Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?

Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?
Philosophical Quarterly (2003), Vol. 53, No. 211, pp. 243-255.

BY NICK BOSTROM
Department of Philosophy, Oxford University

Abstract:

This paper argues that at least one of the following propositions is true: (1) the human species is very likely to go extinct before reaching a “posthuman” stage; (2) any posthuman civilization is extremely unlikely to run a significant number of simulations of their evolutionary history (or variations thereof); (3) we are almost certainly living in a computer simulation. It follows that the belief that there is a significant chance that we will one day become posthumans who run ancestor-simulations is false, unless we are currently living in a simulation. A number of other consequences of this result are also discussed.