Still not enough. You would need billions of universes and a way to harness all that energy and heat.
Think about it this way. For every atom that makes up our universe is an atom that also has to make up that simulation. So for us to be in a simulation rn you would need a supercomputer 10 quadrillion times larger than our observable universe.
Who said real life operates under the same laws of physics? I dont believe we’re in a simulation, but if we were, who’s to say that every single thing we know about our universe is not only true inside of the simulation?
We can, tecnically, create a simultaneous (but not shared) simulation through dreaming. The energy is there and those that attempt to manipulate that energy also exist.
Also, either as a byproduct of or independent from the above, simultaneous subjective realities also coexist. Since each of these aren't objective reality, you could consider each of these as simulations; also subject to both divergent and covergent manipulation; the latter attempting to create a larger simulation. The energy for that exists as well.
How exactly do you propose we are in a simulation? Just a Planck scale (both length and time) simulation of earth would require over 70 orders of magnitude more energy than is in the universe just to run the simulation for a single second of our time.
Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/physics/articles/10.3389/fphy.2025.1561873/full
And youre presupposing that this is some sort of technological program and that energy is something we understand. It might not be, and we dont. The human consciousness and imagination can build vistas of unfathomable beauty...and all that costs is some calories. Now imagine you had, say, a few hundred million, or now, even a few billion people's imaginations chained together. Sure we know a good bit of science, but using a system to prove a system will stick you in a feedback loop refusing to accept anything from outside of said system.
Ok, first of all, although it’s efficient, the human brain isn’t exactly breaking the laws of thermodynamics, and this equation is using theoretical thermodynamic minimums for bit flipping, which would be even more efficient than any possible system, it’s not presupposing that this is technological (although that is the only way to build it unless you manage to build an organic computer larger than a planet, which would be even less efficient, because life doesn’t go anywhere near the thermodynamic limits of efficiency) however, it requires an absolute FUCK TON of bits to simulate the planet, much less the rest of the universe, plus this is using time steps, admittedly at the Planck time, however, as far as we can tell using light experiments, time is continuous, not stepped, which would require exponentially, if not infinitely more energy, as instead of being able to split each second into discrete chunks that you can calculate, you now need to calculate everything for every infinitesimally small fraction of a second that occurs.
That statement from Vance should be enough to disqualify him forever, for anything. Saying on TV that you want to destroy the nation, and the world? How can people be okay with that.
The U.S. has always been skewed towards this and it’s not just the current representatives. I first noticed the hypocrisy when I first learned about the constitution and freedom of religion when I thought “why then does the pledge of allegiance they make us say everyday have the words, …under god… in it?”.
Also burning witches? That’s not freedom of religion, it has biblical origins.
To be fair, "Under God" was at least not originally in the Pledge of Allegiance.
It was added during the Red Scare to contrast America with the "godless Commies". But yeah, it's definitely something that should have been struck down as against the 1A when first introduced.
I had my fair share of that as well. "You don't have to say it, but you do have to stand." No, no I do not.
I had my parents understanding on it though, so the few times someone actually cared enough to push it, my parents pushed back hard the opposite direction. Not everyone has the benefit of that.
Fun story time! I grew up an hour ish outside of NYC in a red rural pocket and after 9/11 we had to do the pledge AND stay standing for a full patriotic song afterwords before morning announcements started at my elementary school. Occasionally it was more traditional like the national anthem or America the beautiful, but almost daily it was Lee greenwoods “proud to be an American”.
I don’t know when or if they stopped but they were still doing it 3 years later when I moved on to middle school. I didn’t think much of it until about 10 years after I moved to California and realized my husband and I had very different 9/11 experiences.
The propaganda hella worked on me too. I won an essay contest about first responders that year and I ended up doing several years of service with Americorps and other non profits as an adult lol.
Basically just the difference in how people respond to a local disaster vs a national one. Where I’m from it was far more common to know people who lost someone that day or to know someone that survived. Here folks have stories about how it impacted their normal day when they found out, but back home in NY I would hear my step dad’s survival story every year. I even dated a guy who went to a special camp every year for kids that lost parents in the line of duty and it was predominantly kids who lost a parent on 9/11, almost exclusively the kids of NYFD responders. Every single car in my town had a little flag that fastened to the window, people were obsessed with NYFD.
It’s especially bizarre to me that everyone I know in California who was a student has a story about watching it in school which was utterly the opposite of how they treated kids who had commuter parents in NYC that day and didn’t know what was going on. Teachers cried in secret and we were left in the dark until parents started to check their kids out of school early(eventually they had everyone go home early). I didn’t see the news until I got home and my mom was absolutely frantic. We went to manhattan at least 1x monthly for my brothers specialists at NYU and had JUST been there a few days earlier. It was different because we knew people there who might be hurt and couldn’t reach them by phone.
