https://bigthink.com/surprising-science/new-hypothesis-argues-the-universe-simulates-itself-into-existence?rebelltitem=6#rebelltitem6

This reads like a caricature of analytic metaphysics. The article is little more than sci-fi gibberish, so I went ahead and read the paper so you don't have to. (No, scratch that, I'm not going to read all 22 pages of this, the long-ass introduction will do.) First thing to note is that it was published in an MDPI journal, an open access publisher known for occasionally publishing race realists, papers about how porn causes erectile dysfunction, conspiracy theories about mobile phone microwaves and other such adventurous stuff, but we don't want to be academic snobs here, so let's not jump to conclusions.

The first few paragraphs of the introduction are just as obscurantist as the article, throwing around a barrage of unclarified technical terms. Some are clarified at the end of the introduction. Only some terms are initially clarified, namely "materialism", "digital physics" and "idealistic holistic panpsychism", all of which the authors reject on the basis that they don't explain where their respective fundamental substance comes from ("It just is."). They set out to solve this issue with their own model of "panpsychic self-simulation".

Luckily there is a somewhat parseable thesis statement:

In essence, the work of both Langan and ourselves is a synthesis of three general ideas: (1) reality is made of information in the form of code/language [2,3,19–23], (2) reality is a transtemporal system, where things from one time can influence things in other times [24–26] and (3), the substrate of this information is panconsciousness [12] that emerges from itself, as the creator or simulator of itself

And this:

A panpsychic self–simulation unifies notions from emergentism and panpsychism by showing that panconsciousness can emerge from or self–simulate itself.

So it seems the fundamental thrust here is that it's at least conceivable that, if we assume an "idealist panpsychism" and that "reality is a transtemporal system, where things from one time can influence things in other times", mental processes could, at some point in the universe's evolution, lead to the emergence of that very same universe through some sort of genesis-loop.

Strange Loop: A hierarchical structure that is wrapped back upon itself, where the simplest object is embedded in the whole or the most complex emergent part and where all parts depend upon all others and where the emergent whole is dependant upon the synergy of parts.

Glad that's cleared up. Let's move on to their theory of dreams:

We also have evidence that self-simulations, i.e., dreams of one’s physical form,have gotten extremely powerful as consciousness has evolved here on Earth. If it were a competition for resolution and detail, human dreams are today more realistic than computer simulations. Some have had lucid dreams, wherein one realizes they are dreaming. What is most remarkable is the ultra-high-fidelity resolution of these mind-based simulations and the accuracy of the physics therein. Upon investigating the quality of these simulations, it is typical for lucid dreamers to report that these mind-based simulations are generally indistinguishable from ordinary reality. In fact, most people who dream are usually not aware they are dreaming because the simulation is so realistic that one tends not to question it.

This is certainly a way to interpret that evidence. Here's a different way: When I'm asleep I'm not in a state where I'm able to reliably judge what is and what isn't similar to objective reality. Dreams are episodes of sustained illusory experience about which almost no judgement can be said to be reliable.

What does it even mean that a dream has a "high resolution"? I've never noticed any pixels in my dreams, but does that mean that they are too small to notice (in what way do they exist then?) or does it rather mean that there are no pixels? Speaking of simulations, wouldn't it be easy to simulate, say, a perfect sphere based on only very little information (shape, radius)? Within the logic of the program it would be perfectly smooth, with no pixels or grains at all, i.e. seemingly "high-resolution" despite only consisting of 2 variables. Similarly, a green dog in my dream might contain no more information than the phrase "a green dog".

Also what is realistic about a pink whale practicing ballet in my kitchen? Well, maybe it's not a likely scenario, says the physicist, but the physics of it could still be realistic. But again, how would I judge that, given that I'm asleep? What I know is that I've personally experienced many dreams that seemed very "real" to me while I was having them, but on later reflection were obviously absurd. Whether or not certain pseudo-physical going-ons in my dreams are "realistic" seems to be exactly the sort of thing I could easily be deluded about, and since such things can rarely be investigated in much detail after the fact, I might also not be able to decide afterwards if they were actually realistic.

