The simulation of space-time and its physical laws are not arbitrary; they are essential constraints. These rules create the context required for consciousness to explore its possibilities and for subjective experiences (qualia) to become meaningful. Without limitations, there is no context for feeling.
Cognitive scientist Donald Hoffman argues that even advanced AI like ChatGPT is fundamentally a powerful statistical analysis tool. It can process vast amounts of data to find patterns but lacks the deep intelligence or a theoretical path to achieving genuine consciousness or subjective experience.
Hoffman's model proposes that consciousness is not a product of the physical brain within space-time. Instead, consciousness is the fundamental building block of all existence, and space-time itself is an emergent phenomenon—a "headset" or user interface—that is created by and within consciousness.
Hoffman's theory posits that our perceived world is not a persistent, objective reality but a simulation that is rendered only when an observer looks at it. According to this model, when you look away from an object, it ceases to exist and is only re-rendered upon observation.
The persistence of objects and shared experiences doesn't prove an objective reality exists. Instead, it suggests a deeper system, analogous to a game server in a multiplayer game, coordinates what each individual observer renders in their personal perceptual "headset," creating a coherent, shared world.
Mathematical models of evolution demonstrate a near-zero probability that natural selection would shape sensory systems to perceive objective truth. Instead, our senses evolved merely to guide adaptive behavior, prioritizing actions that lead to survival and reproduction over generating an accurate depiction of the world.
Within the consciousness-as-fundamental model, dark matter and energy aren't mysterious substances. They are the observable effects inside our space-time "headset" caused by countless other conscious agent interactions and qualia states that are "dark" to us—they influence our reality but are not projected into it.
Our current computation, based on Turing machines, is limited to "computable functions." However, mathematics shows this set is a smaller, countable infinity compared to the vast, larger infinity of non-computable functions. This implies our current simulations barely scratch the surface of what is mathematically possible.
The reason consciousness ceaselessly explores possibilities may be rooted in mathematics. A system cannot fully model itself, creating an infinite loop of self-discovery. Furthermore, Cantor's discovery of an infinite hierarchy of ever-larger infinities means the potential space for exploration is fundamentally unending.
Experiments testing quantum theory have conclusively proven that "local realism" is false. This means physical objects, like electrons, do not possess definite properties such as a specific position or spin until the moment they are actually measured or observed, challenging our classical intuition about reality.
If any civilization can create a convincing simulation, and those simulations can create their own simulations, the number of simulated realities would vastly outnumber the single "base reality." This makes it statistically probable that we are living inside one of the countless nested simulations rather than the original one.
The process of an AI like Stable Diffusion creating a coherent image by finding patterns within a vast possibility space of random noise serves as a powerful analogy. It illustrates how consciousness might render a structured reality by selecting and solidifying possibilities from an infinite field of potential experiences.