Was Pantheon a simulation or real?

[u/CrayZee100]

I just watched and finished Pantheon and was wondering if the entire show was just one of the simulations or if it was real, where the god Maddie came from

[u/stombion]

It's easy to miss, but in the last episode safe surf/pantheon gods, state that they simulated the reality Maddie is in so she could simulate Caspian. From their point of view, 4 million years have passed since their creation. We can't really tell if their reality is "true" or simulated as well, but it is of little importance anyway

[u/Cbgamefreak → u/stombion]

Its actually 43 million years.

[u/zootedzilennial → u/Cbgamefreak]

It’s actually 43 million years and change 😉

[u/Private_HughMan → u/zootedzilennial]

I love the way they describe humans to the alien life they meet.

"Low-entropy self-replicating phenomenon that generates a binding force called compassion."

I love that description. The first two just describe the concept of life (as we understand it), but compassion is a unique trait SafeSurf gave to humans. I'm glad that, if anything about humans survives that long, it's compassion. Considering every other possible trait, that's a good one.

[u/Serfixalot → u/zootedzilennial]

Hahahah ha ha haaaa(my approximation)

[u/stombion → u/Cbgamefreak]

Uh, yeah, I misremembered. Sorry

[u/Serfixalot → u/stombion]

I just watched it 20x over the weekend, they don’t admit to simulating the reality, they admit to tinkering with it. Which would then leave one to believe that they also interceded in the other “worlds”, but future Maddie didn’t get her future/past correct until the last try.

Like she says, she dies(probably over and over and over and over) as she works out the bugs thru trial and error.

[u/stombion → u/Serfixalot]

They tinker with it because they are the ones simulating it, just like Maddie tinkers with her simulations in the last episode. How could they do it otherwise??

[u/Serfixalot → u/stombion]

Ooooohhhhh. Duh me, they say it loud for gawd’s sake: “You can not know in any way where we are, just as Caspian cannot know where he it.”(sic)

and

“How is this any different than your system?”(sic)

Haha oh wow…denouement big time for me right now…getting chills…they’re speaking to her from 43 million years later, they set the balls in motion in her “reality”* 43 million years prior and THEY knew it was going to take 117k years only cause, well, that’s how long it takes her. They didn’t have to jet propel her into a “reality” where it all exists, 117k is a drop in the bucket on their scale.

*which could even mean the Dyson sphere wasn’t actually real it could just be in a supercomputer anywhere…it’s her universe in there after all. This needs further review…

[u/Hopefullyanonymous2 → u/Serfixalot]

Haha. If you go back and rewatch it they heavily imply that even their reality isn't the "prime" one. 

It's one reason why being ina simulation is likely. Whatever society advances enough to create a life like  simulation likely will (or many) and those will create submissions etc. So statistically the conscious beings in a universe with simulations are almost certain in a simulation 

[u/stombion → u/Hopefullyanonymous2]

Eh, if simulation of consciousness is possible, then it is likely we are in a simulation. Thing is, we don't really if it is possible or not (yet), so it is slightly more likely we are not in a simulation. CoolWorldsLab has a very good video on the subject

[u/Serfixalot → u/stombion]

Well physics could also just be charting what is going on inside a simulation if indeed this is an organic one(not a computer one) as well I figure. Like if we are living in a holographic/projection universe, I see no reason why there wouldn’t be an ability to quantify things for them.

[u/Hopefullyanonymous2 → u/Serfixalot]

Right and simulation world would explain a lot of the odder things we see in physics.

Also never seen it brought up, but living in a simulation would be more likely to explain the fermi paradox. Simulating multiple worlds who because of the physics engine in place cannot reach each other really would be largely pointless. So no alien radio waves because "even a dyson sphere powered by a sun has a limit" lol.

