I think philosophical skepticism is an interesting and stimulating learning tool to get people to think—especially about the flaws in modern materialism. But things like simulation theory (just an updated evil genius of Descartes) are intellectually problematic when you get down to business. We don’t need physicists to tell us the universe is not a simulation but more power to the field if it can say that.
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The idea that we are in a simulation is self-defeating (or cuts off the branch it sits in at least) in that it uses observations from our universe to argue from as if they are real or valid. How does one use simulated physics to make concrete claims about the physical capabilities of the “real” universe running the simulation? If we are in a simulation, then all our science, physics and computers are fake in the sense that they tell us absolutely nothing about how things work in the “real” base reality nor that we should even trust our simulated observations to being with. In other words, to argue we are in a simulation one seemingly has to assume we are not since the definition of a simulation only makes sense granted a real, physical world.
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Computers are artifacts which means they have their meaning entirely imposed on them (e.g. a clock). Computer code is inherently meaningless on its own. It is simply a sequence of physical states. The computer doesn’t truly know what a 4 displayed on the screen means. These are pixels being illuminated by electrical signals. Computer output from its code has the meaning an external, conscious mind gives to it. If our thoughts are just simulated code then our thoughts have no intrinsic meaning, including the one that we are in a simulation.
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The brain is not a computer and computers are not a brain. Abstract thought is immaterial (think of a concept like triangularity). Now matter how much processing power a computer gets, no matter how much technology increases, a computer will always consist of an arrangement of unintelligent physical material. Increasing processing power or piling up more code doesn’t magically cross the metaphysical gap between qualitative, conscious experience and non-conscious algorithmic processing. You can stack bricks in a circle and pile them higher and higher but a trillion of them won’t magically turn into a sphere. Simulating water on a computer won’t make it wet and simulating a mind on one won’t make it conscious.
Like the problem of induction, like the is/ought problem, the problem of philosophical skepticism stems from a flawed mechanistic view of reality that goes back to Descartes and Pascal and was taken up by many others such as Hume. For the Thomist committed to hylomorphism, this issue is a non-starter and simulation theory is not cutting edge but simply another logical dead end of materialism.
Vinnie