I often hear the paradox: if we are in a matrix, you would never know; you could, right now, be living inside a matrix within another matrix and never realize it. I like to argue that such an idea is mainly based on the hypothesis of absurdity, or of “ignorant scientists”; that is, we would be facing a large conglomerate of scientists who, in other words, would be ignorant regarding the nature of atoms and stars, or we would be facing a terrifying force with enough energy to sustain infinite suns and the infinity of infinity merely to observe our simplest daily activities.
The problem is with energy, or the lack thereof.
Yes, in some supercomputer that goes beyond our notion of quantum, they would develop the maximum capacity to understand the human brain, going beyond the synapse of Matrix. It is incomprehensible why.
Furthermore, simple nuclear fusions provide more energy than all the “combustion” of human brains; therefore, I would discard any hypothesis of using humans as batteries. And, of course, such a system projection would require an absurd amount of energy to maintain it, or at least to initialize it without microscopic failures that, at the atomic level, would be as if the entire state of Virginia simply disappeared out of nowhere. Well, such an error would be something of magnitude $< 0.0000001%$ of the total projection, admissible even in complex systems.
These are just the most apparent problems that possible aliens or a superior mind would face when placing the entire human mind inside a holographic box. Even if the human being itself were a projection of itself — which sounds even more absurd — incubated in the exact formalization of behavior cell by cell, while condensing in each cell some zillions of atoms chained in dynamic structures, it would be like piling animals into a box made of the skin of other animals and expecting both the skin and the animals trapped there to maintain the structure, while still being dynamic and “free”. It is paradoxical.
Factor processing: a scaling problem
In addition to the problem of total or partial processing., given that the perception of a human A about human B would have to be processed, while human C, who sees both, would also have to be processed in parallel. At the same time that both see each other, this would also need to be processed. Processing increases for each new individual, such that it would seem impossible to process a stadium with a thousand people who see each other and carry reflective utilities, since it would be a recursive function of $K^n$.
One might interject: “But they are already rendering objects in 3D planes; it is a hologram, there is no need for additional processing if the universe already does that.” However, this is debatable, because humans do not treat themselves as simple objects; it is, in fact, the opposite. A human being, in the eyes of one observer, appears as $S$, while in the eyes of another, appears as $W$, although to themselves they are different from $SW$, and so on. I am not referring to prejudgments, but to what precedes them: a pre-vision formed based on current processing, which would need to be processed differently for each individual contained within the unit of planet Earth.
Every observer would have to be processed at all scales.
The same would have to be applied to inanimate objects such as Earth, mountains, trees, etc. Not to mention the waste of energy in generating useless events that have no direct correlation with the terrestrial state, such as the explosion of a star that was not recorded by space agencies but occurred ten galaxies away.
It is literally processing zillions of atoms, gases, and gravitational interactions, among other variables, in a cascade that expands to the limit of the galaxy simply because “yes”. It does not affect the system as a whole and certainly has a cost.
Are the laws of physics and thermodynamics applicable?
Even endowed with infinite energy, ignoring the laws of physics — since they would be restricted to our small and “false” holographic system — the system would face other problems, such as cooling. Assuming that the laws of thermodynamics are not fiction — and if they were, it would be equivalent to creating absurd rules in a closed system where such rules make no sense.
The problem of infinite parallelism and its cost.
Considering infinite energy, an infinite cooling system and infinite programming would be required, or at least the absence of parallelism in the system. Yes, because parallelism would require infinite parallelism, given the dynamics involving the multiplicities of galaxies in an infinite closed “observable universe” and the chromosomal dynamics of humans.
Even a simple handshake between gentlemen would require infinite parallelism, which ceases to be parallelism and becomes an eternal system. There would be the movement of atom A, then the next atom, then electron sets, with care not to alter spin gravitation, and consequently doing this in an absurd unit of measurement for each atom, cell, and further into microorganisms upon which our body depends.
Additionally, there would be air reverberations caused by this movement. When closing the hand, pressure is created which, for us, is negligible, but never for such a system, which would then need to propagate this chain to the edges of the universe or until energy collapse by another energy of equal magnitude.
