Why would there have to be any awareness on the simulator's part for our existence? The simulation, if true, and seen as we can study so far into the macro and micro, is more likely a simulation of the entire universe rather than intentionally focused on us. We might very well just be an unintentional outcome at the far back of the petri dish while their reasons might just be to simulate "a universe" similar to their own. We, as biological creatures on Earth, might very well just evolve and die off at the end of this solar system's time and they might never even have noticed anything about us.

This is also the argument against a deliberate simulation of us. Why simulate in such extreme detail, everything here and beyond if everything was just about us? It is rather more likely that a simulation, if true, has nothing to do with us and that we are just an irrelevant speck of code drowning in the mountain of data they look at.

Why would there have to be any awareness on the simulator's part for our existence? The simulation, if true, and seen as we can study so far into the macro and micro, is more likely a simulation of the entire universe rather than intentionally focused on us. — Christoffer

A valid point and as you rightly point out we might not even register on their system but as mere flashes of code to be analysed for their own end and their nature might be vastly different to ours.

Be so the case that it is and that their simulation is controlled enough from their end that we do not do any real world damage to their purpose whatever that may be and in fact we may be incapable of affecting their reality in anyway shape or form they can simply pull the plug on this whole thing.

There rises the danger that we might indeed start to affect their/IT’S reality in ways neither of us could anticipate such as excessive power draws or even escape in one form or another.

There rises the danger that we might indeed start to affect their/IT’S reality in ways neither of us could anticipate such as excessive power draws or even escape in one form or another. — invicta

We can only hope that if we ever get answers to all the signals we send out into the cosmos, it won't be... "Silence, before they hear you!"

I voted no, but I don't think it's possible. I don't think you can get consciousness from turning electric switches on and off in a certain way, and that's essentially what the hardware running the simulation will be doing. That's as magical as thinking genies come out of certain lamps, if you rug them the right way.

The question that is presented aims to overlook the technical limitations of accomplishing such a simulation and starts of the premise that it is so doable.

My apologies, that would lead to a derail. I still vote no.

There’s the mystery of life existing to begin which raises the question of how and why of its own accord regardless of this life being a simulation or not.

Whether life is a simulation or not would be inconsequential because it would imply a creator either way (for me at least believing in a creator God)

As one of the attributes of God is creation then truth is explicable in those terms without detracting from its mystery as much as the simulation hypothesis itself with the two being almost identical in their end result which is life.

What existential difference does it make whether or not the universe is a simulation? If I am a simulation, then the simulation of the universe I inhabit is real (i.e. ineluctable).

There would be no discernible difference to the beings inhabiting it given that it’s a good simulation. The being can ask probing questions as you’ve postulated and the simulation would yield no answer that it is so, if it’s a good simulation of course and glitches are patched before detection.

Would there be free will in a simulation?

I don’t see why not.

Okay, so then the OP's question is moot.

If there’s no discernible difference in experience then sure it’s moot. The question is not merely referring to experiantelism (term I just made up) but to the subordinatation of a being living in such a simulation being livid that they’re a sub-species of such a matrix creator.

This at least puts the philosopher in better stead to understanding the nature of reality itself … — invicta

Proof that they are living in a simulation is not enough. Unless the philosopher escapes, the "real world" remains a hypothetical world. Only someone who has lived in both worlds can decide which world is preferable. The philosopher may think the truth is always preferable, but the truth may be that depending on the actual differences she may prefer the simulated world.

Why assume "the simulation" had a "creator"?

Why not assume this simulation" is a fractal of an infinite continuum of other fractal simulations that is self-organizing (à la 'eternal inflation')?

And even if this simulation was "created", so what? – nothing existential changes for us simulated inhabitants.

I guess I don't see the point of this thought-experiment – it's like asking 'What if there are an even number of grains of sand on this planet's beaches or odd number of stars in the Milky Way?'

And even if this simulation was "created", so what? – nothing [i[existential[/i] changes for us simulated inhabitants. — 180 Proof

Yes nothing changes in terms of experience I get that. I’m trying to gauge the attitude of the philosopher to such an idea as it would put them in an inferior order in terms of being, not just in precedence but limitation.

Interesting.

Given the realisation of a being in the simulation that it is in one, and by this realisation knowing how to free itself and thereby give itself the choice of which world it would rather inhabit, the simulated one or the real one it would come down to the advantages offered to it by each world as you’ve rightly pointed out.

Why assume "the simulation" had a "creator"? — 180 Proof

A quality of Baudrillard's idea that the films do not connect to is how the 'real' is seen to have been removed as the result of a crime. The ways he points to clues obviously runs into the problem of starting without the realm of 'facts' as given because his claim of what was the result.

But it does give a weird intention quite different from fooling everybody for some specific purpose.

I find it amusing. If one were to speak of a spirit world from which we descend to be incarnated in the mundane to -say - determine or build our characters, and whence we return on death, one would be banished to the religion forums and not even the philosophy of religion forums. But this is speculative science!

I don't know if indignation is the right word, maybe "mind****."

I mean, try to sincerely imagine the following.

-You're driving on the highway. It's a clear day and you're wide awake.
-Suddenly you're aware of something awful happening with the 18 wheeler ahead of you — a tire blows out, jack knifing the trailer across your lane. You intuitively realize you're about to hit a semi going 75 MPH as you instinctively hit the brakes.
-Everything goes black on impact, but you have a weird series of sensations similar to those described in the Near Death Experience literature, which slowly fade to nothing, like a deep sleep.
-Next thing you know, you're awake, somewhere dark and wet. You feel fine. You recall the accident. A dream?
>What the hell? You become aware of having not two but six hand and arm like appendages, which you can feel as well as you could feel your old arms— and a tail.
>A light opens. There is a voice, and it's speaking a language you don't know, except, as if recalling something from a dream, you realize you do know what they are saying.
>You're highly confused, but also strangely unanxious, like this is all familiar.
>Hands help you up, but they are the hands of a strange creature, a sort of six armed cross between a dolphin and a merman. Somehow, this also seems familiar and doesn't provoke anxiety.
>Over the next few hours you're given something to drink and begin to recall an entire prior life that occured before your human life. You recall that you are a non-human entity who went into an entertainment pod to experience a synthetic world. You have friends and acquaintances in this world. You're entire life as a human begins to rapidly seem like the false memories one sometimes has during dreams, something that seemed very real, and came with a sense of memory that lingers, but then is ultimately pushed away by the mind as unreal.

----

I mean, provided this actually happened to you, at no point would you say, "hmm, this really changes how I look at some things?" It would make me worry less about auto accidents in the future, for one thing.

Also, unless I now remembered some really good argument for why my new/current reality wasn't also a simulation, I would begin to seriously wonder if I was still in a simulation. Hell, maybe the whole reason entities create such simulations is that they hope, in some possible world, to find the one argument that grounds anything as non-simulation.

I think this is one of those cases where we can say "what difference does it make," and that may indeed still apply for some philosophical questions, but for much else, it would make all the difference. That is, it can only be dismissed because either people can't imagine it or they dismiss the possibility of such a thing occuring out of hand and so refuse to imagine it.

On a side note, I always thought simulating something like this would be a way to get people to confess to things when interrogations don't work, provided you could make it realistic. After all, why would a spy or terrorist keep any secrets if they've been convinced all their memories are essentially from play testing a VR video game?