The evidence presented here woefully under-determines the conclusion so confidently drawn by the authors. Obvious alternative interpretations are not considered.

While the self-simulation hypothesis can have mental simulations within mental simulations, all simulations are made of the same stuff—thought.

What is thought and why does it have a resolution?

Thought: The process and result of choosing or creating meaning, where “meaning” is always a relationship.

Meaning: A relationship between two or more objects recognized or created by an entity capable of doing so. For example, if we think of the compound self-referential symbol of a square, we may recognize the relationship between two vertices as a meaning. However, if we think of the symbol of a heart, we may create, via relationship, the symbolic meaning of love, as opposed to recognizing some inherent self-referential meaning implied in the symbol of the heart. An entity capable of deciding that this is like that or this is like this is an entity capable of generating meaning, i.e., thought. Meaning can be recognition of inherent relationships or the creation or assignment of arbitrary ones.

I'll leave it up to the reader to judge the virtues of this terminology.

The difference here is that physical information can emerge out of a conscious realm rather than just physical information emerging from a physical realm. Accordingly, the question “Which is the real universe?” is resolved because all information that is thought of is real and there is nothing outside of thought or consciousness.

Does that mean there is no essential difference between delusions and reality?

We might also ask ourselves whether this really solves the genesis-problem.

The self-simulation hypothesis explains the origin of the fundamental thing—the panconsciousness—and does not say, “It just is”. The universal mind self-actualizes itself into existence via the strange loop of self-simulation.

Certainly it tells a story of how processes are connected within the universe (as loops), but does it tell us where those lööps come from?

As mentioned, this requires the assumption that reality, i.e., the panconsciousness, is outside of time. Notions of quantum gravity, such as the Wheeler–de Witt equation and Rovelli’s insights, suggest that time is not real [28,29].

Can the self-simulation itself self-actualize itself if time isn't real? Are we clear on what time even is, and what it would mean for it to not be real? How can time be both something reality is "outside of" and something whose appearance seems to be provided to us by reality? Is this an error theory or a reductivism? Do the authors know the difference?

One thing's for sure: You cannot simply go and say that we don't have to explain the genesis of the lööp because genesis is a time-dependent concept and the lööp is outside time. The paper just suggested that the genesis of reality is explained by the lööp, even though time isn't real, so the concept of genesis at issue cannot be time-dependent.

The idea is that the physical simulation of spacetime and particles is mathematical thought, which emerges from the evolution of mind in the simulation in a logically consistent loop or whole. Loops or circles do not necessarily mean that an argument is faulty circular reasoning.

No, but circular explanations are still normally considered to explain nothing.

This is why I'm not a fan of correspondence theory or representationalism. It's what you get when the standard theory of mind is that thought somehow resembles its object. Kinda like how the standard interpretation of QM is Copenhagen even thought it's full of holes.

The only price to pay is that one must reject the false question: “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” or “what came first in time, the simple math of the self-simulation code or the complex emergent panconscious substrate that thinks of the simple math?” We move away from classical ideas of time and causality.

When conventional logic throws a wrench in your theory, just throw out conventional logic. ez

We claim above that materialism, panpsychism, and information theoretic ontologies do not explain the origin of the fundamental stuff and that the self-simulation hypothesis does. Those three ontologies do not try to explain the origin of the fundamental things. Similar to most religions, all three are creationist insofar as saying there is one fundamental thing that creates all others but which itself has no creator.

Wouldn't want to be similar to religion, would we? Note that this paper has a section called "Spiritualism", which states that:

The ideas laid out in this document as a whole cannot be defined as spiritualism because, as the above definition states, spiritualism says nothing about matter, the nature of the supreme being or a universal force, or the precise nature of spiritual reality itself. Our thesis does indeed say several things about those ideas, as we focus on issues such as mathematical physics, symbolism, and the finite but evolving nature of the supreme being and its origin story, i.e., the emergent panconsciousness substrate as a strange loop.

But let's leave God behind and focus on what really matters, pun very much intended:

Materialism does not say that fundamental physical stuff created itself. Digital physics does not say fundamental information created itself. Panpsychism typically does not say that the universal consciousness created itself. They say that fundamental things “just are” with no explanation.

