The Metaphysics Of Virtual Reality

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The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality

Author : Michael Heim
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0198024320
Total Pages : 200 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (98 download)

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Book Synopsis The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality by : Michael Heim

Download or read book The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality written by Michael Heim and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1994-10-27 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Computers have dramatically altered life in the late twentieth century. Today we can draw on worldwide computer links, speeding up communications by radio, newspapers, and television. Ideas fly back and forth and circle the globe at the speed of electricity. And just around the corner lurks full-blown virtual reality, in which we will be able to immerse ourselves in a computer simulation not only of the actual physical world, but of any imagined world. As we begin to move in and out of a computer-generated world, Michael Heim asks, how will the way we perceive our world change? In The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality, Heim considers this and other philosophical issues of the Information Age. With an eye for the dark as well as the bright side of computer technology, he explores the logical and historical origins of our computer-generated world and speculates about the future direction of our computerized lives. He discusses such topics as the effect of word-processing on the English language (while word-processors have led to increased productivity, they have also led to physical hazards such as repetitive motion syndrome, which causes inflamed hand and arm tendons). Heim looks into the new kind of literacy promised by Hypertext (technology which allows the user to link audio and video elements, the disadvantages including disorientation and cognitive overload). And he also probes the notion of virtual reality, "cyberspace"--the computer-simulated environments that have captured the popular imagination and may ultimately change the way we define reality itself. Just as the definition of interface itself has evolved from the actual adapter plug used to connect electronic circuits into human entry into a self-contained cyberspace, so too will the notion of reality change with the current technological drive. Like the introduction of the automobile, the advent of virtual reality will change the whole context in which our knowledge and awareness of life are rooted. And along the way, Heim covers such intriguing topics as how computers have altered our thought habits, how we will be able to distinguish virtual from real reality, and the appearance of virtual reality in popular culture (as in Star Trek's holodeck, William Gibson's Neuromancer, and Stephen King's Lawnmower Man). Vividly and entertainingly written, The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality opens a window on a fascinating world that promises--or threatens--to become an integral part of everyday life in the 21st century. As Heim writes, not only do we face a breakthrough in the technology of computer interface, but we face the challenge of knowing ourselves and determining how the technology should develop and ultimately affect the society in which it grows.

Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy

Author : David J. Chalmers
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN 13 : 0393635813
Total Pages : 544 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (936 download)

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Book Synopsis Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy by : David J. Chalmers

Download or read book Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy written by David J. Chalmers and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2022-01-25 with total page 544 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A leading philosopher takes a mind-bending journey through virtual worlds, illuminating the nature of reality and our place within it. Virtual reality is genuine reality; that’s the central thesis of Reality+. In a highly original work of “technophilosophy,” David J. Chalmers gives a compelling analysis of our technological future. He argues that virtual worlds are not second-class worlds, and that we can live a meaningful life in virtual reality. We may even be in a virtual world already. Along the way, Chalmers conducts a grand tour of big ideas in philosophy and science. He uses virtual reality technology to offer a new perspective on long-established philosophical questions. How do we know that there’s an external world? Is there a god? What is the nature of reality? What’s the relation between mind and body? How can we lead a good life? All of these questions are illuminated or transformed by Chalmers’ mind-bending analysis. Studded with illustrations that bring philosophical issues to life, Reality+ is a major statement that will shape discussion of philosophy, science, and technology for years to come.

Virtual Realism

Author : Michael Heim
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 019535009X
Total Pages : 264 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (953 download)

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Book Synopsis Virtual Realism by : Michael Heim

Download or read book Virtual Realism written by Michael Heim and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2000-04-13 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Virtual reality has introduced what is literally a new dimension of reality to daily life. But it is not without controversy. Indeed, some say that a collision is inevitable between those passionately involved in the computer industry and those increasingly alienated from (and often replaced by) its applications. Opinions range from the cyberpunk attitude of Wired magazine and Bill Gates's commercial optimism to the violent opposition of the Unabomber. Now, with Virtual Realism, readers have a thought-provoking guide to the "cyberspace backlash" debate and the implications of cyberspace for our culture. Michael Heim offers a comprehensive introduction to virtual reality and a provocative commentary on its present and future impact on our lives. Heim describes the fascinating and important industrial and military uses of virtual reality, as well as its artistic and entertainment applications. He argues that we must balance the idealist's enthusiasm for computerized life with the need to ground ourselves more deeply in primary reality. This "uneasy balance" he calls virtual realism.

