Can the simulation argument be generalized?
“For example, would a terraforming argument, that holds either we’ll almost certainly never terraform and seed many worlds like our own or we’re almost certainly living in a terraformed and seeded world, remain valid?” Yes, the form of the simulation argument could in principle be applied more generally, but one would have to check in each case whether the necessary empirical presuppositions obtain and whether the conclusions are interesting and significant. For example, with the terraforming argument, we would have to assume that the seeded civilizations could not detect directly whether or not they had been seeded; also, that each advanced civilization that decided to terraform would create very large numbers of terraformed planets on which creatures similar to ourselves would evolve. Both of these assumptions might be doubted. The argument would also have to consider our temporal position. Civilizations resulting from the seeding or terraforming of a planet would be able, like we ar
