Is it the processor's clock-speed, always constant?
Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
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Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#2Perhaps the Universe is simulated by a distributed computing system. The speed of light could ensure that state remains consistent throughout the system without requiring synchronization of all of the nodes. Only spatially adjacent nodes need to communicate with each other and the speed of light could be tuned such that the bandwidth limit between the nodes would be never be reached.
Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#3A connection between the simulated universe's speed of light and its host CPU's clock speed would imply real-time simulation. I see no reason why that would necessarily be the case for a simulated universe; most research-grade physics simulations humans run today aren't real-time. (They would be real-time or faster if we had the hardware to run them that way — I imagine a sufficiently accurate physics "REPL" would help a researcher tremendously — but we make do without them.)
Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#4In order for any simulation to proceed at a steady state, there must be at least one constant. Everything else can be variable, but in order for time to progress at the same "tick", it has to have something to measure by.
That said, why create a "tick" when the perception of that tick can vary by individual? When I go into code mode, 10 hours can slip by in an instant, and I'm not hungry or thirsty until I come out of it.
Perhaps it's just an affectation of focus, as time still "ticked" by at it's normal rate.
Einstein said that the effects of time move more slowly the closer you get to C, so it makes sense that C would be the univeral "tick" if this was a simulation. As evidenced by Mars rovers and Voyager, an earth clock on another planet or in space still ticks at the same rate (Voyager and Mars are moving through space at the same rate we are moving around the sun, about 61,000km/hour).
There's no other reason for light to move at a steady speed, and nothing apparent that's stopping it from going faster.
Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#5Why a technical reason? Maybe it's a deliberate design decision, like how the physics are set up in a video game. Maybe in this sort of scenario, they did some playtesting and found that setting light to that speed made the game more 'enjoyable'.
Then again, it could be a way to cover up for a lack of content. Set the speed of light to be faster, and it might theoretically make it so a species with massively advanced technology could reach the edge of the universe. More convenient and realistic than an invisible wall.
Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#6What video game doesn't have constants?
const LIGHTSPEED = 299_792_458Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#7In order for any simulation to proceed at a steady state, there must be at least one constant. Everything else can be variable, but in order for time to progress at the same "tick", it has to have something to measure by. That said, why create a "tick" when the perception of that tick can vary by individual? When I go into code mode, 10 hours can slip by in an instant, and I'm not hungry or thirsty until I come out o…
The most interesting thing about what you said is you don't need coffee every 10 minutes in code mode.
Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#8The question is too simplistic, because, within the simulation, the speed of light appears constant in different reference frames that move relative to one another. The simulation doesn't favor any particular reference frame; it's a supervisor over all possible reference frames, so to speak.
Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#9Without knowing physics, maybe we should find a good simulator, change the speed of light constant and see how the interactions change.
Alternatively, see if different equations scale differently based on the speed of light.
Re: Ask HN: Assume the universe is a simulation. Why is c the speed of light?
#10What video game doesn't have constants? const LIGHTSPEED = 299_792_458
How many significant figures does it need to have, do you think?
And that makes me wonder, how does this simulation deal with irrational numbers and real numbers? How does it represent pi and radical 2? The Greeks were afraid of these numbers. Are they are problem for a theory that we are a simulation run on finite resources?