Assume we're in a simulation and know it. Should we be surprised by how flawless it seems? We (almost) never encounter situations where we feel like something's off (like "oh, what just happened is the kind of thing we should expect to happen in a simulation rather than in an original biological universe").[1] Or is there any good reason to assume that, in a simulation like the one we might be in, it is normal for us not to observe any obvious bug?
Of course, this is only one of the many considerations we should have in mind while assessing the likelihood that we are in a simulation. I just happen to wonder about this one, right now.
- ^
Obviously, if we're in a simulation, we don't know what original biological worlds look like, but we can probably make some guesses regarding what generally differs between these and simulations. For example, say I enter an empty room, and objects "magically" appear in it as I walk through it. This has fierce simulation kinda vibes.
Epistemic status: speculative fiction.
The problem of consciousness is such a glitch.
Its solution is that our consciousnesses are largely outside the simulation. The world we see is a virtual world that our consciousnesses (whatever those really are) have been placed in. The remarkable correspondences in structure between the physical brain and the whatever-it-is consciousness, as evidenced by the effects of brain lesions on consciousness, are usually taken as showing that consciousness is literally a physical process of the brain. But in [reminder: fictional] fact, it is because the brain has to closely mimic a lot of the structure of consciousness to be the effective VR interface that it is.