Aww, no alien empires yet

[JohnnyYesterday]

Well there is one more disturbing possibility, we are really alone, but not because of Dawn hunters. Because this is a simulation, a virtual world.

If that were true, then we wouldn't be alone. We'd be alone in the simulation, but there would have to be a real world beyond the simulation and the being(s) that started the simulation and maintains the hardware in the real world that it runs on.

Lets assume that you want to simulate our civilization, you don't really need to model things in great detail beyond certain point. Why add galaxy spanning civilizations when you care about one planet and it's development? Its wasteful, unnecessary, it increases complexity beyond what is required. So instead of that just leave rest of the universe blank. Use "normal" physics simulation and be done with it.

If that was the case, why would they even bother to simulate a universe much beyond the planet? They could've stuck us in a Ptolemaic universe, and it would seem perfectly plausible to us.