This just demonstrates that you don’t understand simulation very well.
You of course haven’t bothered to define God, but a reasonable definition involves knowing everything. Which is exactly what the author of a simulator does not. (Or else she wouldn’t have to write one.) Second, the simulator does things better and faster than its creator can, which by definition means the creator is not God. Maybe the simulator is god - but the simulator has no thoughts.
Then there is the moral argument. God has some moral authority. The author of a simulator does not, especially of the simulation is of raw physics, If the primitive of the simulation was thinking people, then maybe. But maybe not.
Finally, if the author(s) of the simulator are finite, and there is no reason to think they wouldn’t be, they would make the simulator no bigger than it had to be. Our universe is way to big to be a simulation. You also run it a reasonable number of cycles - ours has gone on too long.
So, there are good reasons to think we do not live in a simulation, and even better reasons to think that the creator of a simulation, if there was one, has nothing to do with any reasonable concept of God.
I’ll leave out the god bit, but this is the point I would make about the simulation hypothesis:
A simulation of our universe is not an emulation; to make such a thing tractable you would need to just approximate lots of things.
For example, you wouldn’t calculate the motions of every particle: just as long as the world works as if it were made of atoms, and every time a human does an experiment, they get the right result, that’s enough. And/or just generalize all the stuff outside the solar system or earth’s surface.
But given this, why would we assume that everything that happens to every human is a critical part of the simulation? Why not simulate some humans instead of emulating them? Or possibly emulate some, but just use fake memories for stuff that’s not worth actually playing out?
But these kinds of doubts lead us to well-worn philosophical dead-ends such as “last-Thursdayism” and solipsism. Thus it seems if I knew that this universe is a simulation, all bets would be off, and I would have reason to doubt everything (including facts such as that this universe is a simulation).
You could be too late. I mean, imagine I someday build a simulation filled with various civilizations and so on, and once it’s up and running I get hit by a bus and die.
Well, of course we’re in a simulation. Planck’s time is the refresh rate and Planck’s length is the resolution. However, we’re just an uninteresting bit of activity that’s happening in once corner of the simulation. Imagine a Game of Life that was 10^30 cells across, or something like that. If once little section starts creating an interesting pattern, who would notice?
To those who argue that we’re too complex or the simulation is too big, I agree with Trinopus – we have no idea how complex the real universe is, where this simulation resides. We also don’t know how quickly the simulation is ticking along in real life – if it took 10 years between updates, we wouldn’t notice. When I pause my Apple II emulator or Mame, Lode Runner and Pac-man don’t know that they are paused.
Of course, this is all unknown, probably unknowable, so my firm statements above should not be taken seriously, but just in the spirit of this simulation discussion.
Back to the OP, this is an argument for deism, not any particular theism. There is no possible argument against Deism, or solipsism, or last-Thursdayism. They are philosophical dead ends, in my view. Also, no one worships a deist god, and deist gods don’t care about gay marriage, whether you to church, whether you mix your fabrics, etc.
"If you might be living in a simulation then all else equal you should care less about others, live more for today, make your world look more likely to become rich, expect to and try more to participate in pivotal events, be more entertaining and praiseworthy, and keep the famous people around you happier and more interested in you.
So, most people live their lives in emulation of what game theory tells them is the best strategy for living in a simulation. I take that as a point against our reality being a simulation, as I do not believe most people are capable of even subconsciously acting in a way that truly maximizes their potential benefit.
Wait, so he’s saying that we might be in a simulation done by another human? Then, that’s silly – it’s way too big for that. Really useless to have other galaxies if you’re just looking to simulate sleeping with super models.
Caring less about others seems like a non sequitur. Either it’s a universal simulation and over the course of 13 billion “years”, humans have evolved as a social species and care about each other, or this is a last-Thursday simulation for Leo DiCaprio, and he programmed us to care about each other. My personal simulated entity is happier when I’m loved by family and friends, and I return that affection. What does living in a simulation matter to that? Damage to simulated others, within the simulation, is real damage for anyone in the simulation.
I’ve long found an amusing thought about the idea that we’re in a simulation: if we are, and we discover how to make a reality-simulation of our own, then we’re probably going to crash the system we’re running on, because it’ll essentially start an infinite progression of simulations, multiplying the processing power needed by the program until the real computer somewhere at the top of the line runs out and crashes.
So if we are in a simulation, we’d best hope that whoever wrote it made sure to write code to prevent us from running our own simulations.
Who says they have to simulate other galaxies? Nobody has been to one. All that has to be done is to simulate the data that gives us evidence of other galaxies, and that only has to be done when someone is collecting that data. Better yet, all that has to be simulated is your belief that you’ve seen the other data that gives evidence of other galaxies. Similarly, the universe doesn’t need to be old. One just needs to simulate your belief that the evidence exists to show it is. How often are you fact checking the raw data?
I read an interview with Elon Musk where he was bummed out because he said that by looking at the sky we should have found evidence of ETs by now. The fact that we haven’t suggests that it hasn’t been written into the simulation yet, since it’s moot and we would have no way of interacting with them at this stage in our history
Another great point. This is called “stacking.” To prevent this we hypothesize that historical simulations will not be run past the point where such technology is viable. The earliest point that this seems feasible is suggested as 2050. Therefore, don’t plan on living more than about 35 years.
On the bright side, if you were depressed that your 401k wasn’t large enough to last through retirement this means that you can cash it out and buy that Porsche you’ve always wanted.
Do you read? Did the title “indefensible position” or the disclaimer at the beginning of the OP, give you even the slightest clue that perhaps there was an element of facetiousness here? How can a thinking human being get “earnestness” from that?
Did, Sir click the link the link to the Oxford Professor’s thesis I provided?
“I do not understand, and cannot be bothered to think or click” does not equal incoherence.
There would be millions and millions of simulations where magic was real and scantily clad women went around whaling on orcs with swords for every simulation in which I have a 45 minute commute to work every day. Therefore “statistical analysis” suggests that I am not living in a simulation.
Even in those, you will need somebody to grow potatoes, or a blacksmith’s assistant to wake up every morning and spend out hours grinding coal so the blacksmith can make the enchanted sword of righteousness for the scantily clad heroine to swing at orcs. Such is the consequence of world building at the level we are talking about.
Similarly, it is crucial that you wake up and drive 45 minutes so that you can make widgets or move paperwork, because your doing so is part of the world being simulated and that paperwork must go through or those widgets must be made in order to provide a consistent and orderly simulation that allows the drinking of piña coladas and banging on supermodels by the paying customer, our deity, Leonardo Dicaprio. (And don’t tell me you would not buy that game.)
I might buy that game or I might prefer to buy the one with the orcs. Currently simulated worlds with orcs are millions of times more popular than simulated worlds with office workers. Therefore I am not living in a simulation.
lots of popular games take place in the modern world with office workers. Today for example, you can buy GTA, run down the middle of the street, find an office worker on his 45 minute commute, shoot him dead and steal his car.
That’s extraordinarily popular, as are the Modern warfares, that take place in city’s complete with civilians.
Lots and lots of the most popular games are taking place in modern simulated worlds, sim city? Civilization? Modern Warfare? Etc, etc. in fact, it seems the more sophisticated simulations are becoming, the more popular modern realistic ones are becoming.