I recently stumbled upon this article on Simulation Hypothesis by Parker’s Ponderings and immediately had to subscribe. I suggest you do the same.
I would like to respond to his article, however, with arguments against some of his conclusions.
Where I come from on this issue: philosophical mind games aside, no, I don’t think we live in a computer simulation. At the same time, I don’t expect it would matter very much. An artificial construct able to produce a reality on this scale would be indistinguishable from the core physical properties of our universe and that existence would be no less real than our present conscious experience.
I’m engaging in this because I enjoyed Parker’s article and want to respond on a grander scale than the comment section.
The argument I’m examining begins like this.
Using The Truman Show as an example, Parker attempts to disprove an argument against the claim that the Simulation Hypothesis is self-defeating.
The claim states:
[Simulation hypothesis is predicated, at least in part, on our scientific knowledge of computers, simulations, and how brains work. But if simulation hypothesis were true, then we’d have a defeater for all of our empirical beliefs, which are largely the basis for our scientific knowledge. We’d acquire a defeater for our empirical beliefs on simulation hypothesis since everything we come to believe on the basis our senses would not be veridical but instead would be a kind of digital illusion. So if simulation hypothesis gives us a defeater for our empirical beliefs, then our scientific knowledge is defeated and drags our belief in simulation hypothesis down with it. And thus, simulation hypothesis is self-defeating. If you believe simulation hypothesis, then you can’t be justified in believing simulation hypothesis. So don’t believe simulation hypothesis.
To rephrase it for myself: if we’re in a simulation, we can’t trust our own sciences or philosophies, so what are you basing all these theories on anyway?
Parker’s purpose is to defend this idea, that simulation hypothesis in self defeating. To do that he has to confront the argument against it.
The argument goes like this:
A sim’s empirical beliefs are largely true [in relation to] their simulated world, even if their empirical beliefs are not largely true [in relation to] the base reality outside of their simulated world.
To show the fallacy of the argument, Parker uses The Truman Show as an analogy.
Truman thinks he’s living a normal life with his wife in a small town, but in reality, he lives in a massive studio and he’s the star of a reality tv show that’s been filming him 24/7 since his birth (maybe even in utero, I don’t remember). Does Chalmers’s [argument] work for Truman? According to the world portrayed to Truman, call it the TV world, Truman is a regular citizen, he knows where he works, he knows his wife’s name, he knows who his best friend is, etc. But according to the real world, all of that is false and he is being systematically deceived. Does it really make sense to say Truman has knowledge according to the TV world? I don’t think so. So, what’s the significant difference between Truman and a sim who lives wholly in a virtual simulated world?
If you haven’t read the article, and you should, you can digest this next paragraph, skim it, or skip it. There’s nothing wrong with it, but outside the scope of reading his piece, I recognize I’m now throwing too much at my reader.
Now if you come to affirm simulation hypothesis, then it seems like you should also affirm something like Proper Functionalism. Your cognitive faculties, your knowledge forming processes, have been designed by a computer simulator to function in the simulated world you inhabit. If that’s the case, why think you can reason about the truths of base reality, a cognitive environment that you haven’t been designed for?
These are the paragraphs I’m interested in arguing against, as they make the same error from different perspectives. The second paragraph argues that we can’t trust ourselves to form theories about base reality if we live within a simulation, but we don’t need to do so.
The entirety of the issue is do we believe the world is a) a construct of either happenstance or divine intervention wherein humanity evolved (or was created) from the base properties existing in our natural environment, or b) that this same experience was created by artificial intervention wherein humanity evolved (or was created) from the base properties existing in our simulated environment. Either way, science is our study of our environment, and to suppose one environment presupposes the basis of our knowledge be any different because of the nature of that environment is to artificially dictate a reality contrary to our experience. That is an unfair and unnecessary constraint. Our experience is our experience. We’re only theorizing about the nature of its construction, something that is, either way, beyond our ability to witness or measure.
It is true that we cannot understand “the base reality” if there is one, but we aren’t called to. We can understand the reality we’ve been given as far as our current knowledge allows. Presupposing limits on that knowledge within its own reality based purely on how that reality was constructed is a prejudicial assumption. We don’t need to understand anything about a possible base reality to theorize about the nature of this one.
That brings us to The Truman Show argument, but it isn’t an applicable analogy.
The Truman Show is the base reality. Truman has been lied to about the nature of his immediate environment and the unseen world, but the same physics apply. He’s a base reality human being in the base reality world.
A simulation doesn’t require us to presuppose our world is not as it seems, any more than if our world is the base reality. After all, we know solid objects aren’t solid. Colors are a projection interpreted by our minds and not a realistic expression of base reality.
When I said earlier that it doesn’t matter, I mean that reality doesn’t have to be a simulation* to be a simulation**.
*artificial
**have the properties inherent to an artificial simulation
Truman’s beliefs are based on intentional misdirection. Our sciences are based on our best studies of reality as we’re able to experience it. We can trust our sciences because real or simulated, the nature of our knowledge and how we attain need not be presumed different. Again, to do so is to artificially prejudice the outcome of this thought experiment.
Fundamentally, the differences in our argument goes back to my initial statement. I don’t view the argument as being, “What if this were just a video game?” We don’t live in the world of Ms. Pac-Man. The irrelevance of that framing doesn’t change for me by upgrading the game. We don’t live in Baldur’s Gate 3. We don’t live in a video game a million times more complicated than that. We live in the reality around us, and the underlying nature behind that reality doesn’t flatten it.
…and I’m deleting everything I wrote after that. Once again, I’m throwing too much at my reader. I want to thank Parker for his enlightening article. He’s more knowledgeable on the subject than I’ll ever care to be.
Until next time,
I’m Thaddeus Thomas
I am thinking reality as we know it most definitely was created by others, the powers that be, and that’s what we are born into and must fight against to become our Self. So fake things are already indisputably here, and that is plenty to worry about.
Great post. I've been grappling with this a lot myself in writing
I have to say as well, perfect length for a post. I got some feedback mine were a bit long, so it's inspiring to see ones like this which fit everything in