I think that we are most likely living inside a gigantic computer, although, of course, there is no way to actually know that. Even if the idea is true, a simulated reality would be indistinguishable from "true" reality. So I guess this is basically an analogy more than anything else. But, it seems to be the most perfect one in connection with religion, so I wanted to explain this a little bit.
This is an old idea actually, and a modern term for this is generally referred to as "digital philosophy" (see the links below) which essentially maintains that all mental and physical activities are digitized information processing: Our brains, genes, living things, galaxies, planets, rocks, and everything else are essentially physical systems which are storing and processing bits of information in a systematic manner - similar to what happens in a computer. The universe itself behaves like a computer and as if it's running on a powerful program ... but we don't know what it is yet.
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/Black...puters.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_philosophy
I do believe that everything we see are "real," but just that what we perceive makes up only the very surface of reality. There is a "greater reality" that exists beyond our awareness, and so the present reality is not as real as we think it is. To extend the idea further, maybe the keyboard that I'm typing on can somehow be turned into some other mysterious object, or a tree can turn into a jumping spider, or a mountain can switch places with another mountain instantly. Such "physically impossible" events would be just like the story of how Moses's rod turned into a snake when he threw it to the ground, or the splitting of the Red Sea, or Jesus turning water into wine, or the splitting of the moon in half, and so and so forth ... events which are possible only if the laws of nature are temporarily hackable somehow, perhaps through divine intervention only ... otherwise known as "miracles."
The whole universe might be something like a gigantic computer which is running down and, eventually, it may crash one day. The bright and stunning stars, galaxies, and even the rest of the universe may cease to exist. But, then, what would happen to our actions in this world? Do they get destroyed also like everything else?
Well, from a religious point of view, we believe that our deeds (or actions) won't be destroyed because they are being automatically "written down" so that they are saved or preserved somewhere for future retrieval - sort of like the "auto-save" in a computer - which later can be replaced or deleted by other deeds.
Perhaps even the whole universe is registering and processing bits of information and there might be some kind of a built-in "memory" system embedded inside it, which is recording our actions.
What about the plausibility of resurrection and afterlife? Can some information get reconstructed in full after they have been destroyed?
I believe that the answer is yes, because postmortem preservation of identity is a fundamental concept in my religion. And this is the idea that our skin, bones, fingers, and our entire bodies will be resurrected into one piece as they were before. Our bodies will be put back into an earlier form; they will be reconstructed even up to the "very tips of our fingers," as the Quran says. And I think that the resurrection process could be something like a real-life system restore, or maybe it would be a kind of natural "reversible computation" that brings dead things back to life again.
People with more sins might take a longer time to go to Heaven because they will encounter a greater amount of obstacles and punishments than those people with less sins. This, to me, also relates well with the analogy that I've been speaking of, because when a computer is filled with too much junk information and viruses and all that stuff over the years, then it starts to operate more slowly. So in the same way, if our souls accumulate a greater load of sins then there is going to be a greater amount of "lag" for us during our spiritual journey; the sins will slow us down just like too many bugs and viruses inside a computer may cause it to operate more slowly ... SYSTEM ERROR!!! And the main mastermind behind that is the devil who is like an interminable spammer, who whispers things into our heads because he is desperate to overload our brains with all kinds of bad intentions and bad ideas.
Interestingly, many people believe that the universe is complex enough that they are justified in ascribing an "intelligence" or a "consciousness" to the engineering of all the countless events occurring in nature. In relation to the computational/informational view of reality, that equals to saying that the universe passes the Turing test. They believe that the complex phenomenons in nature are rather signs of an intelligent designer. Others believe that the events in nature are most likely simply a result of blind and accidental forces - i.e. there is no intelligent/conscious/mind-like properties needed to create them - so respectively they must believe that the universe doesn't pass the Turing test.
At any rate, I'm aware that this "universe is a computer" analogy comes across a little too wacky for many people to believe this, apparently. There is no solid evidence to back up this kind of thinking. But, still, it is something that I have found to have a sound correspondence with religious beliefs which I doubt is merely coincidental. Thus the analogy here is quite interesting to me.