The Aesthetics of Virtual Reality

Author : Grant Tavinor
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000452123
Total Pages : 249 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (4 download)

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Book Synopsis The Aesthetics of Virtual Reality by : Grant Tavinor

Download or read book The Aesthetics of Virtual Reality written by Grant Tavinor and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-09-30 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first book to present an aesthetics of virtual reality media. It situates virtual reality media in terms of the philosophy of the arts, comparing them to more familiar media such as painting, film and photography. When philosophers have approached virtual reality, they have almost always done so through the lens of metaphysics, asking questions about the reality of virtual items and worlds, about the value of such things, and indeed, about how they may reshape our understanding of the "real" world. Grant Tavinor finds that approach to be fundamentally mistaken, and that to really account for virtual reality, we must focus on the medium and its uses, and not the hypothetical and speculative instances that are typically the focus of earlier works. He also argues that much of the cultural and metaphysical hype around virtual reality is undeserved. But this does not mean that virtual reality is illusory or uninteresting; on the contrary, it is significant for the altogether different reason that it overturns much of our understanding of how representational media can function and what we can use them to achieve. The Aesthetics of Virtual Reality will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in aesthetics, philosophy of art, philosophy of technology, metaphysics, and game studies.

Get Real

Author : Philip Zhai
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN 13 : 9780847689835
Total Pages : 254 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (898 download)

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Book Synopsis Get Real by : Philip Zhai

Download or read book Get Real written by Philip Zhai and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 1998 with total page 254 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating look at the brave new world of virtual reality.

The Ethics of Virtual and Augmented Reality

Author : Erick Jose Ramirez
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000517357
Total Pages : 267 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

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Book Synopsis The Ethics of Virtual and Augmented Reality by : Erick Jose Ramirez

Download or read book The Ethics of Virtual and Augmented Reality written by Erick Jose Ramirez and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-12-29 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers new ways of thinking about and assessing the impact of virtual reality on its users. It argues that we must go beyond traditional psychological concepts of VR "presence" to better understand the many varieties of virtual experiences. The author provides compelling evidence that VR simulations are capable of producing "virtually real" experiences in people. He also provides a framework for understanding when and how simulations induce virtually real experiences. From these insights, the book shows that virtually real experiences are responsible for several unaddressed ethical issues in VR research and design. Experimental philosophers, moral psychologists, and institutional review boards must become sensitive to the ethical issues involved between designing "realistic" virtual dilemmas, for good data collection, and avoiding virtually real trauma. Ethicists and game designers must do more to ensure that their simulations don’t inculcate harmful character traits. Virtually real experiences, the author claims, can make virtual relationships meaningful, productive, and conducive to welfare but they can also be used to systematically mislead and manipulate users about the nature of their experiences. The Ethics of Virtual and Augmented Reality will appeal to philosophers working in applied ethics, philosophy of technology, and aesthetics, as well as researchers and students interested in game studies and game design.

Virtual Realities and Their Discontents

Author : Robert Markley
Publisher : JHU Press
ISBN 13 : 9780801852268
Total Pages : 180 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (522 download)

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Book Synopsis Virtual Realities and Their Discontents by : Robert Markley

Download or read book Virtual Realities and Their Discontents written by Robert Markley and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The recognition that cyberspace is a fiction -- a narrative that creates a coherence it would like to imagine "really" exists -- is crucial to any theoretically sophisticated critique of the limitations of this consensual hallucination and the discontents it imperfectly masks. In this groundbreaking volume Robert Markley and his co-authors set out to discover why "cyberspace provokes often-rapturous rhetoric but resists critical analysis." Taking a variety of approaches, the authors explore the ways in which virtual realities conserve and incorporate rather than overthrow the assumptions and values of a traditional, logocentric humanism: the Platonist division of the world into the physical and metaphysical in which ideal forms are valued over material content. Cyberspace, David Porush suggests, represents not a break with our metaphysical past but an extension of its basic theistic postulates. Richard Grusin argues that the claims for new forms of electronic communication depend upon the very notions of authorship -- and subjectivity -- they claim to transcend. N. Katherine Hayles examines debates about cybernetics in the 1950s to demonstrate that the history of mind-body ideas in the age of computers and feedback loops is itself conflicted. David Brande analyzes cyberspace as an extension of the logic of late twentieth-century capitalism. And Robert Markley explores the entangled roots of cyberspace in the philosophy of mathematics. "One of the ironies of our culture's fascination with cyberspace is that our material and psychic investments in Virtual Reality suggest that the death of print culture -- or its disappearance into the matrix -- has been greatly exaggerated.... Cyberspace is unthinkable, literally inconceivable, without the print culture it claims to transcend. It is, in part, a by-product of a tradition of metaphysics that, boats against the current, bears us back relentlessly to our past." -- Robert Markley, from the introduction

