Chapter: Virtual Reality and Computer Simulation

Quote:

Virtual reality and computer simulation have not received much attention from ethicists. It is argued in this essay that this relative neglect is unjustified, and that there are important ethical questions that can be raised in relation to these technologies. First of all, these technologies raise important ethical questions about the way in which they represent reality and the misrepresentations, biased representations, and offensive representations that they may contain. In addition, actions in virtual environments can be harmful to others and raise moral issues within all major traditions in ethics, including consequentialism, deontology, and virtue ethics.

What I expect to learn:

To know more about the downsides of virtual reality

Review:                    

Whenever I hear the term “virtual reality”, a huge shades with 3D display capabilities for computer games is the first thing I can imagine. But what is virtual reality?

Virtual reality, as explained in the chapter, is a technology emerged in the 1980s, with the development and marketing of systems consisting of a head-mounted display (HMD) and datasuit or dataglove attached to a computer. These technologies simulated three-dimensional (3D) environments displayed in surround stereoscopic vision on the head-mounted display. The user could navigate and interact with simulated environments through the datasuit and dataglove, items that tracked the positions and motions of body parts and allowed the computer to modify its output depending on the recorded positions. This original technology has helped define what is often meant by “virtual reality”: an immersive, interactive three-dimensional computer-generated environment in which interaction takes place over multiple sensory channels and includes tactile and positioning feedback.

Now that is the definition from the chapter – any resemblance in mine? – which pretty much the same thing as how I pictured it. A technology or well, goggles, that allows people to interact with computer made graphics as though it is happening in real life. Amazing isn’t it? How technology can do such wonders for our benefits and allows us to experience something more than what we should have experienced back then.

What I learned:

·         Definition of Virtual Reality

·         Computer simulations

·         Applications

·         The Distinction between the Virtual and the Real

·         Evaluating the Virtual as a Substitute for the Real

·         REPRESENTATION AND SIMULATION: ETHICAL ISSUES

·         Misrepresentations, Biased Representations, and Indecent Representations

·         Virtual Child Pornography

·         Depiction of Real Persons

·         Avatars, Agency, and Identity

·         Behavior in Single-User VR

·         Behavior in Multiuser VR

·         Virtual Property and Virtual Economies

·         The Goods and Ills of Computer Games

·         Computer Games and Values

·         Computer Games and Gender

Integrative Questions:            

1.    What is virtual reality?

2.    How often and where do you often hear that term?

3.    What were the ethical issues mentioned that exists in the virtual world?

4.    Define avatars.

5.    Define Single-User VR.