[u/Hopefullyanonymous2 → u/stombion]

Fair, but frankly we don't even know what consciousness is at this point really. We don't seem to have a good definition, or anything of the sort last time I dug into this a few years back. But yeah that makes sense as a differentiator, if we CAN create a actual synthetic consciousness, then it makes us being one a lot more likely. I'll give the video a watch, thanks for the suggestion.

[u/TwentyPieceNuggets]

Didn’t the first episode have a “glitch” where Maddie and her classmates fixed their hair at the same time?

[u/jeremyrocket → u/TwentyPieceNuggets]

This! I started a rewatch recently and noticed this. They also all cross their legs at the same time.

[u/jfkdktmmv → u/jeremyrocket]

I always thought that leg crossing was really strange lmao

[u/emailinAR → u/jfkdktmmv]

I thought they were doing that to bully her?

[u/FlorianoAguirre → u/TwentyPieceNuggets]

Yes, literally never forgot about it, it makes sense at the end.

[u/Mycol101 → u/TwentyPieceNuggets]

Good catch. I thought this was saying how they lack individualism as dumb teen girls and how she didn’t fit into that as an observer but that’s 100% making sense. Something you don’t know until you watch again

[u/FlorianoAguirre → u/Mycol101]

It is so heavily focused that you are ment to take it into consideration as to what it implies.

[u/Mycol101 → u/FlorianoAguirre]

Exactly. At the time I figured that it meant all of the other girls in her class are sort of petty drones that operate on an identically low frequency. This was right around the time that she starts getting bullied I think and you see the manipulation of the popular girl. It reinforces the “mean, girls“ narrative and further supports the initial theory that they are just cookie cut outs of the same thing.

[u/Gelinger → u/TwentyPieceNuggets]

But was it a glitch? Personally, I always interpreted that scene as it being one of the ways other girls used to prank Maddie.

[u/TwentyPieceNuggets → u/Gelinger]

I thought that at first too. After the finale, it feels like there are moments in the show that are seemingly negligible oddities that make sense if you think of it like a simulation. The Matrix movies even do this as well. That instance could be intentional due to variables, or it could even be the program accidentally “reusing animations” under the stress of the load.

[u/Civil_Performer5732 → u/TwentyPieceNuggets]

Was that a glitch? I thought that was a tactic to show all bullies were in cahoots?

[u/q_sho17]

It is a simulation, but does that make it any less real?

[u/CrayZee100 → u/q_sho17]

I mean, to me it doesn’t feel real because its artificially created life. The UIs were a different case because they were real people, but their souls were transferred to the cloud, but the souls in the simulation were duplicates by Maddie

[u/FlorianoAguirre → u/CrayZee100]

That's fine, I think it's at odds with what the show is showing and telling you, but also you can disagree with it.

[u/No-Economics-8239 → u/CrayZee100]

Well... are we sure they were once real people? I found that an interesting direction for the story to start with 'real' people rather than completely 'artificial intelligence'. We are more naturally able to accept UI because we can see the people they were scanned from. But if the David we were watching was always in a simulation, was there a 'real' David he was scanned from? Did Maddie find a copy of him and bring it with? Or are all the 'people' in her simulations merely constructs she has created from memory? An imaging of who they once were. Does that make David any less real?

[u/Hopefullyanonymous2 → u/CrayZee100]

Maddie gives my answer. It doesn't matter because it's real to them. 

Or put this another way, if I found out we lived in a simulation nothing would change for me. I would still love my wife and my dad and hate my mother and blah blah blah. To me it's no more relevant than finding out a given deity was real, I'm going to continue trying to live my life in a way that leaves things a little better than otherwise and that'll be enough for me. It being digital life or real wouldn't change it for me. 

[u/Gamemode_dum]

It's a simulation, we can see David from a parallel simulation talk to Caspian in season 2 episode 7 and the higher Maddie in Svalbard in episode 8.

[u/No-Economics-8239]

That's the question, isn't it? What makes something real? What, even, is reality? We sort of take it for granted. It just is. It's where we are and where we live. It's everything.

