Some speculations on the distant future.

> If we aren’t actually living through a simulation, Mr Musk said, then all human life is probably about to come to an end and so we should hope that we are living in one. “Otherwise, if civilisation stops advancing, then that may be due to some calamitous event that stops civilisation,” he said at the Recode conference.

I don't know why we should hope for that because any civilization in a layer in the stack of sims could be destroyed, which would destroy all nested sims beneath.

In fact you should hope you're further up the stack as much as possible because then the probability of destruction is lower.

However since this is about simulations it is more than likely that the physical parameters are not identical to those of the higher level simulation. Time could be experienced differently in different sims just like how animals have different lifespan ranges.

> computing technology has advanced so quickly that at some point in the future it will become indistinguishable from real life

That is probably the case but we still cannot say so definitively. Since a simulation is not identical to the one higher than it we should also make a line between distinguishablity to observers and actuality. This is probably where the look, don't look 'testing' comes into play.

> “The full-on-crazy version of the merge is we get our brains uploaded into the cloud. I’d love that. We need to level up humans, because our descendants will either conquer the galaxy or extinguish consciousness in the universe forever. What a time to be alive!”

I must admit I don't believe it happens like that. I do believe 'leveling up' is real, since we've done it before several times in our evolutionary past.

I think we're missing a piece here and that piece is the past which is biology. We have not begun to explore the possibilities of genetic modification of humans. I don't see the point of being an immortal brain or a EM without the ability to manipulate, use actuators in the physical reality.

Very seriously what is a 'neo-sapiens'? I think we have a good idea of what it would be in terms of intellectual prowess, being able to coordinate and understand vast quantities of information basically. What is much less clear to me is A: what does such a creature look like?

Perhaps, borrowing from my favorite science fiction book, we stop consuming food completely and simply obtain nourishment via water absorption and photosynthesize like plants only on a different level. That would massively improve our ecology surrounding us to improve our odds of survival. We'd still have qualia, sensation, to help us learn, just mediated by our technologies instead of being prompted indirectly by physical processes like injections or bars of chocolate.

I suspect traits like socialization, conflict, emotion and instinct have every reason to continue to exist long into our evolutionary future. It is just that we shall develop new ones. Goodbye old problem, hello new problems.

I also predict the QWERTY keyboard continues to exist for many thousands of years, like some kind of vestigial limb from millions of years ago as we were flapping about in the ocean. If you can't use CTRL-ALT-DEL to reboot your latest simulation creation then you've got to wonder if you have the same values as future-you.