Here's an idea.
No Man's Sky can help us think through the question of whether
or not we are currently living in a simulation.
Soon, glob willing, the universe-exploring video game
No Man's Sky will be released.
Developed by Hello games and skippered by Sean Murray,
No Man's Sky has been an object of wonder, curiosity,
and impatience since its announcement in 2013.
If you've miss the hype, here is the intergalactic dirt.
No Man's Sky is gigantic.
Players traverse an entire simulated universe exploring
procedurally generated planets.
There's practically no limit to what you can see.
Murray estimates that players will
see maybe 1% of what the game is capable of generating.
And on top of that, much of the appearance and behavior
of things in that universe, planets, plants, creatures,
light itself, it's emergent.
The creators didn't decide how stuff looks or behaves
on a planet-by-planet basis.
They made systems and rules that generate stuff and decide
what happens when various stuffs mingle.
Appearances and outcomes aren't designed, they emerge.
Like one of my all time favorite games,
Dwarf Fortress, even the creators themselves
can't say exactly what'll happen.
Unlike Dwarf Fortress though, No Man's Sky is beautiful.
OK, I take it back.
Dwarf Fortress is beautiful too, but No Man's Sky
is lush, naturalistic, detailed, even occasionally lifelike.
The particulars of how they did this
are beyond the scope of this video,
but "Atlantic" wrote a great piece and "Game Show"
did a video about it last year.
I hope it suffices to say the answer is math, algorithms,
formulas, processing power.
So all of this raises two questions.
The first we've asked before.
If math makes environments, does that
mean math is a feature of the universe?
Our second question is the following.
If we are able to simulate universes of massive lifelike
complexity, like that of No Man's Sky, within our universe,
should we wonder or worry that our own massive lifelike
universe is itself simulated.
And if it is, what does that mean?
That "Atlantic" article that I mentioned
scratches the surface of this idea,
but we're going to try to get near the bedrock, or at least
the substratum.
If you know where we're headed with this,
I think simulation or not, the argument
alone has an important function which No Man's Sky
can help us think through.
If you don't know where we're headed,
hold onto your potentially simulated butts.
Between 2001 and 2003 philosopher Nick Bostrom
put forth his influential simulation argument.
He claims are lives and universe are potentially
a computer simulation run by a post-human civilization, one
in the distant future and much more technologically
advanced than our own.
Our universe could be what he calls an ancestor
simulation, a simulation of the entire mental history
of humankind.
So how does Bostrom actually get to this conclusion?
Actually, he comes to three exhaustive,
mutually exclusive conclusions.
Meaning we'll necessarily arrive at one of these three outcomes
and only one of these three outcomes.
Those outcomes are, one, the number
of human-level civilizations that
reach a post-human stage is practically zero.
Two, the number of post-human civilizations
that are interested in running ancestor simulations
is practically zero.
Or three, our universe, including our lives
and experiences, is simulated.
Bostrom lays out his reasoning pretty succinctly.
The original paper is pretty readable
if you want to check it out.
But basically, if humanity doesn't go extinct,
which is roughly speaking his outcome number one,
the rapid increase in the realism of simulations
in our own time--
[COUGHS]
No Man's Sky-- suggests that super future simulations
would be exceptionally realistic, especially if we
ever get to the point where we're
operating a planetary mass computers,
if we aren't already.
And what's more, as our ability to simulate grows,
it seems our interest does too.
In order for outcome two be the case,
something would have to dissuade post-humans
from running a potentially infinite number
of powerful simulations, including ancestor simulations.
As of right now, it seems likely that if we can, we will.
And if we will, does that mean that we, you and me right now,
are simulated?
I'm a computer.
Bostrom himself puts it at about a 20% chance,
but lots of smart folks say, yeah, definitely.
Futurist Ray Kurzweil questions whether there's even
a distinction between reality and simulation.
Elon Musk recently said the chances
that we are not living in a simulation
are one in a billion.
Also that he and his brother have
agreed to not discuss the simulation argument in hot tubs
makes me wonder what the Musk family holiday
get-togethers are like.
We would such conversations if we were ever in a hot tub.
So at this point, you may be thinking, OK, sure,
maybe No Man's Sky is a step in this direction.
But yeah, this sounds like something
that you argue with your brother about,
potentially in a hot tub, I guess.
Does any of this really matter?
The simulation argument does have implications it turns out.
One could be that all of that this is literally immaterial,
and whatever great mistakes we make again and again
won't be so bad that a little flip of the reset button
wouldn't set it all right.
Another is if we, by some chance,
end up the ones creating civilization simulations,
is there some moral slash ethical imperative
to create a lifelike simulation better than our reality?
And if so, how do we deal with the existence of simulations
better than the real world, which
is especially interesting given the recent rise
of virtual reality.
Also implied by the simulation argument
is the existence of-- brace yourselves-- a higher power.
If we're in a simulation, the simulation a
must have a creator, or a programmer, or at
the very least maintenance staff.
Bostrom is quick to point out these figures would probably
be naturalistic.
They wouldn't be transcendent beings of pure light
unless evolution gets real weird real quick.
But still, they would be literally creators.
This does something really interesting, I think.
The idea of reality reset switches better
than worlds and creator figures especially.
It all turns of the world, our world, the universe really,
a highly complex thing about which we are constantly
developing a deeply rational and scientific understanding,
into something like a story, like a sci-fi or fantasy story
or video game as the case may be.
How so?
Well, No Man's Sky exists because we understand
how the information that flows in an endless sea
of for-real natural systems gives rise
to their emergent characteristics
and interactions.
