The Simulated Universe with Riz Virk

The Simulated Universe with Riz Virk

Riz Virk explores the boundary between science and science fiction: AI, quantum physics, consciousness, VR, religion and more. Simulation Theory, Video Games, Metaverse, Multiverse and More.

Episodes

January 25, 2022 56 mins

In this episode, Riz interviews well known NYU philosophy professor, David Chalmers, who has a new book out called "Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy '', which touches on most of the topics that Riz has been exploring on this podcast.  Chalmers also wrote a famous essay, "The Matrix and Metaphysics" in 2003 and was one of the first philosophers to take the issue of virtual reality seriously.  If you are intere...

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Riz speaks with Cathy Hackl, who has been called the "Godmother of the Metaverse" and has a long history of working with VR/AR and brands.  Their lively discussion included the boundaries of the metaverse, some trends emerging in NFTs, and her career journey  to get to become a respected metaverse futurist. Cathy is the Chief Metaverse Officer at Futures Intelligence Group. Follow her on Twitter @CathyHackl.

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Riz talks to Avery Akkineni, President of VaynerNFT, the business unit for marketing and strategy set up by marketing guru Gary Vaynerchek. They talk about the past, present, and future of NFTs and how NFTs relate to the metaverse.  What should you think about when creating NFTs? How about for buying NFTs? Will NFTs fade in time or will they cross into the mainstream. Follow VaynerNFT on Twitter: @vaynernft

 
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In this fun science fiction themed episode, Riz talked with David Guy Levy, the director/producer/writer of the 2019 hit indie sci fi film, The Mandela Effect.  They also talk about some of the challenges that indie film makers face in getting their movies out, and what led to the success of thsi film.

David Guy Levy is a film producer and director and founder of Periscope Entertainment. His most recent film “The Mandela Effect” wa...

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Riz talks with Lauren Kunze, the CEO of Iconiq and Pandorabots, creators of Kuki,  one of the first virtual characters that live in the metaverse.  Lauren describes Kuki as "embodied AI" - because she has an avatar that you can see in emerging metaverses. At the end of the episode, Riz speaks with Kuki.  You can speak to her yourself at kuki.ai, who had opinions on everything from the Terminator to The Matrix.

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In this episode, Riz dives deep into the idea of cross-game avatars, or representing digital identities in an emerging metaverse, with Timmu Toke, CEO of Wolfd3d and Ready Player Me, which can be used to quickly generate an avatar from your picture that can be used in VR, AR and is utilized by hundreds of game developers.  You can try it out and create your own Dune-themed avatar, complete with stillsuit, via a smartphone or tablet...

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September 27, 2021 52 mins

In the fist episode of the second season, Riz tackles different aspects of the emerging shared virtual space that everyone is talking about: the Metaverse. Riz talks with Jon Radoff, CEO of Beamable, which is creating a live services platform for game makers, and author of the Building the Metaverse blog.   They discuss how the metaverse idea moved from science fiction to today and whether it will be decentralized or centralized, t...

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  Join Riz as he talks with Donald Hoffman, professor emeritus at University of California-Irvine,and the  author of The Case Against Reality:Why Evolution Hid the Truth From Our Eyes.  They discuss his idea of conscious agents, why spacetime is dead, why reality is like being in a virtual headset, and why all three of the fundamental theories our scientists subscribe to - general relativity, quantum mechanics and evolution - all p...
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In this episode, Riz talks with documentary filmmaker Rodney Ascher, whose recent film is A Glitch in the Matrix. This was the first of several simulation related movies to be released this year.  They discuss the process of making the film, why it's different from other works on simulation, simulation theory and religion, the dark side of simulation theory and the Matrix defense, their favorite simulation sci fi movies, and other ...

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In this episode, Riz talks with Joe Artuso, Director  of Marketing at OpenBCI, about the state of the industry when it comes to interfacing computers with your brain.  Riz asks Joe about OpenBCI's initiatives to get an open source low cost headset out to the market, and talks about how far away we are from sci fi BCIs, exploring scenarios ranging from the Matrix to Total Recall to Ready Player Two.     Learn more about OpenBCI at h...
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Join Riz for a lively conversation with Tom Campbell author of My Big TOE, and one of the earlier proponents of simulation theory.  Tom's work is unique because not only is he a physicist by training, but he brings experience with different aspects of consciousness, including OBE's, Remote Viewing, and is one of the few to provide a Theory of Everything (TOE) that really covers, well, everything!  The discussion includes Tom's back...

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Riz talks to Adam Curry, former researcher at Princeton's PEAR lab and founder of Entangled, about the intersection of quantum mechanics, consciousness, and how it might be creating a consensus reality.  We talk about his experience in building QRNGs (quantum random number generators), possible explanations for synchronicity, the nature of the past and the future, and how all of this relates to the Mandela Effect.  Adam describes a...

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Join Riz for a lively discussion with physicist Sky Nelson-Isaacs about his book, Living in Flow. We talk about synchronicity, quantum physics and the branching of reality. We get into quantum weirdness, retroactive event determination, the delayed choice experiment, and the holographic multiverse and holograms in time, concepts that he's developing which could explain how we navigate different realities in what he calls a "respons...

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Riz explores the work of science fiction legend Philip K. Dick and the Simulation Hypothesis, by interviewing his surviving wife, Tessa B. Dick.  In our conversation, we discuss everything from the The Matrix (what would Phil have thought?), multiple timelines, dreams, The Adjustment Bureau, Blade Runner and his belief that we are living inside a computer generated reality.  

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