Get With the Program?

Physicists have used supercomputers to model what they call the "quantum chromodynamics" of some small spaces. Very simply put, quantum chromodynamics are the way that some of the basic forces of the universe, as well as some of the most basic subatomic particles, interact.

Funny thing is, when you model the quantum chromodynamics of an area, you pretty much recreate it in the simulation. Within the confines of the simulation, there's no way to tell the difference between it and the real thing. Of course, since the equations that model chromodynamics are incredibly complex, the size of the area that's being simulated is incredibly small -- a few "femtometers" across. A femtometer, for the curious, is .000000000000001 of a meter. But as computers get more powerful, they can simulate larger areas. And within those larger simulations, the same conditions would apply: There would be no way from within the model to tell it was a model.

This idea leads physicists, who like to think about weird things, to the supposition that the entire universe might be a kind of computer simulation being run by an incredibly powerful supercomputer.

Some physicists in Germany point out that some ordinary measurements, which can be made with modern technology, might indicate whether or not the world we live in is indeed a computer simulation. That would be very interesting if true, but since we wouldn't know the difference in our everyday experience, it's hard to see what it might mean. Unless of course you take the red pill.

On the other hand, if the world is a computer simulation and it's running on some immense version of Windows, that would explain a lot of things, from Joe Biden's high office to the popularity of Twilight, the Black-Eyed Peas and Lady Gaga: They're glitches.

But I'm thinking that the popularity of The Jersey Shore makes the simulation idea tough to believe. There's no program I can think of that would be able to explain that.