Do you directly care about the goals of the simulator(s)? In the absence of a creator, how do you answer about evolution (a goal-less optimization process)? Are your goals dependent on a creator, or independent?
You might not share any goals, but still care because you fear interference or termination if the simulation no longer furthers the creator’s goals. I argue that this fear is unfounded. Whether you’re a side-effect or a primary reason for the simulation, you’re still part of the environment being simulated. If the creators are bothering to simulate this level of detail, then they think this level of detail is important to their goals.
Any detectable change the creators make in the simulation (like creating or altering the path of an asteroid, tweaking human behavior, communicating with some or all subjects, etc.) reduces the simulation value of the simulation.
It’s possible they _WANT_ to simulate a universe with no intelligent interstellar life. If so, they’d build the filters into the simulation, rather than noticing a problem and changing the code. They might notice a problem, change the code, and terminate/restart the simulation, but I can’t imagine any way to guess the things that will accelerate or prevent this from happening. obDouglasAdams: “There is another theory which states that this has already happened.”
It goes without saying that this whole conversation is speculation. Furthermore this post is a speculation about a speculation but at the very least it is entertaining to think about. As far as evolution goes I would say that evolution could be the very thing that they are simulating. Perhaps the dinosaurs were a dead end evolutionary, just as all other life before their respective extinction events. Perhaps we
super speculative I know. too many Perhaps’
I like your point about level of detail. I can’t refute that at all and haven’t thought of detail level that way. My only concern would be that if they are such higher beings that merely simulating our 3 spacial dimensions and one temporal direction benefits them, then life would be a sort of defect in dead chemistry. “A cool thing that dirt does”. There might be code built in to catch life before it can start to mess with whatever there sim is trying to accomplish.
Furthermore it also depends if it is a sim, or a game. If it’s a game then there is probably nothing to fear (except the losing condition i.e. extinction presumably.) If it’s a simulation of something, then there might not even be a goal for US, only a goal for THEM.
Finally, I’m sure there are things that CAN stress the sim, and I could rattle off some interesting ideas I have on that but it really doesn’t get us anywhere. I guess the point of the post was to address a few main questions that are worth asking and trying to reconcile with what we can know about our sim. Are they simulating us, or observing us? If it has nothing to do with us, then are noticeable? Can we affect the simulation from an outside perspective?
Do you directly care about the goals of the simulator(s)? In the absence of a creator, how do you answer about evolution (a goal-less optimization process)? Are your goals dependent on a creator, or independent?
You might not share any goals, but still care because you fear interference or termination if the simulation no longer furthers the creator’s goals. I argue that this fear is unfounded. Whether you’re a side-effect or a primary reason for the simulation, you’re still part of the environment being simulated. If the creators are bothering to simulate this level of detail, then they think this level of detail is important to their goals.
Any detectable change the creators make in the simulation (like creating or altering the path of an asteroid, tweaking human behavior, communicating with some or all subjects, etc.) reduces the simulation value of the simulation.
It’s possible they _WANT_ to simulate a universe with no intelligent interstellar life. If so, they’d build the filters into the simulation, rather than noticing a problem and changing the code. They might notice a problem, change the code, and terminate/restart the simulation, but I can’t imagine any way to guess the things that will accelerate or prevent this from happening. obDouglasAdams: “There is another theory which states that this has already happened.”
It goes without saying that this whole conversation is speculation. Furthermore this post is a speculation about a speculation but at the very least it is entertaining to think about. As far as evolution goes I would say that evolution could be the very thing that they are simulating. Perhaps the dinosaurs were a dead end evolutionary, just as all other life before their respective extinction events. Perhaps we
super speculative I know. too many Perhaps’
I like your point about level of detail. I can’t refute that at all and haven’t thought of detail level that way. My only concern would be that if they are such higher beings that merely simulating our 3 spacial dimensions and one temporal direction benefits them, then life would be a sort of defect in dead chemistry. “A cool thing that dirt does”. There might be code built in to catch life before it can start to mess with whatever there sim is trying to accomplish.
Furthermore it also depends if it is a sim, or a game. If it’s a game then there is probably nothing to fear (except the losing condition i.e. extinction presumably.) If it’s a simulation of something, then there might not even be a goal for US, only a goal for THEM.
Finally, I’m sure there are things that CAN stress the sim, and I could rattle off some interesting ideas I have on that but it really doesn’t get us anywhere. I guess the point of the post was to address a few main questions that are worth asking and trying to reconcile with what we can know about our sim. Are they simulating us, or observing us? If it has nothing to do with us, then are noticeable? Can we affect the simulation from an outside perspective?