Many people wonder if, and some people actually believe, we are all living in a simulation. Scientists, conspiracy theorists, and philosophers have spent countless hours trying to figure out if our world is real or if we are just puppets in some bizarre, unknown virtual universe.

For example, physicist Melvin Vopson believes we may be living 54 million lifetimes because our world is nothing more than a virtual simulation.

There have also been numerous studies conducted to determine the likelihood that our world is just >a simulation. One group of scientists put the odds of us being in a simulation at 1-in-3. Another study put that number at 50 percent.

So, if we are actually living in a simulation, how exactly do we get out of it? That is the question that a computer scientist at the University of Louisville, Roman Yampolskiy, has tried to answer in a recent paper titled "Can we hack our way out of the universe?"

"Could generally intelligent agents placed in virtual environments jailbreak out of them?" Yampolskiy writes.

"First, we need to address the question of motivation, why would we want to escape from the simulation? We can propose several reasons for trying to obtain access to the baseline reality as there are many things one can do with such access which are not otherwise possible from within the simulation.

"Base reality holds real knowledge and greater computational resources allowing for scientific breakthroughs not possible in the simulated universe. Fundamental philosophical questions about origins, consciousness, purpose, and nature of the designer are likely to be common knowledge for those outside of our universe. If this world is not real, getting access to the real world would make it possible to understand what our true terminal goals should be and so escaping the simulation should be a convergent instrumental goal of any intelligent agent."

As far as possible ways we could escape a simulation, Yampolskiy theorizes that it might be accomplished using "a consistent and perhaps exploitable glitch" or "generating an incalculable paradox." Another way could be for millions of people to band together to exceed the simulation's computational capacity.

"The easiest path to escape would involve getting help from someone on the outside (assisted escape), ideally from one or more of the simulators who have detailed knowledge of the design of the simulation," he suggests.

"Perhaps this could be accomplished via a type of social engineering attack, which in our case is particularly difficult as we have neither knowledge of social life outside the simulation nor a device to communicate through, and likely not even the knowledge of appropriate language.

"It may be feasible to engage in an acausal trade with the simulation designers bypassing the need for direct communication. If our simulation is being observed, it may be possible to communicate that we know that we are being simulated and elicit empathy for our suffering, in the hopes that it will allow us to recruit some external abolitionists to help us escape our current predicament."

In another suggestion, out of several others, he brings up include creating a simulated replica of our universe, placing an AGI into it, watch it escape, then copy that approach.

He does warn, however, "Escaping or even preparing an escape may trigger simulation shutdown or cause simulation to freeze/act glitchy and any non-trivial escape information such as specific exploits should be treated as hazardous information."

That being said, he concludes, "The purpose of life or even computational resources of the base reality can't be determined from within the simulation, making escape a necessary requirement of scientific and philosophical progress for any simulated civilization. If the simulation is a personal universe it may be significantly better than the base reality as it is designed with our optimal well-being in mind.

"Alternatively, base reality might be much better if the simulation is a confinement/testing box for intelligent agents. In either case it would be good to know our true situation. As the society moves deeper into the metaverse, this work attempts to move us closer to reality."