[namaria]

Well first you imply a base universe is finite. That is not a given at all.

You don't need to simulate the full universe. Just the experience of consciousness inside it. You don't even have to simulate full consciousness for every 'conscious' being. In fact, I've always seen the simulation argument as a thought experiment arguing for consciousness being more fundamental than matter. There is no need to imagine a human made computer simulating an entire universe in subatomic detail for this thought experiment to intrigue us.

We being able to pinpoint a start of all time is actually a pretty good argument for it being simulated. Why would we be able to calculate a 'start time' for reality? That is not obvious to be a necessity at a base universe at all. There are theoretical cosmologies out there that do away with that need to conceptualize a universe.

The simulated universe doesn't have to run time faster then 'real time' at the base universe at all. In fact, running slower would be a feature if the beings in the base universe wished to escape into the simulation for whatever reason.

[fnordpiglet]

I didn’t imply the base universe is finite just it has to be orders of magnitude larger than the simulation.

Yes but if you only simulate a consciousness there is no nesting, otherwise on what does the consciousness run on? That’s the whole idea behind as you lose fidelity with reality the simulations becomes less capable until it’s unable to simulate anything.

Note nesting isn’t necessary for the probability argument to be true just many simulations. But the vanishingly small likelihood of not being a simulation depends on the nesting idea.

Again, yes, it’s possible what we observe is a simple simulation of experience but I don’t think this is the “almost certainly a simulation” argument.

[namaria]

Like I said, I see this as a thought experiment about 'what is reality' and 'what is consciousness'. Not on 'are we actually living inside alien computers'.

The fact that we only exist in a tiny planet, while we can observe a seemingly infinite universe but with a horizon limit and that 96% of the energy in the universe is unexplainable by our physics would be pretty good arguments for us living in a simulation nevertheless, if we assume nesting simulations necessitate reduction of scope.

> Yes but if you only simulate a consciousness there is no nesting, otherwise on what does the consciousness run on?

This I don't understand. What do you mean?