--- title: "Local Universe · a universe that takes 7.0 × 10⁸⁵ FLOPS · Simulation Hypothesis" url: https://simulation-hypothesis.com/builds/local description: "The Milky Way at atomic resolution, from the Big Bang. Everything we could plausibly reach, computed atom by atom from the starting state." license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ credit: "Ross Allan Dahl, Simulation Hypothesis (simulation-hypothesis.com)" --- [Scenarios](https://simulation-hypothesis.com/builds)5/9 # Local Universe · The Milky Way at atomic resolution, from the Big Bang. Open in the sandbox ▸ Everything we could plausibly reach, computed atom by atom from the starting state. Past the edge of the galaxy nothing is computed. It’s kept only as a probability distribution. Required computing power rough 7.0 × 10^85 FLOPS Never on one star’s power with ordinary logic, even at the thermodynamic floor. [The countdown ▸](https://simulation-hypothesis.com/countdown) That’s 8.6 × 10^-19 of one universe-computer, which is the whole observable universe running at its physical limit. Computer sizetextbook 65,000 × a Sun-mass ultimate computer A star turned into a computer. At Lloyd’s bound this takes 65,000 Suns of matter, all of it computing. Feasibility Beyond an Earth-mass computer More than a planet’s worth of matter could compute at the physical limit. Universe-computerstextbook 8.6 × 10^-19 One universe-computer is every kilogram in the observable universe computing at Lloyd’s bound. Power draw, Landauer floortextbook 5.2 × 10^38 Suns The thermodynamic minimum for flipping bits at room temperature. The best real hardware uses about five billion times more energy than that. 5.2 × 10^38 Suns of power at the Landauer floor, assuming perfect chips. The best real chips use about five billion times more energy than that. On every computer on Earthrough 2.2 × 10^57 years per second How long it takes, on a clock, to compute one second of simulation on all of humanity’s computers, \~10^21 FLOPS. 1.6 × 10^47 ages of the universe, on all of Earth’s computing, for every simulated second. World actually computedwild guess 100% 6.9 × 10^-17% of the mass is watched by 8.3 × 10^15 observers. The observation dial sets how much of the remainder is computed at the full floor. ## Questions this scenario asks * Why does the simulation stop at the edge of the galaxy? * What does running something this big say about whoever runs it? * Are we important enough for atomic detail? * Is what we can’t observe a different kind of thing, or just not drawn in? “Worked out galaxy at atom resolution: 7.0 × 10^85 FLOPS, or 65,000 × a Sun-mass ultimate computer.” ## Report card Instance report ONE SIMULATED WORLD Settings Scale Milky Way Matter floor Atom Lobby Multiplayer Inner lives 8.3 × 10^15 · functional Computed 100% Time Linear, live from 1.4 × 10^10 yrs ago Computing needed 7.0 × 10^85 FLOPS Computer size 65,000 × a Sun-mass ultimate computer Universe-computers 8.6 × 10^-19 Feasibility Beyond an Earth-mass computer Judged, not measured The author’s reading. None of these changes the computing total. Suffering As found Free will Dice Utilitarian leans for Deontological leans for Virtue ethics leans for Existentialist divided “Worked out galaxy at atom resolution: 7.0 × 10^85 FLOPS, or 65,000 × a Sun-mass ultimate computer.” Two of these are rough and three are wild guesses, and each is tagged that way. Change any one dial and you get a different universe. Matter computingrough 7.0 × 10^85 FLOPS 7.0 × 10^67 atom-sized units across galaxy, each updated every 1 fs. Mind computingrough rides along free At the atom floor, brains are already computed as matter. On their own they’d take 8.2 × 10^33. At this matter floor the brains are already computed as matter, so minds add nothing to the total. Inner liveswild guess 8.3 × 10^15 8.3 × 10^15 real minds. 4.5 × 10^26 organisms left as scenery. Operations so farrough 3.0 × 10^103 13.8 billion years on the clock, at 7.0 × 10^85 per second. History that is only storedrough 0% Computing begins 13.8 billion years ago. No humans are present at the start. [◂ The 2050 Server](https://simulation-hypothesis.com/builds/server-2050)Open in the sandbox ▸ [Universe Lite ▸](https://simulation-hypothesis.com/builds/lite)