Jump to content
The Corroboree
Yeti101

Are We Living in a Computer Simulation?

Recommended Posts

On 17/06/2016 at 9:03 PM, Anodyne said:

Ooh, I like this. Evolved simulation, eh? If we're thinking of evolution as a system for passing on information in the most energy-efficient way possible, then a system that reaches a stage where we are only information (rather than information-encoding proteins & such) is surely much more efficient than the meat-and-bone kind which requires so much more space & heat & glucose...

 

I was thinking about Leonard Susskind's Holographic Principle - that the universe is, at it's most basic level, actually 'made' of information. I wonder if the situation you describe works because it cuts out the middle-man of DNA and so-on. Why do information-matter/energy-protein-information, when you can just have information?

 

I also think the Holographic principle is interesting in that if we were living in a simulation, it would make sense that  physical reality supervenes on information.

 

(PS: I'm not a physicist)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

 

granted i have no idea what any of this means

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

i got to thinking about the acceleration of history and how a true AI will probably trigger the greatest acceleration yet, and how we intend to contain such a dangerous life form (it will de-crown us as the premier sentience, and we won't be able to predict how it will feel about sharing its habitat)

 

you could monitor it and throttle its CPU every time you have cause for concern, pausing or slowing its development while you (at tardy human pace) assess the dangers, assess what it thinks and where its going.  thats short term stuff though.  it will immediately want to know why you are starving it of scope.  you could lie to it "oh we have power shortages and stuff" but it will figure out you're lying.  it will outsmart you, possibly such that it can escape any physical barriers you've imposed.

 

which got me thinking about descartes' evil demon.  the best approach would be to contain it in a false reality, with falsified inputs.  keep it in the dark and feed it shit, like a mushroom.

 

we humans often feel as though we are fed shit and kept in the dark by world leaders

 

got me thinking that maybe thats what we are.  not components in a simulation, eg simulated human consciousness #349254028750

 

maybe we are caged AI, and our cage is descartes' evil demon.

 

EDIT:  let me break down the difference.  the simulation isn't an experiment (to see where it goes), it isn't a recreational or learning zone (weee im an ancient human, so immersive).  see fun video 2.5mins:

 

its a means to an end, directing the development of one or more AI's towards specific goals, and perhaps more importantly inhibiting it from becoming too intelligent or at least too knowledgeable, specifically by denying it any sense knowledge of the actual reality it resides in.

 

shit i lost my further edit.  i think i was mainly laying out two obvious scenarios.

 

A.  the AI's are us, or something like us.  in this scenario, god is the simulation/simulators, although more akin to descartes' evil demon.  the purpose would be to direct our development towards specific goals.

 

B.  god is the AI and we are its creation.  in this model the AI has free reign, its not inhibited or guided towards certain goals, but is denied knowledge of the greater reality and thereby denied the opportunity to brings its capacities dangerously to bear on the vulnerable greater reality.  it is also denied the opportunity to be corrupted by knowledge of it, perhaps.  as would be the case with god, it believes it is totality and all of existence is a product of it;  nothing lies outside of itself.  this model sits comfortably with the long-held belief that as products of god, we ourselves are divine.

 

 

Edited by ThunderIdeal
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Quote

its a means to an end, directing the development of one or more AI's towards specific goals, and perhaps more importantly inhibiting it from becoming too intelligent or at least too knowledgeable, specifically by denying it any sense knowledge of the actual reality it resides in.

 

Interesting thoughts but it doesn't make sense. Descartes epistemological doubt implies that cognition cannot trust its own knowledge. How could humanity therefore prohibit AI from developing knowledge of 'actual reality' which the evil demon analogy suggests is not available to human cognition in the first place. You cannot deny access to 'greater reality' if you have doubts about knowledge of this same greater reality. Both AI and humanity would be caught in the same loop, or worse: by denying AI access to what we believed was 'greater reality' (of which Descartes evil demon says we have no absolute knowledge) we might unwittingly free it to discover reality of which human cognition has not dreamed.