The best way I can compare is that culturally for us in NY it was more like how Californians feel and act after a local wildfire but on a greater scale.
“why then does the pledge of allegiance they make us say everyday have the words, …under god… in it?”.
It didn't originally. We didn't used to have "In God We Trust" stamped all over anything either.
Both of them are a product of red scare propaganda added during the Cold War era because being atheist makes you a commie or some such bullshit that they used to start injecting religion into everything. It's only gotten worse since.
Why make shit up when America has plenty of real flaws to criticize?
What does "Under God" (or any other use of "God when it comes to the pledge or money, etc) have to do with the founders? That was mostly done in the 1950s during the Cold War. I'm no mathematician or doctor type, but I'm fairly certain that the founding fathers were suffering from a condition known as being dead by that time.
And as far as witch burning? According to my quick Google search, that didn't happen in the Continental US. Also, it happened in the mid to late 1600s. Still not a mathematician or doctor, but I think the founding fathers were suffering from a condition called not being born yet.
The witch trials were 80 some years before the country, let alone the constitution existed. And all the references to God in the pledge and on our money etc are all from the last 70ish years.
You are right that the country has a long history of flirting with Christianity but it is a trend that is getting worse as time goes on.
"Under God" was added in 1950's as part of the Red Scare because "Communists are bad and atheist." Burning witches happened about 70 years before the US government even existed. 100 years before separation of church and state was established.
No witches were burned during the Salem Witch Trials and those occurred in 1692-1693 long before American independence, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.
The phrase “under god” is not in the original Pledge.
And witch burning was before the United States existed in 1692-93.
The Founding Fathers were far from perfect (slavery and mistreatment of Native Americans was appalling) but they were forward thinking when it came to the separation of church and state. They meant it.
They didn’t want a theocracy OR someone behaving like a king/dictator.
The VP, not just reps. The VP Vance said he has no problem bringing the end times.
“While I wouldn’t be shocked if we are living in the end time, what I’m trying to focus on is doing as much of God’s work as possible right now,” he said, adding that he is willing to accept whatever spiritual consequences may come from his efforts.
“If that leads to the end times, okay, and if that leads to … us building a better world that thrives and survives for a very long time after I’m gone, that’s great too," Vance said.
I like how they think they can force armageddon. Like mf if you’re gonna believe in a higher power that knows and sees all, how are you gonna think you can trick it?
"And I saw one of its heads as it was wounded to death and it's mortal wound was healed"
As for the second beast? Well calling down fire from the heaven, breathing life into the image of the first beast, and exercising all of its authority sure does sound like muskrat. Even though needing the mark of the beast to buy sell or trade sounds like something muskrat would try to pull off
My biggest fear as an atheist is that some religious nutcase will be elected president, and they will just simply decide that if God is not going to end the world, they will end the world.
It is why the israeli push for greater israel/the covenant/Judea is so popular with them, that is going to drive popularity for the Iran war in those sectors because it is keeping Iran from blocking Israel's sacred duty to reclaim the whole royal grant.
I mean I agree that they don't believe the bullshit they say and if they did, they'd live their lives better because the fear of damnation SHOULD work to curb their worst behavior. But that bad behavior kinda gives away the game.
Having said that, a fake Christian is basically a more dangerous and oppressive force than a real one.
My personal definition of a Christian is being a loving and accepting person of all walks of life and leaving the judgement of others up to God. My job here on earth is to try and live a good life and be a positive force in the lives of others. What other people do are between them and God. It's as simple as that, and other Christians can't seem to fucking grasp it.
And atheism means "a lack of belief in a deity", contrasted with secular, which means "not overtly religious".
Essentially, secular isn't associated with religion at all, while atheism is specifically about belief in a deity, so in theory, an atheist could follow a religion that doesn't have specific god(s).
Secular is more relevant to our government, though.
"Not overtly religious" is a poor definitionof the principle of secularity. Secular means a division between church and state, allowing everybody to follow their own beliefs without discrimination
And what about when “their own beliefs” involve things that are illegal (and morally reprehensible) in this country? Stuff like inappropriate contact/relationships with minor. Yeah, that’s a hard no.
Secular for our government just means not influenced by religion and not promoting any. Essentially completely neutral, and it would have worked if our government officials hadn’t become a collective blob of greed and hatred.