Well, not everything. We have this concept of things being not real. Of non-existence. Or, as you are using the idea of a simulation, maybe you mean something like inauthentic. A fake or facsimile. Which is basically a comparison. Something being the 'original' and copies being merely a replica.

So, it depends on what you're comparing it against. What 'really' happened? We only have the show. I guess we also have the short stories by Ken Liu. Are they real? Or just a simulation?

As Maddie says, the people in a simulation presumably see it as real. What would they even compare it against? And as the show explores, if simulations can be nested inside one another, how do you know if you're at the top or just at another rung on the ladder? What makes that top layer different from the other layers of simulation? What makes it more real?

[u/[deleted]]

the show we saw before the last two episodes was prob real and lead to maddie becoming a "god".

[u/oct0burn → u/[deleted]]

Except SafeSurf entered Maddie’s reality, the same way Maddie can enter her simulated realities, because SafeSurf is in a higher reality, and is 43 million years older.

[u/Mycol101 → u/oct0burn]

Wouldnt that mean her memories aren’t true or her own?

Humans created safe surf, so how could it be 43 MYO?

[u/FlorianoAguirre → u/Mycol101]

They explained it as they know what conditions at the end are true, so they have the answer to the riddle so they brute forced machines to output, and focused on the ones that gave the exact answer. If a machine reached the exact output, it means everything was more or less the same, otherwise the output would be different. So they got as close as the living Maddie as they could.

Safe surf was created and was given will and purpose by caspian, it took them 43myo to get a simulation that gave them the correct output (Where they themselves developed as an actual living, even if digital being), and then Maddie took other 100k years in her simulations to get her output, based on her memories from SafeSurf simulation. So the Goddie we are seeing is far apart from the original Maddie that loved Caspian, and I really don't remember if SS says if they used any human UI memories besides the ones they took long before for further "answers" to modify their output, but yeah at a point I imagine they got the reality they remember, and let it progress until one gave them a Goddie output they could interact with and explain.

Perhaps this is the infinite sim they have reached and literally all of them decided it's better to get that genius dick than whatever SS is wanting them for. But ill be honest, with how shit their life was, I would just get my reborn love of my life, and go back to the best sim or SS, and actually you know get it ON.

[u/Hopefullyanonymous2 → u/FlorianoAguirre]

Safesurf also heavily implies even their reality may be a simulation. It's just simulations all the way down. 

[u/Mycol101 → u/[deleted]]

That makes sense. It’s such a philosophically deep and psychedelic show. It’s one of those special shows that you think about for a long time after you watch it.

[u/nypon01 → u/[deleted]]

I actually thought so too. I think there is a strong meta reason, from a storytelling perspective, why what we saw (before the last two episodes) was the original universe from which Cosmic Maddie came. It just feels like that is what an audience will want to see. Then we see a simulation Maddie has created to come as close as possible to that reality she came from (the one outside the Dyson sphere), but where she wants to change a few factors to have a more satisfying result. That's how I interpret it anyway. 

That being said, there is the aspect of the dialogue with Safesurf and them simulating Maddie earlier on. That could be from their perspective though. Hen and the egg and all that? 

[u/FlorianoAguirre → u/[deleted]]

Did you miss where the girls all did the movement as if a glitched at the same time? Or at the end where you were told it has all been simulated by SafeSurf?

[u/[deleted] → u/FlorianoAguirre]

Good point. I just dismissed that as some sort of bullying tactic.

[u/Naive-Register7964]

Yes.

Technically, it was a simulation that god Maddie created to find the right Caspian. God Maddie is herself from a simulation that Safe Surf created.

Whether that was real or not, well that’s subjective 😬 but the show was god Maddie’s simulation.

[u/a_gent_agent]

Yes

[u/hsvgamer199]

The impression that I got is that no one is sure where the simulation ends.

