Do you think any aliens exist in the universe?

[Swammerdami]

The possibility of future technologies is not evidence that we in the putative present live in a simulation,

He is not claiming to have evidence, beyond feelings, intuition and common sense.

Feelings are not a basis for calculating probabilities.

To the contrary: "Feelings" are about the ONLY way to begin to estimate probabilities for a question as difficult as this. (Note that I am not agreeing that 50% is a good estimate, just that a GUESS is all we can aspire to. What's your guess, pood? Zero?

Although it has NOTHING to do with excreationist's hypothesis, analogy with an hypothesis of Boltzmann brain(s) is VERY USEFUL in understanding this probability estimation. With certain "logical" assumptions, the Boltzmann brain hypothesis is true with probability 99.99%+, but most would round this down to 50% (or better yet 0.0001%) to account for uncertainty about the "logical" assumptions.

I think excreationist is doing exactly the same. He has an argument that simulation is VERY likely, but, due to HUGE uncertainties in the modeling tempers that 99% down to about 50%.

IIUC it was Ludwig Boltzmann himself who first conceived of the Boltzmann brain hypothesis, but he didn't apply that name. Arthur Eddington and Richard Feynman are physicists who have pursued the hypothesis (but without considering it likely).

It is the (unexplained) Big Bang with its super-low entropy which renders Boltzmann brains extremely unlikely. I know of no such simple way to overturn excreationist's hypothesis.

 

[pood]

The possibility of future technologies is not evidence that we in the putative present live in a simulation,

He is not claiming to have evidence, beyond feelings, intuition and common sense.

Feelings are not a basis for calculating probabilities.

To the contrary: "Feelings" are about the ONLY way to begin to estimate probabilities for a question as difficult as this. (Note that I am not agreeing that 50% is a good estimate, just that a GUESS is all we can aspire to. What's your guess, pood? Zero?

I really don’t have a guess, a probability estimate, because there is no basis to calculate the probabilities. What I am asking for is EVIDENCE that we live in a simulation — and specifically evidence that excreationist is the only one conscious in it.

I explained earlier that to calculate a 50 percent probability we live in a simulation, you need more than one data point. You need to be able to examine, say, six universes (without knowing which one you came from) and be able to determine that three are base and three are simulations. Then you could validly say there is a 50 percent chance you live in a simulation.

 

[pood]

I think those who purport to calculate the odds that live in a simulation are deploying some form of Bayesian probability.

 

[pood]

Can we know if our universe is a simulation?

 

[pood]

Like I tried to explain in the Roy game they don't really "make" that person conscious - they just connect the external consciousness of the player into that character's senses.

So you are saying some external consciousness is cosplaying being you? But why not me, or anyone else?

What I am trying to home in on is finding an argument not so much that we all live in a simulation, but why you alone are conscious in it. Is this not what you are arguing? And I ask again, why would you think this?

 

[pood]

Your argument seems to be that there is a 50 percent chance we live in a simulation, and that you alone are conscious in it. Have I misunderstood this?

Let’s assume for the sake of argument the first clause — again, for the sake of argument. I see no good evidence for clause one, but let’s just assume it arguendo.

I am asking for justification for the second clause.

 

[bilby]

I explained earlier that to calculate a 50 percent probability we live in a simulation, you need more than one data point. You need to be able to examine, say, six universes (without knowing which one you came from) and be able to determine that three are base and three are simulations. Then you could validly say there is a 50 percent chance you live in a simulation.

Six is likely still far too small a sample for any confidence, unless we know that the total number of universes (real and simulated) is very small - but one of the premises of excreationist's argument is that there are so many simulated universes that the probability of selecting an un-simulated universe, if you chose at random, is low.

I have driven in six different countries*, and in each country, the rule is that you must drive on the left. I conclude that the rule is to drive on the left in every country, or at least that driving on the left massively predominates, and driving on the right is very rare indeed.







* England, Australia, Scotland, New Zealand, Wales, and Ireland.

 

[pood]

I explained earlier that to calculate a 50 percent probability we live in a simulation, you need more than one data point. You need to be able to examine, say, six universes (without knowing which one you came from) and be able to determine that three are base and three are simulations. Then you could validly say there is a 50 percent chance you live in a simulation.

Six is likely still far too small a sample for any confidence, unless we know that the total number of universes (real and simulated) is very small - but one of the premises of excreationist's argument is that there are so many simulated universes that the probability of selecting an un-simulated universe, if you chose at random, is low.

Yes, But what is the evidence that there are ANY simulated universes?

The Roy game is not evidence of such.

 

[pood]

My point is that to establish a probability distribution we would need to examine an ensemble of universes, some simulated and some not. But of course this is impossible. So we are left with some kind of Bayesian probability that can go either way depending one one’s prior assumptions.

