In physics and cosmology, digital physics is a collection of theoretical perspectives based on the premise that the universe is, at heart, describable by information, and is therefore computable. Therefore, the universe can be conceived of as either the output of a computer program, a vast, digital computation device, or mathematically isomorphic to such a device.
Digital physics is grounded in one or more of the following hypotheses; listed in order of decreasing strength. The universe, or reality:
- is essentially informational (although not every informational ontology needs to be digital)
- is essentially computable
- can be described digitally
- is in essence digital
- is itself a computer
- is the output of a simulated reality exercise
Famous quotes containing the word physics:
“He who is conversant with the supernal powers will not worship these inferior deities of the wind, waves, tide, and sunshine. But we would not disparage the importance of such calculations as we have described. They are truths in physics because they are true in ethics.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)