continue reading „The Physical World as a Virtual Reality“, by bwhitworth@acm.org
A virtual reality is here considered to be a reality created by information processing, and so by
definition it cannot exist independently in and of itself, as it depends upon processing to exist. If
the processing stops then the virtual reality must also cease to exist. In contrast an objective
reality simply is, and does not need anything else to sustain it. This suggests two hypotheses
about our reality:
1. The objective reality (OR) hypothesis: That our physical reality is an objective reality that
exists in and of itself, and being self-contained needs nothing outside of itself to explain it.
2. The virtual reality (VR) hypothesis: That our physical reality is a virtual reality that depends
upon information processing to exist, which processing must occur outside of itself.
hmm … strange thinking
