The fact that our reality — the universe which we take for granted — may be just a computer simulation, is not a new idea.
Back in 2003 the British philosopher Nick Bostrom had set the academic world abuzz when he published a paper suggesting we may be characters in an elaborate ancestor software game being played by our descendents millions of years in the future.
Of course 2003 was only a few years after the hugely popular Matrix films in which humans discover that they’re simulations run by sentient machines — which could have contributed to the theory’s popularity too at the time. Because most other philosophers and computer scientists thought the bizarre idea bordered on the daft since there was no way the theory could actually be tested.
Recently, however, a team of physicists at the University of Washington in the US say they may have discovered a way to do just that; to determine if indeed we’re living in a simulation world.
Their contention is that in devising the simulation the designers would have had to leave an underlying telltale signature in the background lattice that could be a dead giveaway to their presence.
The tests have not yet begun but the irony is it would be the first time that scientists will be looking for scientifically hypothesised evidence of intelligent design in the cosmos!
They may rationalise that they’re not looking for the existence of a divine source but there’s no getting away from the fact that whatever’s responsible for the simulation still qualifies as our creator. That’s pretty close.
(This piece first appeared in The Economic Times)