The Oxford Handbook of Virtuality

Author : Mark Grimshaw
Publisher : Oxford Handbooks
ISBN 13 : 0199826161
Total Pages : 794 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (998 download)

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Book Synopsis The Oxford Handbook of Virtuality by : Mark Grimshaw

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Virtuality written by Mark Grimshaw and published by Oxford Handbooks. This book was released on 2014-02 with total page 794 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book is a compendium of thinking on virtuality and its relationship to reality from the perspective of a variety of philosophical and applied fields of study. Topics covered include presence, immersion, emotion, ethics, utopias and dystopias, image, sound, literature, AI, law, economics, medical and military applications, religion, and sex.

Electric Language

Author : Michael Heim
Publisher : Yale University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780300077469
Total Pages : 324 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (774 download)

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Book Synopsis Electric Language by : Michael Heim

Download or read book Electric Language written by Michael Heim and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 1999-01-01 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book Michael Heim provides the first consistent philosophical basis for critically evaluating the impact of word processing on our use of and ideas about language. This edition includes a new foreword by David Gelernter, a new preface by the author, and an updated bibliography. "Not only important but seminal, on the cutting-edge, furrowing new conceptual territory."-Walter J. Ong, S.J. "A philosopher ponders how the word processor has affected language use and our ideas about it. Heim shrewdly updates a school of thought, associated with such thinkers as Walter Ong, that maintains all changes in writing technology tend to change the way we perceive the world. His argument that word processing leads to fragmented thinking should be addressed and debated."-Carlin Romano, Philadelphia Inquirer "The arguments range over all of Western philosophy (and some Eastern as well), from the ancient Greeks to contemporary phenomenology. . . . Everyone who has used a word processor will find much to think about in Heim's ideas."-David Weinberger, Byte "Fascinating, clear, and well-done . . . stimulating and challenging."-Don Ihde, Philosophy and Rhetoric

The Palgrave Handbook of the Philosophy of Film and Motion Pictures

Author : Noël Carroll
Publisher : Springer Nature
ISBN 13 : 3030196011
Total Pages : 1047 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (31 download)

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Book Synopsis The Palgrave Handbook of the Philosophy of Film and Motion Pictures by : Noël Carroll

Download or read book The Palgrave Handbook of the Philosophy of Film and Motion Pictures written by Noël Carroll and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2019-10-30 with total page 1047 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This handbook brings together essays in the philosophy of film and motion pictures from authorities across the spectrum. It boasts contributions from philosophers and film theorists alike, with many essays employing pluralist approaches to this interdisciplinary subject. Core areas treated include film ontology, film structure, psychology, authorship, narrative, and viewer emotion. Emerging areas of interest, including virtual reality, video games, and nonfictional and autobiographical film also have dedicated chapters. Other areas of focus include the film medium’s intersection with contemporary social issues, film’s kinship to other art forms, and the influence of historically seminal schools of thought in the philosophy of film. Of emphasis in many of the essays is the relationship and overlap of analytic and continental perspectives in this subject.

The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Technology

Author : Shannon Vallor
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 019085118X
Total Pages : 697 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (98 download)

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Book Synopsis The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Technology by : Shannon Vallor

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Technology written by Shannon Vallor and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2022 with total page 697 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Technology gives readers a view into this increasingly vital and urgently needed domain of philosophical understanding, offering an in-depth collection of leading and emerging voices in the philosophy of technology. The thirty-two contributions in this volume cut across and connect diverse philosophical traditions and methodologies. They reveal the often-neglected importance of technology for virtually every subfield of philosophy, including ethics, epistemology, philosophy of science, metaphysics, aesthetics, philosophy of language, and political theory. The Handbook also gives readers a new sense of what philosophy looks like when fully engaged with the disciplines and domains of knowledge that continue to transform the material and practical features and affordances of our world, including engineering, arts and design, computing, and the physical and social sciences. The chapters reveal enduring conceptual themes concerning technology's role in the shaping of human knowledge, identity, power, values, and freedom, while bringing a philosophical lens to the profound transformations of our existence brought by innovations ranging from biotechnology and nuclear engineering to artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and robotics. This new collection challenges the reader with provocative and original insights on the history, concepts, problems, and questions to be brought to bear upon humanity's complex and evolving relationship to technology.

