My Wild-Ass Guess as to the Nature of Reality
--
I may be wrong, but I do have an Astrophysics degree and this theory makes as much sense as “The Matrix” or “The Good Place”
I have an Astrophysics degree in my past. It hasn’t made me much money in my lifetime, but it does give me a certain license and obligation to explain mysteries of the universe (note here that perhaps the greatest Astrophysicist on record was Queen guitarist Brian May…he was so brilliant that he gave up a career in Science for one in rock stardom, which made him millions). I will try to keep this short and entertaining, but I think I may have stumbled upon what may at least be a theory of everything that holds water, even if it may be wrong. What got me (and a lot of other people) thinking was “The Matrix” trilogy, which is also most certainly wrong, but raises some very good points about the nature of our reality…that it may be a fake reality constructed by something that exists outside our fake reality. What is really good about my theory is that it kinda sorta incorporates science, religion, and new-age (much to my chagrin, because I never liked new-age, often pronounced by me and others to rhyme with “sewage”) In my theory, I will attempt to be humble according to my lowly place within this reality, while also trying to acknowledge the latest scientific discoveries as I understand them.
There are many theories of simulated realities that predate “The Matrix”, which are collectively called Simulation Theories. In science fiction, one of the earliest was “Simulacron-3” by Daniel F. Galouye, written in 1963. In history, “The Butterfly Dream” by Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi, the Indian philosophy of Maya, the Ancient Greek philosophies of Anixarchus and Monimus, and the renaissance writings of Rene Descartes all espouse this philosophy in some form. Recent science discoveries neither prove nor disprove such theories, but skeptics believe something like “if we live in a fake reality, then why is it so darned complicated?”, which is a very good point, to a point. But of course the counter to the counter point might be “what seems complex to us might be simple to the creators of the contrived reality”, for which my defense is that the quarks, leptons, neutrinos, higgs bosons, gravitons, whathaveyou that make up the basic building blocks might be like tinker toys to our creators, and that the reason for the simulation (or whatever it is we live in) might be that it has to grow organically from these building blocks, so as to create a kind of “free will” premise (even though it’s not quite always so, but I’ll get to that later).
As such, you have the basis for a kind of “everyone is partly right, but on the whole everyone is wrong”, or “the Six Blind Men and the Elephant” (which my father used to recite as a night-night story) theory of reality. Science is correct in describing everything within the simulated reality, and theologians may be somewhat right in saying that our creator(s) live outside our reality, have an interest in how we behave, and occasionally intervene (all religions and sciences would probably get along if they simply agreed to that last statement…unfortunately the devil is in the details?) Even new-agers might have a seat at the table, as by essentially replacing “God” with “Aliens”, they more or less accept the concept of an outside agent influencing our reality. I won’t get into the topic of speculating the nature of the outside agent (who may well not be influenced by our simple notions of “time” and “gravity”). Besides, I’m certainly not an expert on reality and don’t want to piss off any of my guardian angels.
Ok at this point, as a trained physicist, I need to inject some physics. I’m beginning to believe that the “quantum effect” (the position and momentum effect observed in electrons for instance) is scalable, so that instead of “quantum collapse” (as Niels Bohr explained in the 40s), a giant, galaxy sized being might look upon us tiny beings as behaving like electrons (kind of here and there, barely in one place, actually in multiple realities at once). As such, our reality would make us all essentially “Schrodinger’s Cats” or subject to the “Many Worlds Theory” of physicist Hugh Everett. Many have some familiarity of this concept, as it is a common engine for modern sci-fi, which often includes time travel and grandfather paradoxes (ie what happens if you go back in time and accidentally kill your own grandpa or get too cozy with your Mom ala “Back to the Future”). Conveniently, Hugh Everett created a theory in which we simply create a new reality for ourselves if/when we kill our own grandpa, but the nuts and bolts are tricky on that one (as is killing grandpa).
Also, there’s the problematic issue of time travel, as although science says travelling into the future is permitted (by travelling faster than the speed of light like Superman or Captain Kirk do on a regular basis), backward time travel is a no-no as you violate the rules of causality (no matter or energy can precede that which created it, without creating a paradox) but then with Hugh Everett’s “Many Worlds”, all bets are off. Interesting that many modern physicists believe in “Many Worlds” but hate new-age science whores like Deepak Chopra, who say that because of the quantum relationship between the observer and the observed (like the Schrodinger’s cat experiment) we can all create our own destiny (uh….no, say the physicists).
Alright so now we’ve almost created the science ground rules for our fake universe, let’s add to them with some cosmology. We live in and perceive “space-time” which makes us subject to time and gravity, yet we also know that they can be manipulated (in some places, for some things, t & g don’t really exist, like out in deep space). Also, our universe is expanding, and it may or may not have “dark” matter and energy (probably not, but it doesn’t matter since it’s a fake reality anyway). Maybe beyond what’s expanding is the limit of the fakeness, like if you stumble out of Disneyland into a 7–11 parking lot or something, I dunno. But the time and gravity thing is interesting as is the concept of a high-gravity “wormhole” (also a popular SciFi device), which gives us a chance to defy t and g and take shortcuts in time and space. Of course, to do so, you or even a photon would have to be compressed to a size 0 (basically be destroyed), and so scientists tend to not believe in time or space travel (even a trip to the nearest star would take many, many generations, even travelling at the speed of light, which is the speed limit of the known universe).