But this still does not answer the question: why does @excreationist think not just that we live in a simulation at a probability of one half, but why he is the only one conscious in it?

 

[pood]

Sure, if there are billions of simulated universes and just one base reality, then the odds that we find ourselves in base reality are remote.

But what is the argument that there are billions of simulated universes? What is the evidence?

And what is the argument and evidence that in any given simulation, only ONE person is conscious?

Which just happens to be excreationist in THIS alleged simulation?

 

[pood]

What if there is more than one base reality? What if there are an infinite number of them — per, say, the many worlds interpretation of QM?

Are there then an infinite number of simulations? But how do we know that consciousness is substrate independent and can exist inside a simulation?

Why would we think that at least some of these simulations have exactly one conscious entity in them and the rest are p zombies?

We don’t know. We can’t know. All of this is pure speculation unsupported by any evidence or valid probability calculations. Great for sci-fi, though.

 

[excreationist]

Actually I'm basing it more closely on the Roy game, which you seem to be ignoring.

You’re right, I have completely ignored the Roy game and still don’t even know what it is. I prefer to keep it that way.

Then you won't understand my premises and why I reached my conclusion. I guess you'd rather just attack the Nick Bostrom straw man.

I have no interest whatsoever in video games.

It is irrelevant to this discussion because we are discussing the larger, more abstract point about whether what you are saying is even possible or the least bit plausible — principally why you alone are conscious in this allegedly simulated world, they key question which you seem to be ignoring.

The Roy game is all about that. Yet you say you "still don’t even know what it is. I prefer to keep it that way". BTW I'm sure I could explain the Roy game to most high school students after they see the video.

 

[pood]

Actually I'm basing it more closely on the Roy game, which you seem to be ignoring.

You’re right, I have completely ignored the Roy game and still don’t even know what it is. I prefer to keep it that way.

Then you won't understand my premises and why I reached my conclusion. I guess you'd rather just attack the Nick Bostrom straw man.

I have no interest whatsoever in video games.

It is irrelevant to this discussion because we are discussing the larger, more abstract point about whether what you are saying is even possible or the least bit plausible — principally why you alone are conscious in this allegedly simulated world, they key question which you seem to be ignoring.

The Roy game is all about that. Yet you say you "still don’t even know what it is. I prefer to keep it that way".

The Roy game is all about what? About why we are all in a simulation but you alone are conscious in it? Why should some stupid video game count as evidence for such an outlandish claim? Explain in your own words; I’ve no interest in silly videos.

 

[excreationist]

The Roy game is all about that. Yet you say you "still don’t even know what it is. I prefer to keep it that way".

The Roy game is all about what? About why we are all in a simulation but you alone are conscious in it? Why should some stupid video game count as evidence for such an outlandish claim? Explain in your own words; I’ve no interest in silly videos.

The relevant part of the video goes for less than 2 minutes. If you truly want to understand my beliefs you should watch the video. It shows a possible scenario about why there are simulations - they could be cheap enough so that ordinary people can play them. I already did explain a lot of it in my own words in post #854. So it's about the Roy game, not Nick Bostrom and his ancestor simulations, etc. But you'd rather than ignore the Roy game completely even when it involves watching a video that is less than 2 minutes long. The video shows a lot of aspects of it, including having a life where you work at a boring carpet store.

 

[excreationist]

But this still does not answer the question: why does @excreationist think not just that we live in a simulation at a probability of one half, but why he is the only one conscious in it?

This is where the Roy game comes in. The player's consciousness exists in their brain outside of the video game. They use a helmet so that their consciousness connects to the simulation. The simulation isn't generating a separate consciousness that exists only in the game.

 

[excreationist]

And? Is there some valid argument that the analog characters in Superman are actually conscious?? Or maybe just one — say, Jimmy Olsen — is conscious??

Maybe not really what you were talking about - but everyone in the story isn't conscious but the person reading the story has consciousness. If it is a first person story then the reader kind of shares their consciousness with the main character. They could picture what's going on and maybe share their emotions - even though it involves fictonal characters.
Note that current AI could come up with the Superman stories and dialog and draw the images to some degree.

 

[bilby]

The video shows a lot of aspects of it, including having a life where you work at a boring carpet store.

That's because the cartoon is satire.

The whole point of the joke, which you seem not to have even noticed was a joke, is that nobody would actually want to create or play a game that entails working at a boring carpet store, no matter how realistic and immersive the gameplay experience.

It simultaneously satirises both the focus of the gaming industry on better graphics, in-game physics, and sound, at the expense of making games that are fun to play; And also the idea that we are more important and significant than those around us - the idea that there might be a genuine distinction between the lead character (ourselves) and the NPCs (everyone else), that makes us the most important individuals, even in a setting where we appear to be at the bottom of the social heirarchy.