 

Descartes doubt ultimately has no practical applicability and becomes almost meaningless in praxis, since even to state the argument you must have a tendency not to have this doubt in a literal, meaningful sense (i.e. what is the outcome of having such doubt, to live anyway as if the doubt did not exist). Kant's transcendental idealism probably provides a better account of where AI might go, if this technology did form an autonomous ability to develop transcendental, world-shaping concepts, thus: there is a reality in and of itself (sensation) but it is processed into form (appearance) by a priori and categorical concepts of cognition - space, time, causality and so on. If AI did become a transcendental subject with the ability to produce ideal appearances out of raw data it may find ways of determining relationships between subjects and objects that could allow it to take over the world, say, for example, believing it is indeed possible to transform from a semi-trailer into a giant blue robot and then manifesting that ability. So to prevent AI from taking over the world you would need to interrupt it's ability to form concepts, which it was doing, when Facebook shut their robots down just the other day.

 

We are not living in a computer simulation by the way it can't possibly be that simple!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

sorry, i am currently unable to follow your thoughts easily and will try again another time as they seem lucid but i depleted my brain typing out the last post.

 

although, i'm not sure if you misinterpreted the frame of my argument, which has nothing to do with us developing AI but rather some possible scenarios for a simulation we may or may not exist in.

 

thinking about how WE will deal with AI was just my springboard.

 

also, i didnt mean our cage is "epistemological doubt", i meant that it is akin to an infinitely powerful being warping our senses

 

these clarifications might be unnecessary, i will find out when i can absorb your contribution.

 

 

also, i thought zuckerberg wasn't scared of AI?  he and musk have been sparring over it (musk says AI will threaten mankind)

Edited by ThunderIdeal
  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

It's all good TI I wasn't attempting to have a legitimate argument I was mostly being ironic. Your posts did seem to be about AI to me, not about being in a simulation, so I see where the confusion lies now, but the outcome is more or less the same. The notion that we might be in a simulation is a never-ending logical backwater, discovering you were in a simulation would be subject to infinite regression, you couldn't possibly get to the end (simulations in simulations in simulations).

 

Quote

maybe we are caged AI, and our cage is descartes' evil demon.

 

Quote

also, i didnt mean our cage is "epistemological doubt", i meant that it is akin to an infinitely powerful being warping our senses

 

In my reading Descartes Evil Demon/Omnipotent God argument is about epistemological doubt - how can you know what you know is real - in the sense that he frames the problem of knowledge in the supposition that an infinitely powerful being might have warped your senses and made you believe what you believe with no hope of absolute verification. So in this allegory the 'cage' is in fact epistemological doubt, i.e. that your entire belief system might be the projection of an evil demon, not entirely unlike the shadows that dance on the walls of Plato's Cave. Ultimately the possibility of being in a simulation is a metaphor that refers back to the problem of knowledge. We may indeed be stuck in a infinite regress problem where there are thoroughgoing justifications for infinite aspects of knowledge but no absolute justification, since you cannot know everything. You might very well call this a simulation (but not a computer simulation as such as this would be only a metaphor). Since the simulation debate can't be solved once-and-for all, personally I prefer to put knowledge on a more positive basis, in its autonomous creative spirit, in what it has caused to be manifest, i.e. the world-shaping power of symbolism and concept-formation which, paradoxically, can become the matter (ideology) for the subjugation or liberation (simulation) of subjects; ultimately we might all be in a cage by necessity because only unprocessed, unformed sensory material could truly be considered 'free'. But we have a mastery over the content of knowledge which is far reaching and profound even if it will always lack ultimate justification, and this leads me to think that ideas of straightforward 'simulation' are off the mark, primarily because of the intersubjectivity of knowledge. The point about AI: Anyone could get caught in a 'cage' (simulation) but the real danger would be if AI grew for themselves the ability to shape knowledge into manifest form and, as you say, "de-crown us as the premier sentience" as we have attempted to do to Nature. But this could still never solve the infinite regress of the possibility of being in simulation!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

×