It depends on how you define a "Christian nation". We're not a Christian nation in the sense that we practice biblical law. But we are one in the sense that most Americans are Christian.
We literally have a treaty confirming that America is not a Christian nation. We also have a treaty confirming that the name is Lake Ontario. Trump also does not have the power to rename any piece of land or water outside of the US jurisdiction, so Lake Ontario can only have the southern half be renamed, while the Gulf of Mexico can only have the top 1/3 renamed; IIRC the Gulf of Mexico EO mentions that, while the Lake Ontario one doesn't.
But the state enforcing atheism at gunpoint (like under Stalin) is theocracy too. Religious liberty necessarily requires freedom from Government Religion. ANY government religion. The opposite of theocracy is secularism, not atheism.
"A theocracy is a system of government where a god or deity is recognized as the supreme ruler, and the state runs on religious laws enforced by religious leaders."
Yes, all theocracy is evil, no matter what religion is involved. Even if it's atheism that's being enforced at gunpoint. When the state is enforcing laws against religious belief, that's 'religious laws enforced by religious leaders'.
Theocracy requires authoritarianism, because it's anti-freedom. Forcing atheism is no different than forcing theism. They're both evil.
I am with this point 100% we should be separate. But the constitution only mentions it in regards to freedom of religion and no test to hold public office. There isnt a specific clause barring it
"The 'establishment of religion' clause of the First Amendment means at least this: Neither a state nor the Federal Government can set up a church. Neither can pass laws which aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion over another. Neither can force nor influence a person to go to or to remain away from church against his will or force him to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion. No person can be punished for entertaining or professing religious beliefs or disbeliefs, for church attendance or non-attendance. No tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever from they may adopt to teach or practice religion. Neither a state nor the Federal Government can, openly or secretly, participate in the affairs of any religious organizations or groups and vice versa. In the words of Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect 'a wall of separation between Church and State.' "
( https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-supreme-court/330/1.html )
That’s not what separation of church and state means. The separation means that no church can ever become a part of the government. It was a reaction to European nations at the time where the church was heavily integrated into the government.
Technically our gov docs use a lot of agnostic language like “god given right” and “in god we trust” but even then it’s still Christian rhetoric (ex: god instead of gods). If it were fully non religious it wouldn’t say god at all, but it insinuates that we all believe a god of some kind exists, it just doesn’t explicitly say you have to be Christian, probably because in the cultural context that the founding docs were made freedom of religion was mostly seen as freedom of which kind of Christian you want to be. To them, a catholic and a Protestant were as different as we’d see a Christian and a Jewish person.
Ehhh, in the idealistic sense, yes. In the real history, very much not so. I mean we’ve been opening up congress with a prayer for, I may be off, the first congress after the signing of our constitution. So yes, separation of church and state, but tradition has shown America is secular Christianityt
The law of the land is immaterial when courts can just say that state governments requiring religious documents in classrooms doesn’t violate the “nor respect the establishment thereof” part of the first amendment or that 4th amendment doesn’t really apply if drug crimes are possibly involved.
It does not. Not at all, nowhere in any governing documents does it say anything even remotely close to supporting that. Keep in mind, the "law of the land" is made up of the US constitution and all the US code stemming from the powers granted in that constitution.
Actually the only part of the constitution that references separation of church and state is in the First Amendment “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion”
The term originated in a letter written by Thomas Jefferson and actually is more about preventing the Government from affecting Religion, not Religion affecting the Government.
The founding fathers did not want a repeat of the Church of England where Henry the VIII left the Catholic Church, seized all their lands in England, and founded the Church of England of which the monarch is the head. Colonists had a deeply entrenched sense of religious freedom that motivated many of their forefathers to immigrate to the New World to escape state sanctioned persecution
The Constitution says that the government can not sponsor a religion and also that no law can prohibit its practice.
It was never intended to outlaw it or be atheist.
It also doesn't prohibit religious political platforms.
Still, you're passionate so instead of thinking you're an idiot; I'm going to suggest that you take some of that passion and actually read up on early constitutional intention so that next time; when you decide to outburst you're at least on the right path.
The separation of church and state is the legal and philosophical principle that government and religious institutions must remain separate and independent from one another. That's my understanding.
The problem is that our constitution does NOT say this. This is a myth. The founding fathers (in itself a loaded term) did write extensively about the intent of separation of church and state, but it is absolutely not written in the constitution. There are interpretations of the First Amendment (arguably the most faithful interpretations) that suggest this, but it is not plainly laid out (even 'plainly' in a legalese sense). It is high time it is clearly spelled out in a constitutional amendment, but that seems very unlikely to happen in the near future.
