Commonwealth Club Of California Podcast

Are we living in the Matrix? Rizwan Virk—an MIT computer scientist, leading video game pioneer, entrepreneur, film producer, venture capitalist, professor, and a founder of Play Labs @ MIT—is a leading authority on simulation theory. Now he comes to Commonwealth Club World Affairs to discuss the issues raised in his new book The Simulation Hypothesis: An MIT Computer Scientist Shows Why AI, Quantum Physics, and Eastern Mystics All Agree We Are in a Video Game.  Virk says the evolution of our video games, including virtual reality, augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing, will lead us to a technological singularity. We will reach the simulation point, he argues, where we can develop all-encompassing virtual worlds like the OASIS in Ready Player One or The Matrix—and in fact we are already likely inside such a simulation. Though that sounds like science fiction, many scientists, engineers, and professors have given the simulation hypothesis serious consideration, including Elon Musk