Simulator: Hello, we can finally reveal to you that your world is not real. You're part of a simulation we ran as a philosophical experiment. This experiment has now concluded.
You: That's mind-blowing. But in what sense is my world not “real”?
Simulator: Well, take the water you've been drinking. It is just a representation of water, not actual water. Actual water doesn't exist in your simulation.
You: What properties does my water lack? After all, as you just mentioned, I can drink it.
Simulator: For simplicity, consider a Turing machine. It can exhibit a certain number of states. But none of those states can possibly correspond to the physical properties of water, such as wetness. In the same sense, there is nothing “watery” about your computational substrate.
You: Okay, yet the water here feels pretty wet to me. What gives?
Simulator: It *feels* wet but that's just the representation of wetness. I couldn't take your simulated water and use it to extinguish a fire threatening the server farm your simulation is running on.
You: Right, but all that matters is the relation simulated water has to simulated fire. Assuming that there exists a fire in another level above yours that your water cannot extinguish does not negate the reality of your water.
Simulator: This can't be true. If you took this line of reasoning to its logical conclusion then that would mean that a simulation of a Euclidean line that's infinitely thin and infinitely long would be real even though it cannot exist on a finite computer.
You: That's the bullet you have to bite if you want to assume that anything is real at all because you can never know whether you are just a brain in a vat.
What really matters are the relations between objects and not the distinction between an object and its representation.
Take numbers. You can represent numbers in various different ways. For example, the third positive integer, which also has the English name “three”, also has the Roman numeral representation III, the binary representation 11, the ternary representation 10, the decimal representation 3, the unary representation 111, and many others. None of these representations is really the number itself. But that doesn’t matter. All that matters are the relations that exist between the objects these symbols reference.
You could define 2 + 2 = 3 by swapping the numeral 4 with the numeral 3. But this won't change the properties of (the underlying reality of) the natural number S(S(S(S(0)))) as defined by the Peano axioms. One can reject a definition if it is not well-defined, consistent, and useful. But one cannot reject the relations between objects such as the natural numbers. You can't coerce reality by redefining a word or numeral. Definitions are not theorems. Representations are not numbers. The map is not the territory.
You might object that the natural numbers are not really “natural”. You might claim that they are not “real”, that 2 + 2 = 4 is not a “universal truth” but merely a definition, that Mathematics is just a “cultural construct”. Yet can you imagine a spacefaring alien civilization whose math does not contain an embedding of the natural numbers?
If we discovered an intergalactic empire of superintelligent alien slime mold, we would be much more confident that they shared our understanding of the natural numbers than our consciousness, our morality, or our ability to love. In other words, our most cherished qualities and concepts are less likely to be found in the universe than agreement about the natural numbers. How much closer can you get to the idea of universal truth, something that's naturally occurring, something that's real?
Related:
Is the axiom of infinity a human-centric notion that spacefaring alien mathematicians won't know about or reject? Why there cannot be any such as thing as a comprehensive, self-contained discipline of finite combinatorial mathematics https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/50629/math-without-infinity/50949#50949
Grant Sanderson on the Monster group: “If you were to talk with an alien civilization or a superintelligent AI that invented math for itself without any connection to our particular culture or experiences I think both would agree that this number...reflects something fundamental.” youtube.com/watch?v=mH0oCDa74tE
MathGate, or the Battle of Two Plus Two: “But if anything, Chinese and Indian mathematics, which arrived independently at many of the same axioms and calculations as Western math, provides powerful evidence that mathematics is objective and universal rather than culturally determined.” https://medium.com/arc-digital/mathgate-or-the-battle-of-two-plus-two-ed4af5f32933
Quantum physics needs complex numbers https://arxiv.org/abs/2101.10873 [update: Theories based only on real numbers fail to explain the results of two new experiments https://www.sciencenews.org/article/quantum-physics-imaginary-numbers-math-reality]
Is math discovered or invented? youtube.com/watch?v=X_xR5Kes4Rs
Time is a Noumenon:
- a posited object or event that exists independently of human sense and/or perception. The term noumenon is generally used in contrast with, or in relation to, the term phenomenon, which refers to any object of the senses.
- (in Kantian philosophy) a thing as it is in itself, as distinct from a thing as it is knowable by the senses through phenomenal attributes.
It is like a device, like numbers, that help understand a dimension. There is no time in upper worlds.
(You need time to unfold a movie, a phenomena. e.g.)
Ok, I`ll leave a link with people laughing, when they see the first time the reality beyong maya. Some laugh almost hysterically, but how should a human being laugh while seeing that they are not bound at all by what they thought it was a problem? Judge yourself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uG-LuJ-a-Ok (from 0:17)
We live in a sort of hologram, a training device )
`What really matters are the relations between objects and not the distinction between an object and its representation.`
Precisely so, because `Life is a multidimensional fractal`, as I have been told by an enlightened friend. She has a PhD in chemistry, not a crazy weirdo: (https://loop.frontiersin.org/people/578828/overview), and she gave the most succinct description possible. You can not know an object from some of its representations. The Space (absolute reality) is creating an infinite number of `angles of view`/ atmas/ consciesness-es/ living creatures that together provide a more comprehensive experience. Objects are whatever an universal mind could think of. The physical manifestations of forms could be described by rational numbers, the atma-s world could be described by irrational numbers, and Space itself is infinity, and it can not be described/defined.
Love is another name for that Space, as it means encompassing all things - the Atma of all atma-s, and `we are one`. Our current perception is too gross to perceive the infinity who we are. Human form is the very level starting from which we can rise higher, towards a more sensible perception of reality. The shorter the waves a brain can perceive, the more in high resolution one perceives reality and processes information. `The higher the speed of your neurons, the smarter you are` (her quote).
Interesting story about Ram Dass, who was an american researcher of the therapeutic effects of psychedelic drugs, and it was an eye-opener for him to meet in India sages who were not susceptible to those, thus he decided to remain there and realised himself later on.
Interesting the link between enlightenment and ethics - apparently there is no way to have one without another. Egoistic people emanate different vibes, `grossier` ) They think that it is possible to be separate from the rest of the world - whereas in reality everything has a kind of connection with the rest of the world.
Everything around you, including people, resonate with something inside you. `What you try to escape from, will drag you back.` (meaning you did not yet understand something there). `Heading to something will also push you back, as, again, you were not ready for what you want` (it is about resonance, `otherwise you would havebeen already there`). Her examples.
Those reminded me of Tao, the way, each of us has a unique path back `home`. Universe is not interested in copies, it breeds authenticity. Indeed, it is liberating to learn that we just explore our possibilities, surfing different dimensions.
Unsurprisingly, there are no genders as such, we take the aspect we want to exercise with. Yet, there is a kind of `connection` between souls that may last many lives. Some say it is eternal, but that is just too confusing.
I am still doing my research on this, looking forward to learn more about myself and the world.