programmer like creature that we can ask
questions okay so let's put let's pursue
the idea that we're living in a city
simulation which is not not totally
ridiculous by the way there we go then
you still need to explain the programmer
the programmer had to come into
existence by some the even if we're in
this in a simulation the the programmer
must have evolved or if if he's in a
sort of more she's or she she she's in a
meta simulation then the the meta meta
programmer must have evolved by a
gradual process you can't escape that
fundamentally you've got to come back to
a gradual incremental process of
explanation to start with there's no
shortcuts in this world
but maybe to linger on that point about
the simulation do you think it's an
interesting I basically talked to
boarded the heck out of everybody asking
this question but whether you live in a
simulation do you think first do you
think we live in a simulation second do
you think it's an interesting thought
experiment it's certainly an interesting
thought experiment
I first met it in a science fiction
novel by Daniel gal I called counterfeit
world in which it's all about I mean I
our heroes are running a gigantic
computer which which simulates the world
and and something goes wrong and so one
of them has to go down into the
simulated world in order to fix it and
then the the the Dynamo of the thing the
climate so novel is that they discover
themselves in another simulation at a
high level so I was intrigued by this
and I love others of Daniel gallows
science fiction novels then it was
revived seriously by Nick Bostrom boss
from talking to him in an hour okay
and he goes further not just treated as
a science fiction speculation he
actually thinks it's positively likely
yeah I mean it's very likely actually
well he's he makes like a probabilistic
argument which you can use to come up
with very interesting conclusions about
the nature of this universe I mean he
think he thinks that that that we are in
a simulation done by so to speak are
descendants of a future that the
products but it's still a product of
evolution it's still ultimately going to
be a product of evolution even though
the super intelligent people of the
future have created our world and you
and I are just a simulation in this
table is a simulation and so on I don't
actually in my heart of hearts believe
it but that I like his argument well so
the interesting thing is that I agree
with you but the interesting thing to me
if I would say if we're living in the
simulation that in that simulation to
make it work you still have to do
everything gradually just like you said
that even though it's program I don't
think there could be miracles otherwise
we'll note I mean the the programmer the
higher up the upper ones have to have
evolved gradually however the simulation
they create could be instantaneous I
mean it could be switched on and we come
into the world with fabricated memories
true but what I'm what I'm trying to
convey so you're saying the the broader
statement but I'm saying from an
engineering perspective both the
programmer has to be slowly evolved and
the simulation because it's like yeah
I'm an engineering perspective yeah it
takes a long time to write a program no
like just I don't think you can create
the universe in a snap I think you have
to grow it okay well that's not that's a
good point
that's an arguable point by the way um I
I have thought about using the Nick
Bostrom
eye idea to solve the riddle of how we
were talking we were talking earlier
about why the human brain can achieve so
much I thought of this when my then
hundred year old mother was marveling at
what I could do with it with a
smartphone
and I could you know coral look up
anything in the encyclopedia I could
play her music that she liked and so
Jane please it's all in that in that
tiny little phone no it's it's out there
it's in it's in the cloud it's and maybe
what most of what we do is in a cloud so
maybe if if we're if we are a simulation
yeah then all the power that we think is
in our skull it actually may be like the
power that we think is in the iPhone but
is that actually out there it's an
interface to something else yeah I mean
that's what beautifully including roger
penrose with pen psychism that
consciousness is somehow a fundamental
part of physics that it doesn't have to
actually all reside inside a network but
Roger thinks it does reside in the skull
whereas I'm suggesting that it doesn't
that it's that there's a cloud that'd be
a fascinating fascinating notion and a
small tangent are you familiar with the
work of Donald Hoffman I guess maybe
nothing is named correctly but just
forget the name the idea that there's a
difference between reality and
perception so like we biological
organisms perceive the world in order
for the natural selection process to be
able to survive and so on but that
doesn't mean that our perception
actually reflects the fundamental
reality the physical reality or in youth
well I do think that although it
reflects the fundamental reality I do
believe there is a fundamental reality I
do think that what the perception is
constructive in the sense that we
construct in our minds a model of what
we're seeing and so this is really the
view of people who work on visual
illusions like Richard Gregory who point
out the things like an echo cube which
flipped from a two-dimensional picture
of a cube on on on a sheet of paper but
we see it as a three-dimensional cube
and it flips from one orientation to
another at regular intervals what's
going on is that the brain is is
constructing a cube but
the sense-data are compatible with two
alternative cubes and so rather than
stick with one of them it alternates
between them I think that's just a a
model for what we do all the time when
we see a table when we see a person when
we see her let me see anything we're
using the sense data to construct or or
make use of a preps previously
constructed model I noticed this when
when I meet somebody who actually is say
a friend of mine but I until I kind of
realized that that is him he looks
different and then when I finally clock
that it's him
his features switch like an echo cube
it's just into the familiar form is it
as it were I've taken his face out of
the filing cabinet inside and grafted it
onto or used use the sense data to to to
you to in to invoke it yeah we do some
kind of miraculous compression on this
whole thing to be able to filter out
most of the sun's data it makes it make
sense of it that's just a magical thing
that we do
you