I’ve uploaded my new paper to PhilSci-Archive. Click the comments section for the Medium article (with pictures!).

This basic premise came to me seven years ago in a San Diego hot tub. The word “problem” in its (admittedly provocative) title can be interpreted as a fatal flaw or an obstacle that must be acknowledged before further progress can be made.

The piece was always meant to be a conceptually over-enriched Necker Cube, a playful excoriation of the unimaginative or less-than-rigorous treatments I’ve seen of the simulation hypothesis from critics and acolytes alike (though there are exceptions, like Roman Yampolskiy’s papers).

At 1,700 words, it could have been substantially longer. However, brevity is a virtue. Let the reader extrapolate (and mutilate) to their heart’s content; that’s the fate of any attempt at art or philosophy anyway.

I will use my yearly @highlight for this.