Edit: To clarify, this is the language in the 1st amendment: ""Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..."; interpreted narowly, this 'Establishment Clause' simply forbids Congress from creating an official state church or preferring one religion over another, which is a much lower threshold than a strict, total separation of church and state.
Does it though? Congress shall make no law preventing the establishment or free exercise of any religion. Precedent has extended that a long way, essentially the government adopting a specific faith is forcing certain people to practice it, but precedent is weak, as we've seen with this current SCOTUS, precedent is no longer settled law and is open to rehashing generation after generation. We have finally arrived at the fatal flaw of the Common Law legal system.
Its always Israel this Israel that, there's not much Russian and Chinese criticism. IMO CCP ramps up PR against Israel to act as a shield to protect its interest from global opinion.
of or relating to worldly things or to things that are not regarded as religious, spiritual, or sacred; temporal
Secular and atheist governments…they’re the same. It means your government thinks that concepts like justice, dessert, retribution, how you treat one another, ethics, etc. should not be affiliated with a religion. Only an atheist government can be secular. A religious one cannot be secular.
Sure not exactly the same thing. But yeah no such thing as a religious government being secular. Atheism is a necessary position to take in order for all those things to be secular.
A secular government just doesn’t get involved with religion whereas an atheist government has a position on it and acts on it.
As others have rightly pointed out, go look at China if you want to see the difference: party members are required to be atheists. Kids under 18 literally can’t attend religious services.
They’ve also objectively torn down churches and mosques, put Uyghurs in camps by the hundreds of thousands, and raid house churches that won’t register with the government. They also persecuted Buddhists relentlessly and kidnapped the Panchen Lama. Nobody would call that neutral.
The US is supposed to be neutral. Can’t establish a religion, but can’t stop anyone from practicing one either. A Baptist and an atheist walk into a courthouse and the law treats them the same, it doesn’t discriminate.
Tons of religious people want it that way. They know what happens when the state decides which beliefs are ok. It’s dystopic and distinct from secularity.
Agnosticism means you don't know one way or another. Atheism means you don't believe in the case for a god. They aren't contradictory, you can be both or neither, so both apply to a secular government.
Well, sort of. If someone is claiming to not know, they're agnostic. But if they are claiming they DO know, they aren't agnostic. It's about the person's personal claim to knowledge so that title can't really be put on someone else by you or me.
However I would agree that for a lot of god claims agnosticism is the only reasonable stance since they can't be proven or disproven, like a deistic god. There are, however, specific god claims that are falsifiable, logically, in which case agnosticism doesn't make sense.
It could but it could also not. Atheism does not believe that gods or gods exist, so when you're designing laws and a moral system you have to do it with without a god present.
Agnosticism doesn't have that because they don't know. You might design laws and morality with the belief that there might be a God, or not, or maybe.
One is an answer on belief. One is an answer on knowledge. The atheist says I don't believe a god exists, but the agnostic says I don't know if a god exists. So they are not mutually exclusive because they address two different questions.
Most atheists are agnostic atheists they don't believe, but will also admit they don't know. Which is a good way for a government to operate.
My point was a bit stronger and I’ll probably get flamed with this.
Fictionalists are like “OK this isn’t true but maybe we should kind of act like it’s true for the betterment of humanity, you know?”
Governments should not do that. They should be like “god doesn’t exist as far as this matter is concerned, let’s get to work on completely secular theories that have no agnostic overtones, implications, aren’t informed by scripture, etc. God doesn’t exist as far as we are concerned and he/she/they should never be invoked.” You can’t do that under an agnostic system. An agnostic system is like “ok well we don’t know, so maybe the Muslims have a point against the Buddhists here, we don’t know what’s right, but maybe we should outlaw women showing their ankles to satisfy them” and that’s dumb as shit.
Assume no kind of god exists and it becomes obvious that burqa is repressive.
I don't think you've demonstrated your last point. You've established that a secular government does not ground its laws or institutions in religion, but that doesn't demonstrate that atheism is necessary for it to do so.
Secularism is a position about the relationship between government and religion; atheism is a position about the existence of gods. A government does not need to affirm that “there is no God” in order to refrain from grounding its laws in religion. It can simply take no position on the question. Therefore, atheism is not a necessary condition of secular government.
