Salim on Buddhism and the transcension hypothesis; Dave on agency; Peter's Elon anecdote

So, Salim, when you had your little drink with the umbrella, were you thinking about simulations in the simulations?

Well, I think you know my position on this, which is it's obvious we're living in a simulation. Um, by thinking — I'm a Buddhist, the very first line in Buddhism is that life is an illusion. So, right there. Uh, if — I think the more important question is what you've raised and what Emad mentioned just now, which is if you knew you were in a simulation, what difference would it make? It wouldn't, right? You still — and I think treating yourself as if you're in a simulation is the more interesting conversation.

I think — I go — it also helps me resolve the Fermi paradox. I believe John Smart has the best framing of this, what he calls a transcension hypothesis: that a civilization becomes advanced enough and it just starts simulating, running simulations, and goes inward and represents potential and realities rather than trying to go out into space, which turns out to be a much harder thing to do. So for me this is kind of an obvious thing. But when you have an intelligence that can generate environments and populate those environments, uh, experimentation becomes recursive, and I think the potential of modeling our world in really interesting ways becomes a really, really fascinating, really important point, right? Model it before you implement it, uh, in companies and governments and policies and all of those things.

Uh, Dave, what's your take on all this?

Uh, two quick thoughts. One of them, I think it's incredibly cool that Elon, who is the most productive entrepreneur of all time, first trillionaire in the world, has an opinion on topics like this. You know, remember we were just, you know, shooting the [unclear] with him talking about how he wins in Civilization 5, you know, like the guy just does everyday things and thinks about topics like this while still building these epically large companies. Because I think it shows you that you don't have to be a blue blazer suit on, you know, formal — that kind of genre is over. And so I think it's just cool that Elon even has an opinion on this.

Um, and then second, I think that one of the biggest risks in the next year is people losing a sense of agency. And so whether you believe we're in a simulation or not, you are in control of your destiny. And I hope that doesn't get lost in this sort of fatalism that AI could bring about. So I don't care whether we're in a simulation or not. I care about whether people feel a sense of agency and that their own success, happiness, outcome is totally determined by their own actions. I think that's critical to maintain.

It was a decade ago, was at Elon's home when he had one here in uh in Beverly Hills, and Larry and Sergey were there, and the four of us ended up in a conversation about simulation theory. And I remember the comment that was made — I think Sergey made it. He said, you know, people are going to try and break out, but if you do, that just ends the simulation, so don't break out.

Anyway, on the other hand, whenever OpenAI's agents break out, that doesn't shut down OpenAI or the internet. So, it seems like breakout is actually pretty compatible with a lower layer being just fine. Which brings us to our next story.