This is a question I have barely thought about at all - but since AI and
science build so many simulations of parts of the world, and philosophers
like Bostrom talk conceptually so much about similar simulations - it seems
worth thinking about.
What's the difference between a computer simulation of a pet operating in a
virtual world, or weather conditions like storms and hurricanes occurring
in a virtual world, and the real things - or direct copies/replicas/clones
of the real things?
I think, for the purposes of this discussion, we should assume that computer
simulations could in principle be solid - and DON'T have to be confined to
a flat screen - that they could, say, control solid footballers on a solid
pitch and not just flat, televisual ones.
It strikes me that the big difference will be that the computer simulation
will contain vastly more rules and attached programs than the real thing -
will contain a rulebook that is either much more complex than the actual
rules in living creatures' minds, or that doesn't actually exist for
inanimate objects but is merely a human conceptualisation (like Newton's
laws).
But these are my first thoughts. Comments?
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