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this post was submitted on 31 Oct 2025
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Very simple fix for that perceived contradiction: A simulation doesn't need to simulate everything. All it needs to simulate is the inputs and outputs perceived by a single human being, the observer, me.
For me it would be indistinguishable if the universe I am living in is real, if it's a simulation or if it doesn't exist at all and instead only the things I can perceive are simulated.
Simulating the perception of a single human being should be in the reach of our current calculation power.
Kind of how in a computer game only areas around a player are simulated.
"In order to bake an apple pie from scratch, you first have to create the universe"
If you don't create the universe, then you aren't really making an apple pie from scratch. In the same way, what you're referring to doesn't simulate the universe - not in the way that it is simulated in the simulacrum hypothesis.
In the simulacrum hypothesis, the entire universe is simulated. You exist entirely inside the simulation rather than being merely plugged into it, and so do I and so does every other consciousness that exists.