Whether they're made by math or not,
we can use that math to faithfully or near
faithfully model those things.
And those models are astounding.
Where the forest near where I grew up is just a forest,
a No Man's Sky forest is an enchanted forest.
Its artificiality makes it special, sort of magical.
The environments of No Man's Sky are enchanted
because we humans made them.
A human is its creator figure or, at the very least,
its maintenance staff.
The simulation argument, I think,
functions similarly to No Man's Sky.
It marries the rational and the enchanted,
but on an infinite scale.
And it provides access to two potentially conflicting
attitudes.
On the one hand, it supports a scientific understanding
of our world.
It doesn't replace physics or biology.
It explains their existence via simulation,
another deeply scientific process,
one involving computers, and they're the most rational
of all the things.
They're built on logic literally.
But on the other hand, though we may follow the empirical logic
from computers are powerful and make simulations
to computers will get more powerful
and make better simulations, we end up
at a conclusion that is ultimately and inarguably
fantastic.
Maybe that real forest is artificial.
Maybe we're simulated.
It's an argument for a kind of techno moralism, transcendence,
and even creator figure, which is rooted
in technology and experience.
It enchants reality.
Of course, some folks aren't so enchanted.
Talking with inverse philosopher and neuroscientist
Ned Block says, consciousness is necessarily
embodied having to do with, quote, electrochemical
processes in the brain, something more complex
than even super future quantum computers could do, he says.
And besides, he also says, just as a simulation of a rainstorm
isn't wet, there's no reason that a simulation
of conscious experience would be conscious experience.
Like a good science fiction story,
maybe the simulation argument just
takes what is the case and extrapolates
out to what appears likely even if it's not.
And I mean, even if it were likely,
the weird truth may be that ancestor simulations sit
at the crossroads of complicated, expensive,
and boring for whoever the audience is.
My hometown nature preserve isn't
enchanting because I live it.
No Man's Sky's forest is enchanting because I play it.
That's an important distinction.
No Man's Sky may be notable for how big
and detailed and potentially lifelike it is,
but in order to justify the resources it took to make it
and to keep it running, it's going
to have to be good and entertaining.
Which I mean, time will tell, I guess.
Maybe I'm being cynical, but I think
the same would go for ancestor simulations.
Following the simulation argument's own logic,
computers will become more powerful, sure, but also more
power hungry.
US data centers alone tripled their power needs from 2000
to 2013, so we can imagine that the resources needed
to simulate, you know, everything
would be unimaginable.
And sure, OK. maybe someday post-scarcity, free energy,
well-funded research, the simulation is the power source
and Neo is the one, there is no spoon,
but now we are stacking speculative super future
scenarios.
So heck it, let's just all agree to become transcendent beings
of pure light.
Seriously though, I just think it's more likely
that an ancestor simulation would be ad supported,
you know, like reality.
Hi, it's Vince with Slap Chop.
You're gonna be in a great mood all day.
Simulated existence is most likely, I think,
if it's appealing, and life, our lives at least,
they may be dramatic.
But they aren't entertaining.
The growing intricacy of modern video games
supports this point about as much
as it supports the technological aspects of the simulation
argument itself.
For all their visual complexity, there's
a point of diminishing returns when
it comes to mechanical or environmental complexity.
Writing for "Gamasutra," RimWorld developer Tynan
Sylvester put it pretty well.
He says, we can't blindly simulate everything
because most things are boring, and people can't understand
over complex systems anyways.
Writing for "Backchannel," Logan Hill puts it very succinctly
and says, I can't imagine an exec who
would green light this planet.
Really for most people, deep down,
I don't think the simulation argument
is about what's actual, though it's often dressed that way.
I think we're talking conveniently
about what's virtual.
We're talking, as Michael Saler put
it in his book of the same name, "As If", it were the case.
The simulation argument brings our lived experiences
closer to No Man's Sky or Minecraft or, well,
hopefully not Dwarf Fortress.
The simulation argument enchants the actual world
like it's a video game without requiring we sacrifice
our modern science-based, or at least science-themed,
sensibilities.
No Man's Sky, at the same, time provides a whole universe
interior to our own, a literally virtual one
to explore from the comfort of our homes.
Imagine what's next.
Perhaps living in that universe?
No Man's Sky provides a view to endless simulated planets,
sure, but also a view to games which function like life.
And who doesn't want life to be like a game?
What do y'all think?
Do we live in a simulation?
Is there something about No Man's Sky and
all of the games that are probably
going to come in its wake that lets us think through what
it might be to live in a simulation
or to create simulations?
Let us know in the comments, and I will respond to some of them
in next week's comment response video.
In this week's comment response,
we talk about your thoughts regarding cyborgs.
If you want to watch that one, you
can click here or find a link in the doobly doo.
We are going to be taking next week off,
so the next Idea Channel video you see
will be out the week of the 15th.
But in the meantime, over on the subreddit,
we've been talking about maybe starting an Idea Channel book
club.
And it looks like something that we're
interested in starting with is maybe a Borges short story.
So I'm going to write some updates about that this week
and next, and maybe we'll get that rolling.
So check in over on the subreddit
if you are interested in that.
In addition to the subreddit, we also
have a Facebook and an IRC.
Links to all those things in the doobly doo.
And the tweet of the week comes from dooman01
who points us towards Left 4 Bazinga, which continues
the trend of creatively skinned video game videos
that we started with the Dark Souls of Crabs.
I feel like maybe there's a playlist in the works here.
Anyways, Bazinga, it does involve "Big Bang Theory."
I didn't think I would want to see this video.
I grinned.
I bore it, beared it.
I don't regret it.