This is an old idea actually, and a modern term for this is generally referred to as "digital philosophy" (see the links below) which essentially maintains that all mental and physical activities are digitized information processing: Our brains, genes, living things, galaxies, planets, rocks, and everything else are essentially physical systems which are storing and processing bits of information in a systematic manner - similar to what happens in a computer. The universe itself behaves like a computer and as if it's running on a powerful program ... but we don't know what it is yet.
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/Black...puters.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_philosophy
I do believe that everything we see are "real," but just that what we perceive makes up only the very surface of reality. There is a "greater reality" that exists beyond our awareness, and so the present reality is not as real as we think it is. To extend the idea further, maybe the keyboard that I'm typing on can somehow be turned into some other mysterious object, or a tree can turn into a jumping spider, or a mountain can switch places with another mountain instantly. Such "physically impossible" events would be just like the story of how Moses's rod turned into a snake when he threw it to the ground, or the splitting of the Red Sea, or Jesus turning water into wine, or the splitting of the moon in half, and so and so forth ... events which are possible only if the laws of nature are temporarily hackable somehow, perhaps through divine intervention only ... otherwise known as "miracles."
The whole universe might be something like a gigantic computer which is running down and, eventually, it may crash one day. The bright and stunning stars, galaxies, and even the rest of the universe may cease to exist. But, then, what would happen to our actions in this world? Do they get destroyed also like everything else?
Well, from a religious point of view, we believe that our deeds (or actions) won't be destroyed because they are being automatically "written down" so that they are saved or preserved somewhere for future retrieval - sort of like the "auto-save" in a computer - which later can be replaced or deleted by other deeds.
Perhaps even the whole universe is registering and processing bits of information and there might be some kind of a built-in "memory" system embedded inside it, which is recording our actions.
What about the plausibility of resurrection and afterlife? Can some information get reconstructed in full after they have been destroyed?
I believe that the answer is yes, because postmortem preservation of identity is a fundamental concept in my religion. And this is the idea that our skin, bones, fingers, and our entire bodies will be resurrected into one piece as they were before. Our bodies will be put back into an earlier form; they will be reconstructed even up to the "very tips of our fingers," as the Quran says. And I think that the resurrection process could be something like a real-life system restore, or maybe it would be a kind of natural "reversible computation" that brings dead things back to life again.
People with more sins might take a longer time to go to Heaven because they will encounter a greater amount of obstacles and punishments than those people with less sins. This, to me, also relates well with the analogy that I've been speaking of, because when a computer is filled with too much junk information and viruses and all that stuff over the years, then it starts to operate more slowly. So in the same way, if our souls accumulate a greater load of sins then there is going to be a greater amount of "lag" for us during our spiritual journey; the sins will slow us down just like too many bugs and viruses inside a computer may cause it to operate more slowly ... SYSTEM ERROR!!! And the main mastermind behind that is the devil who is like an interminable spammer, who whispers things into our heads because he is desperate to overload our brains with all kinds of bad intentions and bad ideas.
Interestingly, many people believe that the universe is complex enough that they are justified in ascribing an "intelligence" or a "consciousness" to the engineering of all the countless events occurring in nature. In relation to the computational/informational view of reality, that equals to saying that the universe passes the Turing test. They believe that the complex phenomenons in nature are rather signs of an intelligent designer. Others believe that the events in nature are most likely simply a result of blind and accidental forces - i.e. there is no intelligent/conscious/mind-like properties needed to create them - so respectively they must believe that the universe doesn't pass the Turing test.
At any rate, I'm aware that this "universe is a computer" analogy comes across a little too wacky for many people to believe this, apparently. There is no solid evidence to back up this kind of thinking. But, still, it is something that I have found to have a sound correspondence with religious beliefs which I doubt is merely coincidental. Thus the analogy here is quite interesting to me.
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