The Unobserved Observer
There are those who argue that it would suffice to simulate only what is seen, and the rest would be a function of refraction, well positioned; but this is another cosmological absurdity, like claiming that Venus does not exist until observed for the first time, or that a microorganism such as a microbe is nonexistent by nature until someone observes it and then it begins to exist. But how is something that does not exist observed? It is not; it simply cannot be. It exists, and therefore it is observed.
Although this premature “cleverness” seems to indicate a favorable position toward universal processing, it would have to argue that poisons do not kill, or that radiation does not exist, or even the wind, since these are factors that, although not fully visible, interfere with existence, indicating constant and real processing. It is like placing meat in a pan and turning your back: it will burn. If processing were observer-dependent, it would never burn, because it would never cease to exist.
Even if one argues that the meat is being observed by an inanimate observer, “the pot or the fire,” I would question: who is observing the observer? If the answer is nothing or no one, then it is a logical fallacy. That is, you must accept that everything is observed by something within the cosmological chain.
And again, you would face other parallelism problems, such as burning without noticing, which is, in other words, applied heat — unless it is merely processing defined by proximity to the object “fire”, which would be a reprocessing act culminating in infinite parallelism.
Or even memories, which would be impossible: how do you remember something that does not exist? This would imply absurd rework, managing the automatic memory of each individual so that they remember past slices according to their lived experience separately, and storing this in a matrix for memories, acts, objects, and actions.
And interleaving this with each individual in the environment leads us to literally processing the entire environment separately for each individual, which is more costly than simply processing everything.
“A dumb system for such intelligent beings.”
Thus, the approximate cost would be:
Where:
- $K$ = individuals
- $n$ = memories
- $p$ = number of actors involved in the same shared memory
If the idea were simply to map and record everything into a super-matrix and then render using the billions of atoms in the universe, it would be necessary to keep billions of spins in constant standby until something is rendered. Logically, communication between each spin would be required for collapse or non-collapse.
For comparison, the number of processes could not be less than:
Where:
- $N_a$ = number of atoms in the universe
- $c$ = number of structural groupings
- $p$ = observers or uses of matter
Even in inanimate systems, such as a planet orbiting a star, the observer itself is inanimate but influences what is observed.
And this leads to a series of almost endless problems, of unimaginable complexity, for extremely powerful and intelligent beings to observe inferior beings whom they do not need, do not want, and certainly do not use as tools.
Energy Constraint
You may argue that such beings could have created an abstraction — a simulation so powerful that it effectively becomes a new universe, distinct, yet preserving all rules and observances; still, it would remain a simulation, at the very least a “theater.”
I am not even taking into account the fundamental laws of physics, such as:
Doing so would make it even more evident how absurd it is to claim that “we live in a simulation,” because for every kilogram of matter, more than 21 megatons of TNT would be required.
Consider that Earth’s Moon has a mass of approximately:
To convert this into energy, we would have:
Yes — an absurd amount of energy, and that is for a simple moon, not for our planet, which has a mass approximately 99.98 times greater than that of the Moon. In other words, we are not yet considering our Sun, the billions of existing suns, nor the countless planets.
Speed of Light Limitation
Additionally, there is the limitation imposed by the speed of light regarding information and efficient communication.
To connect and process all data simultaneously in a chained manner — that is, to ensure that everything is actually processed and not simply left “free” as in the universe — communication beyond the speed of light would be required:
One may argue that such a superior system operates beyond this scale, but this is equivalent to claiming that reality itself makes no sense based solely on our current limitations, without any further foundation. It is like stating that infinity is finite simply because one does not know anything infinite.
In other words, it is a paradox closed upon itself.
Conclusion
We have come to the conclusion that the energy, procedural, technical, physical, quantum, and thermodynamic costs are more than enough to demonstrate that a simulation control for each individual is improbable, if not impossible.
There are no motivations, logics, or even comical reasons for individuals with superior technological capabilities, beyond time, beyond what can be defined as reality, to create a simulation of everything we know, simply because they can.
There would be no other answer for this, because if they are truly superior on all cosmic scales, and sufficient, there is no need for human action. Therefore, we become an extremely costly and extremely unnecessary “entertainment.” Reality is simply real.