1 - Cosmyk
- Member
Offline - Registered: 8/29/2018
- Posts: 18
Virtual Reality Conjecture
Hey, guys. This is going to be my last post regarding the simulation hypothesis. If you're not interested in the simulation hypothesis, or you think it's silly or not worth your time, just ignore this post.
A PhD named Brian Whitworth has published an interesting paper arguing certain physical phenomena are better explained by virtual reality rather than by objective reality. Whitworth is neither a philosopher nor a physicist, and one should probably take his words with a grain of salt. Nevertheless, I find his "Virtual Reality Conjecture" interesting and worth considering. He points out many similarities between our world and a virtual world, such as our world having a maximum velocity, quantum tunneling, and observer effects in quantum mechanics. Virtual reality, he would say, explains why all of these features are present in our world, while objective reality would say it is a large coincidence.
Right now, I find simulation theory to be the biggest threat to Theism and Christianity in particular. I would greatly appreciate anyone's thoughts on this paper. Thanks!
- RomanJoe
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 5/01/2017
- Posts: 486
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
Cosmyk wrote:
Hey, guys. This is going to be my last post regarding the simulation hypothesis. If you're not interested in the simulation hypothesis, or you think it's silly or not worth your time, just ignore this post.
A PhD named Brian Whitworth has published an interesting paper arguing certain physical phenomena are better explained by virtual reality rather than by objective reality. Whitworth is neither a philosopher nor a physicist, and one should probably take his words with a grain of salt. Nevertheless, I find his "Virtual Reality Conjecture" interesting and worth considering. He points out many similarities between our world and a virtual world, such as our world having a maximum velocity, quantum tunneling, and observer effects in quantum mechanics. Virtual reality, he would say, explains why all of these features are present in our world, while objective reality would say it is a large coincidence.
Right now, I find simulation theory to be the biggest threat to Theism and Christianity in particular. I would greatly appreciate anyone's thoughts on this paper. Thanks!
Why do you think it's a threat to theism?
- Cosmyk
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 8/29/2018
- Posts: 18
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
Why do you think it's a threat to theism?
If we live in some kind of simulation, we could not know much about the world that simulates our world. The premises of the Classical arguments would be cast into doubt, because we could be fooled by the simulation about them. Maybe there is some way to make them work, but very little has been written attempting to do that.
- •
Thread Starter- RomanJoe
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 5/01/2017
- Posts: 486
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
Why do you think it's a threat to theism?
If we live in some kind of simulation, we could not know much about the world that simulates our world. The premises of the Classical arguments would be cast into doubt, because we could be fooled by the simulation about them. Maybe there is some way to make them work, but very little has been written attempting to do that.
So maybe it's the case that the metaphysical principles that govern reality are completely different than those that govern the virtual world?
- RomanJoe
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 5/01/2017
- Posts: 486
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
It really is an epistemological issue. How can we have knowledge of the workings of reality if we are deluded by a virtual one? I'll think on this. One of my initial reactions would be to question whether or not rational beings that inhabit a reality that isn't governed by something like the PSR or POC could devise a virtual one in which something like it is true. Could they even conceive of something like PSR or POC?
- Cosmyk
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 8/29/2018
- Posts: 18
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
Why do you think it's a threat to theism?
If we live in some kind of simulation, we could not know much about the world that simulates our world. The premises of the Classical arguments would be cast into doubt, because we could be fooled by the simulation about them. Maybe there is some way to make them work, but very little has been written attempting to do that.
So maybe it's the case that the metaphysical principles that govern reality are completely different than those that govern the virtual world?
Yes, or maybe no metaphysical principles govern the base reality, or metaphysical principles so different from those we are framiliar with they are incomprehensible to us.
- •
Thread Starter- Cosmyk
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 8/29/2018
- Posts: 18
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
It really is an epistemological issue. How can we have knowledge of the workings of reality if we are deluded by a virtual one? I'll think on this. One of my initial reactions would be to question whether or not rational beings that inhabit a reality that isn't governed by something like the PSR or POC could devise a virtual one in which something like it is true. Could they even conceive of something like PSR or POC?
I think if we did discover ourselves to be living in a simulation, we would have no idea what the intentions of our simulators are. I think it is best to find reason why we are not living in a simulation. Possibly, metaphysics could be done on simulated objects. I think deducing the First Principles from within the simulation would be our best option.
- •
Thread Starter- RomanJoe
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 5/01/2017
- Posts: 486
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
It's possible that in a reality where PSR doesn't hold, it would be impossible to construct a virtual reality where PSR (or any other metaphysical principle absent in base reality) could hold. The virtual simulated reality is a part of base reality. Why should the simulation consistently behave in accordance with a programmed PSR if it really is, fundamentally, operating within the metaphysics of the ~PSR base reality? We aren't dealing with two separated realities, the virtual reality is a product of the base reality and thus is adherent to whatever natural principles base reality has. Why should simulated flame always follow the simulated striking of a match? Why should the simulated explanandum always have a correlative simulated explanans?
- Hypatia
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 3/24/2018
- Posts: 69
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
Why do you think it's a threat to theism?
If we live in some kind of simulation, we could not know much about the world that simulates our world. The premises of the Classical arguments would be cast into doubt, because we could be fooled by the simulation about them. Maybe there is some way to make them work, but very little has been written attempting to do that.
It might affect cosmological arguments (though no more so than any other version of epistemological skepticism), but if the line of ontological arguments can be made to work, they should work as well in a virtual reality as in an objective one. Arguments from consciousness are also equally powerful, since self-aware virtual programs are as difficult to explain as self-aware material objects, and things like qualia are if anything an even poorer fit with the virtual conjecture.
- ficino
- Member
Offline
- Registered: 9/27/2017
- Posts: 188
Re: Virtual Reality Conjecture
Cosmyk's OP reminds me of one stage in the debate between Feser and Keith Parsons. Parsons said that the PSR does not do the work that its proponents think it does:
" It is one thing to think that things have sufficient reasons; it is something else entirely to say that we are in the epistemological position to discover them. We might go wrong every time we think that we have found the sufficient reason for anything."