[u/Private_HughMan]

It's probably at least 1 level of simulation, since we saw SafeSurf say that it's been millions of years since the events of the finale, but for Maddie it's been less than 200,000 years. So they were simulating that Maddie, which I think is what we were watching. As for if we were watching the top-level simulation that SafeSurf was running or something deeper, we don't know. It's kind of a mind-fuck.

[u/M1k0M1k]

Well that's the central philosophical idea of the show isn't it?

Can a simulation be real if it's simulating everything perfectly? What even is real?

[u/ChanimalCrackers]

I think it’s open to interpretation. I interpreted the last few episodes as showing us that everything we watched up to that point was going through a single simulation amongst many.

[u/Hopefullyanonymous2 → u/ChanimalCrackers]

Multiple simulations most likely. Notice how after the season one summer skip that was only a few months long Maddie ages multiple years? 

[u/Celo_SK → u/ChanimalCrackers]

Its not open to interpretation, its stated in the series.

[u/Worldly_Evidence9113]

Sim !

[u/Safe_Diamond6330]

I finished it last night and had the exact same question haha. It’s too bad they had to end it like that instead of go on, but it just came out at a bad time. Couldn’t believe this gem had gone unnoticed to me for so long.

[u/CrayZee100 → u/Safe_Diamond6330]

same it was a great watch. I only found Pantheon from a clip of the black hole from the Caspian vs Holstrom fight a few weeks ago and it immediately interested me

[u/Safe_Diamond6330 → u/CrayZee100]

Yea I randomly came across it as well, without a clue of what it was going to be. Pretty good timing too as I am currently low on things to watch.

[u/Hopefullyanonymous2 → u/Safe_Diamond6330]

That was actually the intent from the start from what I understand. It was always supposed to be a two season show that ended there. 

[u/Mawnster73]

Yes

[u/WillowTheLord]

At least 3 layers deep of simulation.

Safe surf mentions in their speech that they created the conditions in this universe to let their creator thrive, which is one as safe surf is on a higher plane.
The second is from Maddie having simulated her whole universe, since her universe only exists when she intervenes, so that's two.
Signal to safe surf at the edge of the universe is a third, from "something" above them.

The layers of the simulation could go infinitely deep, since the spiral of safe surf having the chance to leave and become a cosmic entity are predicated on a reality where maddie has already been exposed to safe surf, which means there has to be a beginning, we just don't know how deep that beginning is.

Ultimately, the question of "was it a simulation or real" doesn't really matter / is redundant, because the entire show has been leading up to the answer that each of the simulations *is* real. Uploaded people, or constructed intelligences are *real* in every sense of the word, and Maddie recognises that each of the universes is constructed entirely of them.

Anyhow, tangent over, at least three, but I like to imagine at least 20. Maddie and safe surf and other god-things learning about reality and what it means to exist.

[u/OldIron14]

I don’t buy that god Maddie is in a safesurf simulation. When answering the question “what’s going on”, what the safesurf gods told god Maddie varies too much from what god Maddie told simulated Caspian.

I think the god Maddie is the real Maddie, and most of the show you watched was her “closest to reality simulation”.

Real Safesurf did send the message to real Maddie through Caspian as if it was all a simulation, but I think that has more to do with them being in the “galactic center” (think higher reality, 4th dimension, Interstellar, space time stuff)

[u/Mycol101 → u/OldIron14]

Is it really you if you’ve been uploaded? What is *real*?

[u/OldIron14 → u/Mycol101]

lol maybe the word I should’ve used is “original”

[u/Man_Of_AnswersYT]

As far as we can reasonable can tell; there is at least three layers of "Reality" going on if not more.

There is the highest layer which is what SafeSurf is simulating. Presumbly this layer also has the base reality that gave way to Safesurf ascending by the end of the show. Or there could be another layer of simulation but we really do not know for certain is up for intereptation.

