For decades, many scientists and philosophers have tried to answer a billion-dollar question: Do humans live in a simulated universe? Is the reality we are witnessing real?
University of Portsmouth scientist Melvin Vopson believes he has evidence that proves reality is ‘fake’ and that the universe is trapped in simulation.
According to Vopson, the key to proving this theory lies in the Second Law of Infodynamics, which is inspired by the second law of thermodynamics.
According to the second law of thermodynamics, entropy – a measure of disorder in an isolated system – will only increase or remain the same, but will never decrease.
Based on this law, the entropy of the information system should also increase with time. To our surprise, entropy is on a downward trajectory in the information system.
Instead, Vopson argued that it either remains constant or decreases to a minimum value at equilibrium. Such a deviation goes against the second law of thermodynamics, which inspired Vopson to adopt the Second Law of Information Dynamics.
“However, we also know from thermodynamics that entropy always increases. I argue that this shows that there must be another entropy – information entropy – to balance the increase,” he said.
Vopson claims that the decrease in entropy in the information system points to the built-in digital nature of the universe that is dominated by data optimization and compression “to reduce the computing power and data storage requirements to run the simulation.”
“This is exactly what we observe all around us, including in digital data, biological systems, mathematical symmetries and the entire universe,” he added.
Vopson’s Second Law of Information Dynamics is not verifiable enough to prove the simulation theory. But it is also hoped that the law could unlock the secrets of some interesting discoveries.
