Are we really living in a virtual world?

Mankind has become so deep in high technologies and virtual reality that first assumptions (not from ordinary inhabitants, but from well-known physicists and cosmologists) that our Universe is not reality, but only a giant simulation of reality appeared. Should we think about this seriously, or should we take such promises as the next plot of a fantastic film?

You are real? And what about me?

Once upon a time these were purely philosophical issues. Scientists were just trying to figure out how the world works. But now the inquiries of inquisitive minds have gone to a different plane. A whole series of physicists, cosmologists and technologists amuse themselves with the idea that we all live inside a giant computer model, being nothing but a part of the matrix. It turns out that we exist in a virtual world, which we mistakenly consider to be real.

Of course, our instincts revolt. All this is too real to be a simulation. The weight of a cup in my hand, the aroma of coffee, the sounds around me - how can you forge such a wealth of experience?

But at the same time there is extraordinary progress in the field of computer science and information technology over the past few decades. Computers gave us games with supernatural realism, with autonomous characters that react to our actions. And we unwittingly plunge into virtual reality - a kind of simulator with a huge force of persuasion.

This is enough to make a person paranoid.

In life - like in a movie

The idea of a virtual world as a human dwelling place was presented to us with unprecedented clarity by the Hollywood blockbuster "Matrix". In this story, people are blocked in the virtual world so much that they perceive it as a reality. A science-fiction nightmare - the prospect of being trapped in the universe born in our minds - can be traced further, for example, in the films by David Cronenberg's "Video Screen" (1983) and "Brazil" by Terry Gilliam (1985).

All these anti-utopias gave rise to a number of questions: what is true here, and what is fiction? Are we living in error, or delusion - a virtual universe, the idea of which is imposed by paranoics from science?

In June 2016, a high-tech entrepreneur, Elon Mask, said that the odds are "one billion to one" against us living in a "basic reality."

After him, the guru of artificial intelligence, Ray Kurzweil suggested that "maybe the whole of our universe is a scientific experiment of some young schoolboy from another universe."

By the way, some physicists are ready to consider this possibility. In April 2016, the issue was discussed at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

Evidence?

Adherents of the idea of a virtual universe give at least two arguments in favor of the fact that we can not live in the real world. So, the cosmologist Alan Guth assumes that our Universe can be real, but for the time being something like a laboratory experiment. The idea is that it was created by some kind of superintelligence, similar to how biologists grow colonies of microorganisms.

In principle, there is nothing that excludes the possibility of "making" the universe with the help of an artificial Big Bang - says Gut. Moreover, the Universe in which the new one was born was not destroyed. Just created a new "bubble" of space-time, which was possible to pinch away from the maternal universe and lose contact with it. This scenario could have some varieties. For example, the universe could have been born in some equivalent of a test tube.

However, there is a second scenario, which can negate all our ideas about reality.

It consists in the fact that we are completely modeled beings. We can be nothing more than a string of information manipulated by a gigantic computer program, like heroes in a video game. Even our brain is imitated and reacts to imitations of sensory inputs.

From this point of view, there is no matrix of "flight from". This is where we live, and this is our only chance to "live" at all.

But why believe in such an opportunity?

The argument is quite simple: we have already produced a simulation. We carry out computer modeling not only in games, but also in scientific research. Scientists are trying to model aspects of the world at different levels - from subatomic to whole societies or galaxies.

For example, computer modeling of animals can tell how they develop, what kind of behavior they have. Other simulators help us understand how planets, stars and galaxies form.

We can also imitate human society with the help of fairly simple "agents" who make choices according to certain rules. This gives us an understanding of how cooperation between people and companies takes place, how cities develop, how traffic rules and the economy work, and much more.

These models are becoming more complex. Who will say that we can not create virtual beings that show signs of consciousness? Progress in understanding the functions of the brain, as well as extensive quantum computations make this prospect increasingly probable.

If we ever reach this level, a huge number of models will work for us. They will be much more than the inhabitants of the "real" world around us.

And why not assume that some other mind in the universe has already reached this point?

The idea of the multiverse

No one denies the existence of many universes formed in the same way as the Big Bang. However, parallel universes are quite a speculative idea, suggesting that our universe is just a model whose parameters have been refined to give interesting results such as stars, galaxies and people.

So we got to the heart of the matter. If reality is just information, then we can not be "real," information is everything that we can be. And is there any difference, was this information programmed by nature or super-master creator? Apparently, in any case, our authors can in principle interfere with the results of modeling or even "turn off" the process. How should we treat this?

And yet we will return to our reality

Of course, we like the joke of the cosmologist Kurzweil about that ingenious teenager from another universe that programmed our world. And most adherents of the idea of virtual reality proceed from the fact that now the 21st century, we make computer games, and not the fact that someone does not do super-beings.

There is no doubt that many supporters of "universal modeling" are avid fans of science fiction films. But we know deep down that the notion of reality is what we experience, not some hypothetical world.

Old as the World

Today is an age of high technology. However, over the questions of reality and unreality philosophers fought for centuries.

Plato asked himself the question: what if what we perceive as reality is only a shadow projected on the walls of the cave? Immanuel Kant argued that the world around can be some kind of "thing in itself," which underlies the visions we perceive. Rene Descartes, with his famous phrase "I think, therefore I am," proved that the ability to think is the only significant criterion of existence that we can attest to.

The concept of the "modeled world" takes this ancient philosophical idea as a basis. There is no harm in the latest technologies and hypotheses. Like many philosophical riddles, they encourage us to reconsider our assumptions and prejudices.

But while no one can prove that we exist only virtually, no new ideas do not change our concept of reality to a large extent.

In the early 1700s, the philosopher George Berkeley argued that the world is just an illusion. In response, the English writer Samuel Johnson exclaimed: "I refute it like this!" - and kicked the stone with his foot.