magfrump comments on Theists are wrong; is theism? - Less Wrong

5 Post author: Will_Newsome 20 January 2011 12:18AM

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Comment author: Perplexed 20 January 2011 02:17:11AM 5 points [-]

Tegmark cosmology implies not only that there is a universe which runs this one as a simulation, but that there are infinitely many such simulations.

I'm not sure that this is true. My understanding is that IF a universe which runs this one as a simulation is possible, THEN Tegmark cosmology implies that such a universe exists. But I'm not sure that such a universe is possible. After all, a universe which contains a perfect simulation of this one would need to be larger (in duration and/or size) than this one. But there is a largest possible finite simple group, so why not a largest possible universe? I am not confident enough of my understanding of the constraints applicable to universes to be confident that we are not already in the biggest one possible.

There is a spooky similarity between the Tegmark-inspired argument that we may live in a simulation and the Godel/St. Anselm-inspired argument that we were created by a Deity. Both draw their plausibility by jumping from the assertion that something (rather poorly characterized) is conceivable to the claim that that thing is possible. That strikes me as too big of a jump.

Comment author: magfrump 20 January 2011 06:49:28AM 6 points [-]

There isn't a largest finite simple group. There's a largest exceptional finite simple group.

Z/pZ is finite and simple for all primes p, and if you think there is a largest prime I have some bad news...

Comment author: Perplexed 20 January 2011 03:01:46PM 0 points [-]

Doooohhh!

Thx.