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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Phys.
Sec. Interdisciplinary Physics
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fphy.2025.1561873
Astrophysical constraints on the simulation hypothesis for this Universe: why it is (nearly) impossible that we live in a simulation
Provisionally accepted- University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
We assess how much physically realistic is the "simulation hypothesis" for this Universe, based on physical constraints arising from the link between information and energy, and on known astrophysical constraints. We investigate three cases: the simulation of the entire visible Universe, the simulation of Earth only, or a low resolution simulation of Earth, compatible with high-energy neutrino observations. In all cases, the amounts of energy or power required by any version of the simulation hypothesis are entirely incompatible with physics, or (literally) astronomically large, even in the lowest resolution case. Only universes with very different physical properties can produce some version of this Universe as a simulation. On the other hand, our results show that it is just impossible that this Universe is simulated by a universe sharing the same properties, regardless of technological advancements of the far future.
Keywords: cosmology, information, Simulations, black holes, Computing
Received: 16 Jan 2025; Accepted: 07 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Vazza. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Franco Vazza, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
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