Evil Demons and Simulations: How Can We Know What is Real?
This is the first in a series exploring David Chalmers’ 2022 book Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy. It might be considered, in light of the previous series on Schrödinger, Decoding Chalmers’ Metaphysics.
David Chalmers, the Australian-born philosopher of consciousness, is justifiably famous for his significant contributions to our understanding (or lack of it) of consciousness. As we saw earlier, he won a 25 year long bet with neuroscientist Christof Koch because he did not agree with Koch that within that timespan science would discover how the brain produces consciousness. He also introduced the term “the hard problem” which, in his own words, was just a recognition of the state of affairs that most philosophers considered well before he introduced this term.
Reality+ is causing a bit of a stir. It is a far reaching and wide-ranging book focused on what he calls “simulation realism,” the idea that it is at least possible, and reasonably likely, that we are living in a digital simulation. He argues for the rationality of the simulation hypothesis, but goes far beyond that to consider the philosophical, and even theological, implications of that possibility. The existence of God, the nature of evil, ethics, morals, values and other major topics of philosophy and religion are explored from the…