It's a metaphor, a satire, and a joke; And you are treating it as though it were a serious philosophical model of reality.

 

[excreationist]

The possibility of future technologies is not evidence that we in the putative present live in a simulation

Indeed. And why would a future individual want to live in a completely realistic simulation of the past, in the role of expendable peasant, third class?

Only someone that chose for the character to be random with no restrictions. But I think not many people would do that. Note I think a lot of those people just accepted that they were stuck in that life and weren't really depressed about it. Partly because they believed they'd go to paradise.

If the world is a simulation, and excreationist is the real person immersed therein, why the fuck did he chose to play a weird internet rando from the early 21st Century, rather than someone of historical significance, or someone from his own time who has a better life than his everyday existence?

Would you rather be me, Newton, or Nietzsche? At least I have a pretty happy marriage though I had been suicidal when I had girl problems. It could be like Alter Ego where you have a series of somewhat random life experiences. I could go on for ages about why I'd only want to be myself and not someone else. I could have prevented the mental illness and dated before the age of 29. Though if it wasn't for the 2019 mental ward stay I might not have come up with my Brutal Bible Bloodbaths game.

If you were some sad loser in the 29th century, playing a computer game set 800 years in the past, surely you would choose to play a role that could do more interesting and entertaining things with your life?

Well in Alan Watts' scenario

1.2.3. - Mythology of Hinduism - Pt. 1

I wonder, I wonder, what you would do if you had the power to dream at night, any dream you wanted to dream. And you would of course be able to alter your time-sense and slip, say seventy-five years of subjective time into eight hours of sleep. You would, I suppose, start out by []

web.archive.org

you can initially wish for anything you want - they you go on adventures rescuing princesses from dragons - then you eventually want to life an ordinary life...
In the Roy game you forget your original identity. It would be more of a pleasant surprise if you had been having a bad life in the video game.

If I could play a realistic game set in the 13th century, I would want to play a king, an emperor, or at least a character with enough clout in society to forge an entertaining life for myself, rather than choosing the role of a guy living in a leaky hovel slowly starving to death in the freezing cold - Whatever period of history my game is set in, I would want to be entertained by my simulated life, rather than driven to depression and despair by my mediocre social standing.

What about Robin William's life? He had severe depression - what if your other choice was a peasant who was pretty content?

When you play Pacman, you want to be controlling Pacman himself; Or maybe you might want to control one of the ghosts. But who would choose to control one of the little immobile dots that gets eaten; Or a short fixed segment of the maze wall?

No one I guess.

 

[pood]

But this still does not answer the question: why does @excreationist think not just that we live in a simulation at a probability of one half, but why he is the only one conscious in it?

This is where the Roy game comes in. The player's consciousness exists in their brain outside of the video game. They use a helmet so that their consciousness connects to the simulation. The simulation isn't generating a separate consciousness that exists only in the game.

So you are being simulated by someone donning a helmet?

 

[excreationist]

The video shows a lot of aspects of it, including having a life where you work at a boring carpet store.

That's because the cartoon is satire.

Apparently 1984 is a satire too. Anyway if I say that my beliefs are much closer to a satirical cartoon than Nick Bostrom then the counter-arguments should be against the Roy game cartoon. My beliefs about God also partly come from a cartoon:

God and the Bible - Life's Player

Is the Bible 100% true and moral? Does the supernatural exist?

lifesplayer.com

The whole point of the joke, which you seem not to have even noticed was a joke, is that nobody would actually want to create or play a game that entails working at a boring carpet store, no matter how realistic and immersive the gameplay experience.

It is about a plausible real life. Real lives always contain unpleasant parts and the carpet store isn't that bad and it was bearable. The video shows that the player was able to not return to the carpet store - which makes the game more interesting because different players can compare their experiences. Some people find school very boring - but that is just a fairly normal part of a real life.

It simultaneously satirises both the focus of the gaming industry on better graphics, in-game physics, and sound, at the expense of making games that are fun to play; And also the idea that we are more important and significant than those around us - the idea that there might be a genuine distinction between the lead character (ourselves) and the NPCs (everyone else), that makes us the most important individuals, even in a setting where we appear to be at the bottom of the social heirarchy.

It's a metaphor, a satire, and a joke; And you are treating it as though it were a serious philosophical model of reality.

Yes I am. It is more entertaining that way. It is filled with a lot of insights into the kind of simulated life I think is plausible - and packs more into under 2 minutes than is in a longer paper/essay.

For some people playing the Roy game it would be about:
"Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get"
i.e. they didn't know about the carpet store before they decided to play it.