Is God a C++ programmer?

Jon

Administrator
Staff member
#1
I listened to an interesting concept last night, cleverly described by Russell Brand of all people, the comedian and actor for the uninitiated.

He was talking about the Simulation Hypothesis, where a significant number of smart people believe the probability of us being in a simulation is greater than the probability of us not being in one. Russell said that legitimacy of this being taken as a more rational thought is due to its link to technology. We build computers, we run simulations on them, these simulations (if advanced enough) could run their own simulations and so on into oblivion. There is nothing esoteric about this, thus appealing to those who don't believe in God due to its apparently sound reasoning.

But wait, how is that not different to there being a God, except for pedantic semantics? Our creator would instead be a geeky pimpled teenager of enormous proportions, rather than the bearded deity who imposes endless bizarre rules which conflict from religion to religion. He bangs out endless C++ code on his buggy old laptop, thus being the master of his own universe.

The concept of there being a creator has been around from year dot, yet to the modern scientific mind it only appears more rational once we introduce the concept of being in a simulation.

And so I had seen the light. Thank you Russell Brand for pointing out that God may indeed be currently addicted to playing Pokemon, while forgetting about the next impending typhoon about to decimate the Philippines.
 
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The_Doc_Man

Founding Member
#2
Though these stories might sometimes be hard to find, may I offer for anyone's reading enjoyment:

Robert A Heinlein's short story, "The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag"

Isaac Asimov's short story, "The Final Question"

They are relevant to Jon's question regarding reality not being quite what it seems. Actually, it is quite easy to explain disasters in Jon's scenario. I can see the "heavenly conversation" now.

Mom: "Junior, I have told you three times now. Clean you room and take out the trash."

Junior: "Awww, MOM, come on. It's only waist deep and just a little dusty. I've got plenty of room. Besides, I'm busy with this simulation. I've just introduced a simulant who can give the other simulants some advice about the rules of the simulation environment. Right now, he's just a little bit ill-defined. It has gotten messy. Ah, that 's the way these things work."

Mom: "You just don't get it, do you? Cleanliness is next to godliness! Clean your room! NOW!!!!!"

Junior: "But Mom, I've got a lot of work to do on this simulation project. Don't you want me to get a good grade on it?"

Mom: "That's it, young man - I'll take NO MORE BACKTALK. Turn off your computer. No privileges for a week."

Junior: "But Mom, my project is still running. If I shut it down, everything will reset. Last week when you interrupted me, it simulated a flood and I couldn't get back in time to stop it. I almost lost all of my simulants. I'll get a lousy grade if that happens. It has taken me days of work to get everything back to a stable situation."

Mom (grudingly): "OK, you can leave the computer running - but give me the keyboard, mouse, and display. Let it run on its own for a while."

Junior: "But MOM, the little simulants will forget the rules! They will rebel against my information-giver. They get pretty violent when left to themselves because of that pesky free-will requirement that the teach added to the goals."

Mom: "I SAID NOW, Mister. Give me the input devices and get to work on cleaning your pig-sty of a room. Your little simulants will have to get along without you for a while. Any more backtalk and I'll pull the plug. Then BANG you'll have to start all over again"

(Sorry, the scene just popped into my head and I couldn't hold it back...) :giggle:
 

Bee

Founding Member
#3
Doc, I'm always grateful to receive short story recommendations, so thank you. And on that subject - I think you could turn the above into a short story, or even flash fiction.
 

Jon

Administrator
Staff member
#8
I don't have time to read novels. I did start on The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand. I found it very complicated! The style of writing was hard to read. But I read something about critics of this "novel", to the extent that they are in fact misunderstanding it. Consider Plato's works. I believe they are told as stories? Questionmark because I am not 100% sure but think they might be. No one complains about his storytelling but they have become important milestones in the thought of mankind.

The beauty in the work is the philosophical insight, rather than linguistic beauty.
 
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