--- title: "A Scientist Is Crowdfunding an Experiment to Check if We Live in a Simulation" description: "A theoretical physicist has not only figured out a way to test out the theory that we live in a simulation — and is crowdfunding the experiment." date: "2022-11-22" modified: "2022-11-22" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/scientist-crowdfunding-experiment-simulation" categories: - "Physics" - "Science & Energy" tags: - "computer simulation" - "simulation theory" - "the digest" - "theoretical physics" --- # A Scientist Is Crowdfunding an Experiment to Check if We Live in a Simulation ![A theoretical physicist has not only figured out a way to test out the theory that we live in a simulation — and is crowdfunding the experiment.]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* ## Simulating By now, most people have heard of the "simulation theory" that we live in an advanced virtual world — but one theoretical physicist now says he not only has a way to test the concept, but is crowdfunding to make it happen. In [an essay for *The Conversation*](), physicist Melvin Vopson of the University of Portsmouth in England laid out the theory behind his simulation test, which builds on the idea that a "simulated universe would contain a lot of information bits everywhere" and that those bits would "represent the code." "Hence," Vopson wrote, "detecting these information bits will prove the simulation hypothesis." ## Material Girl Building on his own recently-proposed "[mass-energy-information (M/E/I) equivalence principle]()," which suggests that "mass can be expressed as energy or information, or vice versa," the physicist believes that information bits would have a small mass. If one can find the mass of those bits, he adds, one would be theoretically detecting the bits themselves. Per his M/E/I theory, Vopson has, as he wrote, suggested that information could be considered a fifth form of matter in the universe after solids, liquids, gases, and plasmas. The ensuing experiment makes a beautiful, albeit kind of complicated, sort of sense. "The experiment involves erasing the information contained inside elementary particles by letting them and their antiparticles... annihilate in a flash of energy," the physicist wrote, "emitting 'photons', or light particles." In English, Vopson is looking to demonstrate that information bits exist by introducing the particles that contain them to their opposites, making them explode and emitting giveaway photons. To pull it off, as [Vopson wrote on his Indiegogo]() page, the physicist is looking to "build a workbench positron-electron annihilation system" containing "custom-built components that will allow detection of gamma and \[infrared\] photons simultaneously." There's obviously a lot going on here, and thus far, the campaign's only raised about $1,000 of its roughly $219,000 goal. Nevertheless, it's exciting that someone is finally going to put the "alien sim" theory to the test — though there's no telling what will come of it. **More on theoretical physics:** [*Physicist Says There's a Small Chance You'll Wake Up on Mars Tomorrow Due to Quantum Physics*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()