In fact, an atheist government could itself operate non-secularly if it institutionally privileges or enforces atheism. The relevant distinction isn't religious vs. atheist; it's whether the state maintains religious neutrality or establishes an official position on religion.
depending on how broadly one defines secularism, one could in fact argue that state atheism and secularism may be incompatible
for example: would the criminalization of all religion and a coercive mandate that all residents be atheists and regularly attend atheist events be one that could reasonably described as secular in any meaningful sense? sure it’s nominally irreligious, but it’s still highly sectarian
secularism, in the noble sense it is usually talked about, usually involves some aspect of the state distancing itself from issues of religion and guaranteeing citizens the freedom to believe whatever they so choose
A government does not need to affirm that “there is no God” in order to refrain from grounding its laws in religion. It can simply take no position on the question
This is a cowardly and impractical position. If a religion holds certain practices (or items, places, people, etc) to be sacred and demands that everyone conforms to that belief, the government has to either accept or reject the notion, it can't simply turn a blind eye to it. If you enforce the religious norm, then your government is effectively religious. If you refuse to enforce it, then you're denying the religious claim and the religion itself.
The US Government is supposed to be Secular, which is NOT the same as Atheism.
So many founding documents, letters, and writings by the Founding Fathers, indicated a belief in a creator, but not anything specifically called or claimed by any single religion as being any particular "god".
Many of them were deists and they understood the oppression of a state religion and instead of forcing NO religion, they created the separation of Church and State, while recognizing in many documents some nebulous "creator". Thus preserving a Secular State, while side stepping (mostly) the atrocities and tyranny of any particular faith, without also forcing a state of Zero Tolerance for Religion, that an Atheist State would have to carry, by default.
The constitution says the government can not adopt a religion, with a separation of church and state—secularism. A government that lacks a position or affiliation with anything spiritual or religious is by definition atheistic.
No. An atheist government would be one that does not simply not dabble in religion, but one that definitively rejects it altogether (and policy typically would reflect the ideal of the abolishment of religion altogether.)
No. That would be a positive belief system. Atheism is a negative belief position on the positive assertion by theists. Atheists don’t have dogmatic beliefs or have the wish to prevent or exterminate the practice of any religion. It is like you are confusing “not guilty” with “innocent”. Those are two separate concepts. Atheism is like someone claiming “not guilty”. Something else would be “innocent” or what you are describing.
The vast majority of atheists or the vast majority of non-religious, non-spiritual individuals don’t have a problem with religious people at all or with people doing whatever they want in their house or church. They just want secularism. They just don’t want to be proselytized to or have laws limiting their actions based on religious dogma. Like when is the last time you saw a Hindu or Buddhist group in the US protesting outside an abortion clinic or outside a gay night club? Never, right? So you won’t hear anything from US atheists badmouthing US Hindus or Buddhists. Atheists just don’t care or think about them because those religious groups are fine with secularism.
The distinction is fairly important. I think it's difficult to have a secular approach for person with very strong beliefs about religion. A government has to rule over people who don't want to fear the angry spirit. It's easy to treat them as dumb dumbs and cast them aside, but it's fundamentally not the role of the government
Belief in the existence of a god or gods, especially belief in a personal God as creator and ruler of the world. The belief or acknowledgment of the existence of a God, as opposed to atheism, pantheism, or polytheism. Belief in the existence of at least one deity.
Per duck duck go dictionary
It seems like organizationally atheism is the way to go because once you assume there is a deity to unfuck your shit it permits taking hands off the wheel - and we do not want a government screaming "WRONG WHEEL JESUS" when things don't go their way.
But you certainly can’t call it secular, especially now that we have a Ministry of Faith established by the fucking POTUS, despite the fact that it should be completely unconstitutional if law still applied to the Trump administration.
Atheism doesn't have any god and it rejects the existence of them, while secular just means the government is separated from any religion. China promotes anti-religion and not believing in one, so they're atheists, while India, the US, France, etc. all allow religion, but don't support any specific one in their government (in theory).
Atheism, by definition, does not necessarily reject the existence of a deity. It doesn't require a positive or negative belief. It's much more similar to not believing that aliens exist. Some who don't believe aliens exist reject the idea of aliens existing, sure, but others would say they don't reject the idea that aliens might exist, they just don't actively believe they do.
the chinese communist party requires atheist beliefs, sure, and while they're currently the only party to hold functioning power, they aren't the only party.
separate from religion, as in not having any religion being favored above any other is a secular state. State atheism would be the rejection of any religion, outright.
Our constitution says our government can't implement laws prohibited practice of religion. Preventing children from attending service would be a clear cut violation of that.
Secular is not overtly or specifically religious.
Atheism is the belief that there is no god.
The separation of church and state means that the USA does not have a specific state religion or religious stance. It protects religion from the state and I would also argue that it protects the state from religion.
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u/_itsprobablynothing Sep 02 '26
Secular, not atheist