yeah, and I consider this part of (b): maybe our universe itself (or the meta-universe containing it or something) is some kind of "useful software" in a simulation VM (what I mean by "bitcoin miner" :)), and we are just some by-products of its running.
I read (b) to suggest that we are are intimately important part of this simulation. The simulation starters wouldn't consider us a threat to the integrity of their simulation as we are part of that simulation.
However, if we were unintended by-products, the simulation starters could turn on us - especially if we start interfering in the global state of the simulation. There is an interesting Asimov story along these lines where top scientists would be mysteriously killed in order to prevent humans developing force field tech. The protagonist compared humans to bacteria growing in a petri dish. In order to stop the bacteria spreading out you surround the bacteria with penicillin. The simulation starters did something analogous to humans.
Think of the Deist philosophy of the 18th century: that of God as a "clockmaker," who wound up the universe and then left it to tick. Whatever outcomes emerged were not necessarily the results of his actions or intentions; they were the effects of his original cause. It was a quirky and relatively short-lived philosophy, especially in the Western cannon. But it's eerily applicable here.
If this is all a computer simulation, it's possible the creator(s) of the simulation programmed only the fundamental physics and set up the Big Bang, allowing everything else to unfold and develop as it has.
In effect, this wouldn't be very different (to us) from a non-simultated reality. Hell, it's possible that we're in a simulation that people in the "real" universe set up as a scientific study, to model their own universe's birth and evolution.