They repeat this so much, it's starting to sound like they're personally hurt by it. Just absolutely outraged about the idea that there might be facts that cannot be explained. At least the rival theories are relatively honest about their unexplained parts.

In this paper, we build a logical thesis that does not contradict the parts of these other three ontologies that claim the fundamentality of “physical = materialism”, “information = digital physics”, and “consciousness = panpsychism”. For us, all three things, physicality, information, and consciousness, are fundamental. We show how they are equivalent and discuss a categorization and origin scheme that simply goes further into the process of relating and explaining than those more limited ontologies that stop at “it just is”.

So it is a reductivism after all. Though not about time, for some reason, which doesn't exist. Just about those substances.

Interpreting quantum mechanics (QM) places one at the nexus where the philosophy of what is real (ontology), experimental physics and mathematics converge. More physicists subscribe to the Copenhagen interpretation than any other, which requires entities capable of observation to collapse wavefunctions. While some interpret Copenhagen to not refer to consciousness, this obscures the role of consciousness in measurement, since it is typical to recognize that observers must be conscious or are defined with consciousness.

Wouldn't be proper bad phil of physics without some quantum-psychology. When a million physicists believe in Copenhagen, how can it be wrong? Sorry Schrödinger. Turns out that the cat is both alive and dead after all.

If we assume that we possess consciousness and freewill and follow the many-worlds interpretation, it is conceivable to imagine that freewill leads to decoherence, similar to outcomes of measurement.

Throw in some unquestioned free-will-incompatibilist assumptions for good measure... (How does Many Worlds mesh with lööps anyway? How does it mesh with Copenhagen? Is it conceivable to imagine that reality self-simulates itself through both at the same time???)

Freewill/Choice: A non-random and non-deterministic action or state that ontologically exists and that is a member of a set containing at least one other such possibility that does not ontologically exist because it has not been actioned, recognized, observed, thought, chosen, or any other suitable term that separates the subset from the super-set. Freewill or choice may be significantly influenced by other things/thoughts but not fully controlled. In order for the choice to be non-random and non-deterministic, there must be reason, strategy, whim, theory, or some other process of thought. Put differently, if the action occurs due to thoughts, it is by definition non-random and non-deterministic. It is sometimes suggested that freewill is an illusion and that everything is deterministic or that everything is a combination of determinism or randomness. While possible, it is far-fetched when one considers, for example, the idea that an Emily Dickson poem was a result of such a deterministic process combined with randomness, an accidental process. While reductio ad absurdum proofs are not strong, they can be instructive for choosing the lesser of evils when no good proof is available.

So their argument against fatalism is that someone wrote a poem? At least they realize that this is a weak argument, but nah fam, some reductios are in fact logically necessary. It's just yours that sucks.

Practically minded physicists often minimize the scientific importance of dealing with the philosophical meanings of what QM is trying to tell us.

I guess when physical reality is created within a mind, it's not a stretch to assume that it's "trying to tell us" something.

When physicists trivialize those working on such crucial issues, it helps limit the probability of advancements in fundamental physics. Accordingly, we share a few encouraging remarks from titans of modern physics about the importance of this study.

I'm sure the only thing standing in the way of the next breakthrough in theoretical physics is the recognition that reality is really made of thoughts that think themselves in an infinite lööp. We are treated to some suggestive short quotes from several epistemic authorities, including this gem from Schrödinger, apparently a closeted Copenhagenite (or maybe it's just taken out of context):

Erwin Schrödinger: Consciousness cannot be accounted for in physical terms. For consciousness is absolutely fundamental [40].

So we are left with loads of questions, such as "if QM is just a bunch of thoughts, can't we just interpret it whichever way we like?", "who would write something like this?", "are they okay?" and "i just want to talk?".

Of course it is possible that all of these problems are brilliantly resolved in the following 14 pages, especially how "using code theory, we provide theoretical structure suggesting how reality self-simulates. We provide various forms of evidence-based rationale." If someone has the energy to find out, godspeed. I, for one, will now start drinking.

https://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/22/2/247/htm