Musk is just one of the people in Silicon Valley to take a keen interest in the “simulation hypothesis”, which argues that what we experience as reality is actually a giant computer simulation created by a more sophisticated intelligence. “Quite frankly, if we are not living in a simulation, it is an extraordinarily unlikely circumstance,” he added. The simulation hypothesis also accounts for peculiarities in quantum mechanics, particularly the measurement problem, whereby things only become defined when they are observed. For Terrile, the simulation hypothesis has “beautiful and profound” implications. First, it provides a scientific basis for some kind of afterlife or larger domain of reality above our world.

Source: The Guardian October 11, 2016 12:30 UTC