The Problem With Simulation Theory As Explanation For Fake News
Aside from zero evidence
THE LITERAL SIMULATION CLAIM:
Many Simulation Theorists believe we are inside a video game and contend that predictive programming and the “eerie coincidences” that often connect fake news to entertainment media are evidence that nothing is real.
In this view, reality is fake. Therefore, all news is technically fake.
If all news is fake, whether real news or psyop theatre, both are not “real.”
In a simulation, there is no meaningful distinction between real and fake news.
THE SIMULATION AS A METAPHOR FOR THE MENTAL MODEL
I do argue that we live in a mental simulation, that our map of the world is a “simulation.” Furthermore, I contend the model of the world the consensus shares is a simulation that doesn’t always match the terrain. This internal simulation is the target of the psychological operations in mass media which insert simulated events into our personal worldviews, affecting our internal models.
Simulation theory, however, argues that the physical world is a literal simulation.
The evidence supports my contention: the world exists, although our internalized concept of the world may not always align with the real thing due to media manipulation.
The discovery that news is fake does not mean the real world is fake.
Our news is infused with simulated events. This does not mean the real world is a simulation.
I would also contend that Simulation Theory is a “guardrail” conspiracy to hide media fakery and its effects on our consensus worldview.
Simulation theory, like the Mandela Effect, relies on pure Subjectivism being the ultimate truth, wherein nothing is true and nothing is false. In this view, all news is equally fake, and therefore, the distinction between real and fake news is meaningless.
OCCAM’S RAZOR:
There is no evidence we live in a simulation other than the indicators of manipulated mass media. Simulation Theory largely rests on misattributing the cause of media manipulation to a “higher power” in control of the video game we reside within.
What is more likely: that media is manipulated by man to control the minds of man, or, that nothing is real, and a higher power reveals itself in Hollywood movies and government propaganda in corporate news media?
Like the Mandela Effect, Simulation Theory is another explanation for the anomalies and glitches in the propaganda matrix. Both lack evidence and rely on a Divine Fallacy, the appeal to a “higher power,” for which their best evidence is man-made propaganda within movies.
To claim that only certain scenes within each movie are evidence of a higher power is to claim that “higher powers” are inserting prophetic easter eggs into films, but aren’t directing the entire movie. To believe this is to also claim that one can, with certainty, show the “hand of god” at work in every Netflix production. For example, the striking parallels between White Noise and the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio is, according to Simulation Theory, evidence of a higher power. This would mean that Netflix has better evidence than the Bible for the existence of a higher power.
WHAT IS MORE LIKELY? That we live in a government-directed propaganda matrix that creates a false worldview, or that God is revealed in television programming?
I would argue that Simulation Theory is a deliberate attack on cognition disguised as a new philosophy. Why? Because it undermines one's ability to see the fake and separate it from the real. It, instead, leads to relativism and subjectivism and denial of objective reality. Without Objective Reality, distinctions between real and fake are rendered meaningless.
Tim Ozman,
IPR Host