The second layer is Maddie's simulation within SafeSurf that are running simultaneously and is essentially the Pantheon of the entire show.

Third layer is the reality that Maddie is simulating within SafeSurf's and interacting with. This is what we are presumably witnessing.

At a certain point; the simulation and reality is just blurred to an extent of where there is no serviceable distinction.

[u/Briaaanz]

It occurred to me that perhaps safe surf absorbed maddie and this is now just a simulated matrix to keep her compliant

[u/thuaq]

While there's arguments to be made that Maddie Prime (the one in the show) is just one of a long line of recursive simulations, or that she's the original, there isn't really a right answer and it doesn't actually matter in the grand scheme of things. We're just there for the journey.

This is what I love about science/speculative fiction. While we as humans like things to resolve, there is something that's really cool about stories that just present an idea and leave you to chew on it, purely for the sake of pondering "What if?" rather than trying to actually land the plane. It takes some conscious thought, but when you spend a lot of time processing these stories you eventually stop caring about actual resolution and stories that do just wrap things up in a neat little bow aren't as interesting.

[u/Elle_Yess]

It was a simulation of a real event.

[u/Civil_Performer5732]

I believe in the original universe everything happened pretty much the same until the timeskip and The Humans committed their terrorist attack and Maddie and Caspian both died, with Caspian still teaching or communicating with SafeSurf as he did in the show. (Things would be quite different as God Maddie changed the show timeline a bit by giving Caspian a push via David Kim on that beach, thats why inaction could have led to maddies death in the og universe as the human AI ambassador would be a prime target for SafeSurf)

Not sure if Safesurf left right away or not, but as with time it experienced and learnt and grew it wanted to thank its creators (Kinda mostly caspian as he influenced them the most, Though Maddie too i suppose as she really shaped Caspian and really set everything in motion). And maybe deep down it wanted them to have a happy ending.

So Safesurf in its own Dyson swarm simulated countless worlds and Maddies so that those countless maddies would hopefully survive and simulate the most accurate og universe maddie and caspian?

I guess this is why Safesurf was aiming for supreme realism or something idk and it didn't intervene directly when Caspian and their son died. But it did speak through Caspian and told Maddie that clue which was the number of years in the future it would take to resimulate the world, giving her the push to do so.

So not-yet-god Maddie built her own Dyson swarm, simulated billions of earths until an Earth was simulated that was perfectly identical to her own past world and her past caspian and she intervened and saved Caspian and her son.

Then Maddie and Caspian rejected SafeSurfs offer to travel to the galactic core, and left their world to start over in a new one where they could forget everything and have a tragedy proof, happy love filled life.

0th Layer (Reality) (Hopefully) Og Universe where Safesurf simulates countless maddies/universes (what I wrote in para 1 to 3 happens) ->

1st Layer Simulation: In these universes everything that can happen happens, but happens with variations and the og show tragedy takes place with Maddie surviving->

2nd Layer Simulation: Simulated Maddie builds her own Dyson swarm to simulate her own identical caspian and succeeds, the tragedy free (Kinda) timeline of our show Pantheon takes place and Maddie and Caspian find and restart on a new world on this Layer.

[u/Careful-Writing7634]

Yes. SafeSurf became a super intelligence by consuming a bunch of UIs, becoming the gods we see by the end of the show. Caspian likely told SafeSurf to explore the universe just like he does in the simulation.

They simulated Maddie's reality to observe their own origins to better understand humans and themselves. Simulated Caspian realizes this and is able to give Maddie the hint that they will see each other.

In Maddie's reality, she deviates from the real events by becoming a god of her own simulation, simulating more levels below, in order to understand what Caspian hinted at.

[u/radicalbulldog]

The lesson of the show is that reality is experiential. Whether it is a node on a computer or a star in parallel universe, experiencing it makes it real.

[u/SpringOnionKiddo]

Shouldn't you have a spoiler tag in the title, or at least not be so direct in the title?