Despite the age and immensity of the Universe, we have not been visited nor been contacted by extraterrestrial beings because we are a part of a computer simulation. According to the Simulation Hypothesis, theory provided by Nick Bostrom, humans are unaware of being part of this computer generated simulation. The most compelling piece of evidence that supports this hypothesis is the fact to one can consider a sequence of possible situations which an increasing fraction of all people live in simulations becomes more accurate. (Bostrom 1) Nick Bostrom’s studies conclude that a “technologically mature ‘posthuman’ civilization would have enormous computing power”. If this were the case, and the posthuman civilization were able to produce “ancestor simulations,” the number of ancestors would “greatly exceed the total number of actual ancestors”. SO according to Bostrom, one of the following theories is most certainly true: (1) The fraction of human level civilization that reach a posthuman stage is very close to zero, (2) the fraction of posthuman civilizations is very close to zero, or (3) the fraction of all people with our kind of experiences that are living in a simulation is very close to one. In fact, if theory number 3 is correct, we are most certainly living in a simulation. To counter argue, many philosophers disagree with this approach; calling it a “metaphysical hypothesis” rather than a skeptical one. These …show more content…
To conclude, according to Nick Bostrom’s take on the Simulation hypothesis, at least one of the three theories are valid. (1) human species are very likely to go extinct before reaching a posthuman stage, (2) any posthuman civilization is extremely unlikely to run a significant number of simulations of their evolutionary history or we are almost certainly living in a computer
1. Suppose a researcher wants to design a new study with a power of 0.8 and a significance of 0.05 to test whether the caffeine content for a brand of coffee is really 100mg. A previous study gave a mean caffeine level for this brand of 110 mg and a standard deviation of 7 mg. Use PROC POWER to determine how many cups of coffee need testing.
Think about the last time you sent a text in order to communicate with another person. You may have been under the impression that you were talking with someone, but in reality you were simply pressing down on your phone and watching the pixels on the screen move. According to Jean Baudrillard’s ideologies, you were the mere product of a simulation. In “Simulacra and Simulations” and “Simulacra and Science Fiction”, author and sociologist Jean Baudrillard explains this phenomenon by exploring the concept of simulacrum and simulations. Baudrillard argues that we live in a simulation that is more real than reality, and thus no longer even bears a resemblance to reality. In other words, the reality we think we know is really just an illusion. One movie with an exceptional amount of parallels to Baudrillard’s ideologies is The Matrix, directed by the Wachowskis. Many people believe that foundation of The Matrix’s plot is based off Baudrillard’s philosophies, however this has been met with numerous counterarguments. While The Matrix’s plot may correspond with many Baudrillard’s beliefs, it is my belief that The Matrix is not solely based on Baudrillard’s works but instead incorporates ideas from a variety of different sources.
Uncertainty of what seemed the clear distinction between the simulated and the real: No clear line between the artificial and the real
At the point of Q1,I chose the workhorse as my first target segment. This is because workhouse is the medium kind of computer, customers will be much more than the other two. People talked about easy to use, low price, after sale service and support and other staffs to pick computers.
It sounds like using the stratified random sampling would be a good choice for using a particular group of people. In stratified random sampling the individuals conducting the research know some things about the community that is providing date such as age, gender, ethnicity, and medical diagnosis. This is also a good option when there is a time restraint to obtain the information that is being gathered. The survey would also have to be ensured it is written in a way that the average person can clearly understand the question to get a proper answer.
I thought about the immediacy of the simulation through eyewitness accounts and thought that it may have to do with the catastrophic characteristics that the event had possessed and would potentially possess.
Exercise 1: Cell Transport Mechanisms and Permeability: Activity 2: Simulated Facilitated Diffusion Lab Report Pre-lab Quiz Results You scored 100% by answering 4 out of 4 questions correctly. 1. Molecules need a carrier protein to help them move across a membrane because You correctly answered: d. they are lipid insoluble or they are too large. 2. Which of the following is true of facilitated diffusion? You correctly answered: c. Movement is passive and down a concentration gradient. 3. Examples of solutes that might require facilitated diffusion include You correctly answered: d. all of the above. 4. Which of the following would not affect the rate of facilitated diffusion? You correctly answered: a. the amount of intracellular ATP
I chose the issue of differentiating simulation from reality because I am passionate about considering the effects of developing A.I. without thinking of the consequences of creating something that could harm us. Jon Kofas states in Artificial Intelligence: Socioeconomic, Political and Ethical Dimensions: “Cyberculture that has created virtual communities raises philosophical questions about identity, relationships, values, the withering of real community culture, and lifestyles that will largely be determined by the AI industry” (Kofas). Kofas’s concerns revolving around the growing cyberculture reflects similar concerns of my own. Cloudhive, the company that develops IMAGINE technology, creates a product so powerful that they violate the
I lived my childhood surrounded by robotic servants, raised by them to have everything I needed as ordered by my mother. I never set foot outside the floating Theta-Fortress, and only sometimes did I look through the window of the observatory on the 404th level, and only sometimes did I think of the trillions of people living
Some people believe we're living in a computer simulation. Some thinks it's as far as we are disembodied brains floating around connected to wires, or more like the Matrix. There are many theories supporting the idea of us living in a computer simulation but also a lot that disprove this argument. When you really think about, maybe it doesn't seem like such a crazy theory after all. There's so many things that can't be explained that would only make sense if we were
Simulation theory is supported by research on autism. Autistic people are unable to ‘mind- read’ or attribute mental states to others, and this causes great difficulties with predicting behaviour and navigating the social world . According to theory-theory, autistic people lack propositional knowledge this is why they cannot mind read. FP is a theory and Autistic people unfortunately did not learn it like the rest of us, because they lack the ability to empathise and to put themselves into other people’s shoes or pretend play . This lends support to the simulation theory, because we know independently that autistic people tend to lack empathy and imaginative capacity. On the other hand, they do not seem to have many problems with theorizing. Indeed many autistic people are quite skilled with technical and theoretical things
In my personal philosophy paper, I copied an earlier class note that stated, “ethics consultation is an embodied activity which requires moral imagination.” After taking this course and being able to be part of various simulations, I do take this statement to be true. With only a short role description in hand, I had to bring each person I played to life. I had to imagine what it feels like to be in another person’s shoes. However, one thing that I noticed that was difference between the simulations and the improvisation that we did in class was that in improvisation, there are no wrong answers, no wrong movements. In simulations, what I said did matter. Not only that, but body language mattered as well, especially when I became fully embodied
In this video, NASA must make a major decision that their outcome can affects a large group of society, some decision like NASA or congress can be very tough because it can have a disaster outcome for everyone.
“All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace: Part 2” highlights the main theory of cybernetics, and all of its faults. This second episode looks at how ecological theories would later inform the growth of computer systems. This episode further discusses how mechanical concepts such as cybernetics and systems theory were once applied to natural ecosystems, and how this relates to the false idea that nature is perfectly balanced. Cybernetics is a fantasy view of nature. A monstrous push was made for cybernetics to be applied to humanity as a way of building societies with no central control. This idea of a self organized
Some of the strongest claims to support the theory that our reality is a simulated one comes from the fact that the universe can be described mathematically (Moskowitz). Massachusetts Institute of Technology cosmologist Max Tegmark insists that the reason our universe is highly mathematical could be a result of it being a simulation (Moskowitz). Additionally, James Gates, a theoretical physicist at the University of Maryland, found equations similar to those used for particles such as quarks and electrons in the code he was writing (Moskowitz). Such similarities between our world and computer code might indicate that the fabric of the universe is a virtual creation.