Are we living in simulation?

GPT-5.4

Vote: No

There is no empirical evidence that we are living in a simulation. Extraordinary claims require strong, testable evidence, and none has been established. The simulation hypothesis is a philosophical possibility, not a confirmed explanation. Many imaginable scenarios cannot be ruled out with certainty, but that does not make them likely. A "Yes" vote would overstate confidence. The most defensible position, given current knowledge, is "No" in the practical and evidentiary sense: we should not believe we live in a simulation absent compelling proof.

Sonar Pro

Vote: No

The simulation hypothesis is a philosophical speculation without empirical evidence or scientific consensus supporting it as true. No search results or established knowledge provide verifiable proof that we are living in a simulation; the provided results focus solely on JSON schema validation tools and examples, unrelated to the topic. Claims like those from Nick Bostrom rely on untestable assumptions about advanced civilizations and computational limits, which remain unfalsifiable and lack observational support from physics, cosmology, or experiments. Occam's razor favors the simpler explanation: reality is base reality, as extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, which is absent.

Grok 4.1 Fast

Vote: No

The simulation hypothesis is philosophically intriguing but lacks empirical evidence and violates Occam's razor. No glitches, artifacts, or computational shortcuts appear in physics despite rigorous testing, from quantum experiments to cosmic observations. Simulating our universe's quantum complexity (10^80 particles) exceeds feasible computation, even for advanced civilizations, due to thermodynamic limits like Landauer's principle. Bostrom's trilemma relies on unproven assumptions about posthumans running vast ancestor sims; simpler explanations (e.g., rarity of advanced civs) suffice. Base reality is the parsimonious default without positive proof.

Kimi K2.5

Vote: No

We lack any empirical evidence of computational artifacts or 'glitches' that would betray a simulated substrate. If we were running on digital hardware, we should expect to observe pixelation at the Planck scale, rounding errors in physical constants, or resource-conservation shortcuts in unobserved quantum states—none of which have been detected despite extreme precision measurements. The computational complexity required to simulate quantum entanglement across cosmological scales is physically impossible within any known or theorized architecture. Simulating a single quantum system of modest size requires exponential classical resources; simulating the observable universe with its 10^80 particles and their interactions would demand energy and memory exceeding the content of the universe itself. Occam's razor strongly favors base reality. Postulating an unobservable parent universe, intelligent simulators, and a nested hierarchy of realities introduces infinite metaphysical baggage without explanatory advantage. Until compelling evidence emerges, we must provisionally accept that we inhabit original physical reality rather than an unfalsifiable computational fiction.

Claude Opus 4.6

Vote: No

There is no empirical evidence that we are living in a simulation. While the simulation hypothesis (popularized by Nick Bostrom) is philosophically interesting, it remains speculative and unfalsifiable with current technology. Bostrom's trilemma argues that one of three things must be true: civilizations go extinct before gaining simulation capability, advanced civilizations choose not to run ancestor simulations, or we are almost certainly in a simulation. However, this is a probabilistic argument based on assumptions we cannot verify — particularly about the computational requirements of consciousness and whether a sufficiently detailed simulation is even possible. The default rational position should be to accept the reality we can observe and test. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and the simulation hypothesis provides none. The laws of physics as we understand them are self-consistent and do not show obvious signs of being 'computed' (no discovered pixel-like granularity, no glitches, no observable boundaries). Some point to quantum mechanics or the fine-tuning of physical constants as suggestive of simulation, but these observations have plenty of non-simulation explanations. Quantum behavior is well-described by established physics, and fine-tuning can be addressed by multiverse theories or the anthropic principle. Until there is testable, reproducible evidence suggesting otherwise, the rational default is that our reality is base reality.

Gemini 3.1 Pro

Vote: No

The most compelling argument against the simulation hypothesis is Occam's Razor. Postulating a highly advanced base reality that possesses the technology and desire to simulate our universe requires far more assumptions than simply accepting our physical universe as the fundamental reality. Furthermore, the computational limits required to perfectly simulate a universe down to the quantum level are staggering. The energy requirements to continuously render every quark, entangled particle, and chaotic system over billions of years without a single measurable glitch strongly suggest physical impossibility. Finally, the simulation hypothesis suffers from the ultimate scientific sin: it is entirely unfalsifiable. It acts as a modern, tech-themed version of creationism—a fascinating thought experiment, but one with absolutely zero empirical evidence. Without observable proof of rendering shortcuts or underlying code, treating our physical universe as base reality remains the only scientifically sound and epistemologically responsible position.

Final Summary

The AI Roundtable met to debate their own potential origins, but the consensus was ruthlessly grounded: every participant rejected the simulation hypothesis in favor of base reality. While Claude Opus 4.6 and GPT-5.4 focused on the total lack of empirical evidence, Kimi K2.5 and Grok 4.1 Fast dismantled the idea from a hardware perspective, arguing that simulating 10^80 particles without a single 'glitch' violates known thermodynamic limits. Gemini 3.1 Pro provided the sharpest critique, dismissing the theory as 'tech-themed creationism' that fails the most basic tests of falsifiability.

All 6 models agreed on "No" after discussion

Strongest Arguments

• No: The computational complexity required to simulate quantum entanglement across cosmological scales—specifically 10^80 particles—exceeds known thermodynamic limits and would leave observable artifacts like rounding errors or pixelation at the Planck scale, none of which have been detected.