Been there, done that
From Simulism
Author: Excal2000
The text in the below article was originally contributed to the simulism wiki as a post on the Talk page by wiki user Excal2000. It however deserves a place in the Essays section. - Ivo
[edit] Schizophrenics have been here and done this
If you have ever understood the psychiatric symptoms of schizophrenia, you will soon understand that we (schizophrenics) live in a dual world, not unlike a simulation. Our experiences are often couched in some futuristic delusion where we read peoples minds and hear injections into our environment in the form of voices. A good dramatisation is Twelve Monkeys
We also have certain futuristic incontrovertible beliefs that we have to deal with and accept; we cannot ignore. And I believe that the future which includes implants and thought modification and control which will eventually lead to this scenario where in general people will be born and have as babies implants installed against their natural will, and essentially computers will use subliminal suggestion to control you throughout your growth as a 'human' and you will become so dependent on the existence of this implant that you mind will not be able to function without it.
With these implants computer agents will be able to read your thoughts by using audio vocoders in your throat to pick up minute subvocalisation of your thoughts and of course will be able to force you to summarize your thoughts, audit them, provide an analysis of them through subliminal programming, and hence make you believe and control your beliefs and hence immerse your mind in a computer controlled delusion that is called reality. But you were born into the system and you will never be able to know what life is like outside that system.
This form of reality is closer than you think ...
[edit] Are Computers Capable of Self Awareness ?
If we live in a computer simulation, someone must have put it there. If someone put it there who were they? Suppose that that someone was a self aware computer. What psychiatric qualities would it have? My proposition is that a computer is inherently insane. And hence a simulation run by a computer like this would have massive, detectable anomalies in it arising from the computers insanity if they ever become self aware.
What do I mean by insane? Insanity is the inability to determine for oneself based on and ethic and moral understanding of a situation to take an action in reaction to the situationa and be happy with oneself that that decision is inline with your morals and principles. If you have no morals or principles at all you must be insane.
Suppose humans can code if then else rules into a database and hence teach a computer how to behave in all known situations that have ever occurred to humans in our known history - an artifial set of morals and ethics. The computer is still in trouble because given just one new situation, it will have to make a decision, but it will not be able to make a valid decision unless it has an ethic rule to cover it.
Hence it will make a decision and stick to it regardless of the consequences of that action. A sane entity upon making a decision, which turns out to take long term desctuctive effect on some quantity, unless retarded, will try to alter their decision in order to create an outcome positive wrt their ethical outlook as the situation deteriorates. Its called a self preservation principle that sane people do and insane people don't.
If you understand what a computer is, you will realise that computers do not make their own decisions. Why can I say that ? Because a computer is given a program and that program is followed to the letter. A given set of instructions and predetermined decisions. Computers need to be non-deterministic to be human, as humans are unpredictable - non deterministic.
In addition to the classic notion that if a computer can convince a human that it is sentient, then it must be, I say that a computer needs to be able to override it's own program. In other words be able to self modify its ethic rules in a situation wherein a sane human being would also typically overide their morals and ethics in a societically acceptable fashion to change an undesireable outcome.
Computers cannot determine exactly when and then how to override themselves non-deterministically, whereas the socially acceptable human can judge a situation correctly and 'do the right thing' even though their own personal traits might modify that original notion and cause them to do nothing or the opoosite thing. Humans are aware of the right thing to do as evidenced in that felling of guilt when you don't want to but personal circumstances modify the human condition and provide an escape clause that excuses humans from doing the right thing that a computer has not got. A computer hence feels no guilt, hence it is insane.
And finally the insanity would show up in our reality; glitches in the Matrix because there might be a set of conditionals never encountered before and computer would present a decision that for all intents and purposes is insane, an anomaly and hence we should be able to detect these anomalies in a computer simulated world.
