It seems like you’re trying to get at multiple things here, so I’m a bit confused.
On the question of how to define simulation, why not treat it as a computation with the purpose of telling you something about the state of something? This seems to be what you’re doing, but then you bring up a number of concerns about doing this for reasons that remain unclear to me. Maybe if you can say a little bit more about your motivation in writing this it would help make things clearer.
It seems like you’re trying to get at multiple things here, so I’m a bit confused.
On the question of how to define simulation, why not treat it as a computation with the purpose of telling you something about the state of something? This seems to be what you’re doing, but then you bring up a number of concerns about doing this for reasons that remain unclear to me. Maybe if you can say a little bit more about your motivation in writing this it would help make things clearer.