So what, finally, is my theory of everything? I’M GETTING TO THAT!! The creator(s) used basic building components that seem complex to us, but are like paper mache and paint to them (sorry…”He” if you are a paternalistic monotheist). Then they let the universe grow organically using things like big bangs, the elements, the creation of organic molecules, and DNA, to make us all believe in science (which after all, does hold up well within a certain realm). Since the creator(s) live in a world without time, they look upon us and our environment as more or less characters in a book, so that they can jump anywhere in the story (using the fast forward button on their gigantic remotes), while the storyline never changes. However, to make things interesting, they’ve devised a way that there are endless variations on the story, which exist in separate “Hugh Everett Many Worlds”. Furthermore, the creator(s) compete among themselves (or oneself, but even God has his built-in Holy Trinity?) to create the best “outcomes” (realities that result in the most success). Being very competitive, the creator(s) sometimes influence the outcomes, even though they shouldn’t (sort of like a baseball fan that accidentally hits an outfielder with a beer bottle). As such, they enter our world as “ghosts” or “aliens”, but are careful to cover their tracks so that we only vaguely remember the interaction (the “Neuralyzer” in “Men in Black” comes to mind here). They sometimes create disinformation, like the Lost City of Atlantis, the King Arthur Legends, or the Trump Presidency, to further distract us from the fact that we are in a simulation with occasional intervention.
To keep us all believing that our world is completely real, they allow us to make discoveries, but are getting kind of worried that they might have to say “pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!”, or do one gigantic Neuralyzing (possibly with a giant comet or meteorite…is this what happened to the dinosaurs? Did they get too smart?) However, worm-hole travel may be the little back-door that we may someday find, to perhaps figure out this game (maybe it’s the cheese at the end of a giant rat’s maze, or maybe a cosmic one of those “Mystery Escape Game” centers). Even so, many mysteries would remain…what happens when we die? Are the aliens that visit us really from other worlds or are they advanced us-es from the future (more likely). What do ghosts do during their considerable time-off? Why do aliens probe things (if they’re that smart, why not use a sensor? For that matter, why even bother?)
I also need to digress and explain dreams and free-will. Do you remember that science film they used to show you in high school, about how the eyes turn everything upside down and your brain turns it right side up to satisfy itself? Did you ever start wondering what other aspect of reality your brain messes with? Perhaps, like… anything it wants to? Reality has a very karmic aspect (new-age again, but we seem to get not what we want, but what we deserve?) As such, maybe our dreams are “many worlds” and our waking state makes us see what we want, with an occasional dash of cold water (what we deserve). Maybe this is a trick played on us by the creator(s), so that we keep believing but not always behaving, like an ox following a bucket of grain, with an occasional lash of the whip. Another thing about dreams is that they are essentially a movie made on the fly, with information you barely know you have…almost like you’re tapping into the collective consciousness of all humanity. Maybe dreams are our view of all the possibilities, and a chance to reconvene with our creator(s), to help exercise “free will”, which of course makes the game interesting for God or anyone else. But of course you also fear that “free will” is a trick, because if you understand the game (or are a Presbyterian), you know that the game is rigged and your fate is probably sealed. But it may be more like programmed “free will”, like a Patrick Mahomes avatar in a “Madden NFL 20” game, who “free wills” a pass or handoff according to his programmed “tendencies”, yet reverts to his “fate” (overall statistics) over the long haul. Except that some manage (by an extreme twist of fate) to get an angel or alien to intervene (like Moses, George Bailey, or the ’69 New York Mets).
As for dying, I say that we all get recycled into a kind of cosmic spare-parts boneyard, with everything from aardvarks and salamanders to amoebas, except it’s not a physical boneyard, but more of a concept boneyard, which is no indictment but simply suggests that we weren’t exceptional (hell?). After all, what’s the point of torturing things? Isn’t the fact that you’re there punishment enough? But there’s no time there so your essence gets to mingle with Judas Iscariot (a good, not great disciple), Neville Chamberlain (a good, not great statesman), and Zlorg, the inventor of fermented tuber juice. The chosen few of us, who have played the game incredibly well, are taken behind the curtain and told how the game works (kind of like “Candid Camera”), which is a type of heaven if you will. Also, maybe “dying” is the point when you figure out that it’s only a game, and have to be “retired” (like what you’d do to your dog if he were to suddenly turn around and say “wait! you’re not really my friend! You just put tennis balls, sprinklers, cats, and mirrors in front of me so you can laugh behind my back! It’s over!”) Those who play the game historically well (Socrates, Gandhi, Lassie, and Flipper?) are even asked to help run the game? All of this is beginning to sound like Woody Allen’s “I don’t believe in the afterlife, but I am taking along a change of underwear”, or “The Good Place” so I’ll stop here and let Ted Danson and Kristen Bell do the rest of the ‘splainin’.
