Unless you, dear reader, are a web-scraping software bot quietly pulling this text into a data-hungry LLM, you’re probably a human. And though you’ve likely never seen me in person, you have good reason to believe I’m human, too. But we don’t know one another exist, for sure. In fact, we have no definitive proof that anything is conscious beyond ourselves—a clunkier analogue to René Descartes’ famous dictum: Cogito, ergo sum — “I think, therefore I am.”
Forget one another—what if none of it’s real? Not our coworkers, the trees, the constellations—not even ourselves? That’s a question Gizmodo recently posed to a slew of experts across the fields of computer science, philosophy, social psychology, and neuroscience.
For this Giz Asks, we asked these experts a straightforward question: How do we know we’re not living in a computer simulation? Their answers—varied and nuanced—offer thought-provoking insights into a question much older than computers themselves, yet one that has remained compelling, if not obsessive, for thinkers through the centuries. With so much technological innovation happening right now, it’s only natural to consider the age-old question with greater scrutiny. We’re creating technology so uncanny, it seems like it will climb out of the valley and dust itself off. Strange, surreal times—the perfect time, I would suggest, to ask how we know what is real at all. Some responses are lightly edited for clarity.
For all we know we are, in fact, in a vast computer simulation. Here’s a version of the simulation argument that I am fond of. Suppose that the commonly held view in astrobiology that there is life on other worlds is correct. Further suppose that at least some of these life forms evolve to become technologically sophisticated, developing artificial intelligence to such a degree that they run sophisticated computer simulations. Now, if there are only two civilizations out there that do this, the chances are 2 to 1 that you are in a computer simulation now!
Of course, there are many issues with this version of the argument, and those like it, well worth debating. Can consciousness be something that is simulated by a computer? Is it possible to build highly sophisticated AIs, such as quantum computers capable of simulating Earth? Do civilizations survive long enough to develop such technologies, or do they hit some sort of wall or ‘great filter’ in their development. Indeed, perhaps life does not even exist on other planets. (Of course perhaps we are being simulated by future Earthlings, as in the Matrix.) The jury is out, and the issue is a fascinating issue indeed!
