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Comment by allisthemoist | Hacker News Reader

> “You’re not going to get proof that we’re not in a simulation, because any evidence that we get could be simulated,” Chalmers said.

This is where the argument starts to sound like creationist claims that god put the bones of dinosaurs on Earth just to test our faith.

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As someone with a conservative upbringing, I can't say I've heard that argument. In my experience the most common explanation is that the dinosaurs died in Noah's flood along with the rest of the animals. The dinosaurs that survived on the ark were unable to adapt to the new environment and went extinct shortly after. While I don't doubt the "God put dinosaur bones here to test our faith" argument has been used by Christians, I can't imagine it's very prevalent.

It was taught in a private Christian school my ex-girlfriend's daughter went to. Saw it on paper even, they weren't ashamed. Also seemed to be very against evolution and considered that to be the devil whispering in your ear.

The Omphalos hypothesis holds that God made the universe approximately 6000 years ago, but made it look like it was many billions of years older. I don't think it has ever been the majority view among creationists, but some have advocated it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omphalos_hypothesis

The interesting thing is, as it pertains to this general story, that it's not really a God-made-it-look-old (as in to trick us) issue, but that's a side effect.

When I think about the simulation hypothesis, I picture Skyrim. You boot it up, load the maps, etc, and you see a picture perfect (on the PC anyway) world that looks millions of years old. Mountains are weathered. There are pre-existing historical races that died out thousands of years ago. Portions of the terrain are covered in deep snows. There's rain; it might even be raining randomly when you spawn from a save.

Bethseda isn't lying when they make the place old. It's that way because it has to be. Who knows, our reality for God could be the same thing?

Picture the Wind Fish from Link's Awakening. Whole island with people, places and attack chickens. It was a simulation in the mind of the Wind Fish.

These things have changed in the last decades. I was raised as an evangelical Christian. During my childhood we were never taught to directly disagree with science, with the idea that science and religion were separate things. Nowadays they make a point of telling that science is wrong.

I recall an episode of The Simpsons where Flanders says something to that effect; I assumed that it was a parody of creationists rather than an actual, common belief.

I heard it as a mormon growing up.

I don't think I ever heard this growing up as a Mormon, at least not as something considered as a serious belief. My Aunt quipped once how silly it was that my Granpda (also a Mormon) believed that 'the Jews planted dinosaur bones to discredit Christianity' - he's dead now and I don't know if he actually believed that, but it's possible that he did.

My experience growing up as a Mormon is that questions of how exactly God created the world are mostly left up to science. I haven't seen any hints of evolutionary science being considered 'taboo' with any seriousness in quite a long time.

My mother asked me around 15 years of age if I "believed in dinosaurs"

As someone with a conservative upbringing, I can't say I've heard that argument.

If only I'd received a nickel for every time I've seen that online. I might buy myself a latte.

(Downvote? If one is arguing for the evidence based life, then it's a bit weird to engage in non-factual hyperbole. I doubt I've encountered that more than about 30-40 times, because by the time one has seen that stupid non-argument and all the other stupid arguments about 30-40 times, one is done with the places online where people think it's clever to post such nonsense.)

Maybe the only universe where we can absolutely prove we're not in a simulation is one where we are in fact in a simulation.

I lost some respect for Chalmers when I heard his TED talk that suggested consciousness was a fundamental force. He has some good ideas about consciousness but also a bit too mystical for me to agree with.

Well... what kind of evidence could demonstrate a universe isn't simulated?

Continuousness, perhaps, but I don't think it is possible to prove that a universe isn't discrete unless you can measure with infinite precision. Even if it was possible, a simulation could certainly be continuous with the proper hardware. Similarly, a real universe certainly could be non-continuous, so I don't think the question is even relevant either way.

I think you may be missing the point of that specific statement. It's conceivable that we might discover that we are living in a simulation. On the other hand, trying to prove conclusively that we're not is futile.

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