How does one "brute force simulate a human"? If compute is the limiting factor, then isn't it currently possible to brute force simulate a human, just extremely slowly?
I guess technically, one can try to simulate every single atoms and their interactions with each others to get this result.
However, considering how many atoms there are in a cubic foot of meat, this isn't very possible even with current compute. Even trying to solve a PDE with, I don't know, 1e7 factors, is already a hard to crack issue although technically, it is computable.
Now take that to the number of atoms in a meatbag and you quickly see why it is pointless to put any effort into this "extremely slowly" way.
We have no way of knowing the initial conditions for this (position etc of each fundamental particle in any brain), even if we assume that we have a good enough grasp on fundamental physics to know the rules.
But if we had enough compute, it'd be trivial, right? I mean, I didn't think so, but the guy I replied to seems to know so. No, in all seriousness, I realize that "extremely slowly" is an understatement.
In davidzheng's defense, I assume he likely meant a higher-level simulation of a human, one designed to act indistinguishably from an atom-level simulation.
I just think calling that "trivial with enough compute" is mistaking merely having the materials for having mastered them.
I have a computer like that, embedded in my head even! It's good for real-time simulation, but has trouble simulating the same human from even a couple weeks before.
In all seriousness, it's simultaneously wondrous and terrifying to imagine the hypothetical tooling needed for such a simulation.