Bodies in Technology

Author : Don Ihde
Publisher : U of Minnesota Press
ISBN 13 : 9780816638468
Total Pages : 208 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (384 download)

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Book Synopsis Bodies in Technology by : Don Ihde

Download or read book Bodies in Technology written by Don Ihde and published by U of Minnesota Press. This book was released on 2002 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New technologies suggest new ideas about embodiment - our 'reach' extends to global sites through the Internet; we enter cyberspace through the engines of virtual reality. In this book, a leading philosopher of technology explores the meaning of bodies in technology—how the sense of our bodies and of our orientation in the world is affected by the various information technologies. 'Bodies in Technology' begins with an analysis of embodiment in cyberspace, then moves on to consider ways in which social theorists have interpreted or overlooked these conditions. An astute and sensible judge of these theories, Don Ihde is a uniquely provocative and helpful guide through contemporary thinking about technology and embodiment, drawing on sources and examples as various as video games, popular films, the workings of e-mail, and virtual reality techniques. Charting the historical, philosophical, and practical territory between virtual reality and real life, this work is an important contribution to the national conversation on the impact technology-and information technology in particular-has on our lives in a wired, global age.

Digital Mantras

Author : Steven R. Holtzman
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 9780262581431
Total Pages : 360 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (814 download)

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Book Synopsis Digital Mantras by : Steven R. Holtzman

Download or read book Digital Mantras written by Steven R. Holtzman and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 1995 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Blending ideas from music, computing, art, and philosophy, with biographical and historical anecdotes and a thread of mysticism, Steven R. Holtzman gives us a new way to think about the integration of computers into the creative process. He shows how computers will change the way we create, and reveals the exciting potential for entirely new forms of expression.

The VR Book

Author : Jason Jerald
Publisher : Morgan & Claypool
ISBN 13 : 1970001135
Total Pages : 523 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (7 download)

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Book Synopsis The VR Book by : Jason Jerald

Download or read book The VR Book written by Jason Jerald and published by Morgan & Claypool. This book was released on 2015-09-01 with total page 523 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Virtual reality (VR) potentially provides our minds with direct access to digital media in a way that at first seems to have no limits.However, creating compelling VR experiences is an incredibly complex challenge.When VR is done well, the results are brilliant and pleasurable experiences that go beyond what we can do in the real world.When VR is done badly, not only is the system frustrating to use, but sickness can result.Reasons for bad VR are numerous; some failures come from the limitations of technology, but many come from a lack of understanding perception, interaction, design principles, and real users. This book discusses such issues, focusing upon the human element of VR rather than technical implementation, for if we do not get the human element correct, then no amount of technology will make VR anything more than an interesting tool confined to research laboratories. Even when VR principles are fully understood, first implementations are rarely novel and never ideal due to the complex nature of VR and the countless possibilities. However, the VR principles discussed within enable us to intelligently experiment with the rules and iteratively design towards innovative experiences.

Virtual Reality

Author : Sandra K. Helsel
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 160 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis Virtual Reality by : Sandra K. Helsel

Download or read book Virtual Reality written by Sandra K. Helsel and published by . This book was released on 1991 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On the creation of highly interactive, computer-based multimedia environments in which the user becomes a participant with the computer in a "virtually real" world. Essentially, the volume is a republication of articles published in the summer 1990 issue of Multimedia review, plus an additional previously unpublished article on metaphysics, a directory of companies and individuals working with virtual reality concepts and technology, and a suggested readings list. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Every Thing Must Go

Author : James Ladyman
Publisher : OUP Oxford
ISBN 13 : 0191534757
Total Pages : 368 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (915 download)

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Book Synopsis Every Thing Must Go by : James Ladyman

Download or read book Every Thing Must Go written by James Ladyman and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2007-07-05 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every Thing Must Go argues that the only kind of metaphysics that can contribute to objective knowledge is one based specifically on contemporary science as it really is, and not on philosophers' a priori intuitions, common sense, or simplifications of science. In addition to showing how recent metaphysics has drifted away from connection with all other serious scholarly inquiry as a result of not heeding this restriction, they demonstrate how to build a metaphysics compatible with current fundamental physics ('ontic structural realism'), which, when combined with their metaphysics of the special sciences ('rainforest realism'), can be used to unify physics with the other sciences without reducing these sciences to physics itself. Taking science metaphysically seriously, Ladyman and Ross argue, means that metaphysicians must abandon the picture of the world as composed of self-subsistent individual objects, and the paradigm of causation as the collision of such objects. Every Thing Must Go also assesses the role of information theory and complex systems theory in attempts to explain the relationship between the special sciences and physics, treading a middle road between the grand synthesis of thermodynamics and information, and eliminativism about information. The consequences of the author's metaphysical theory for central issues in the philosophy of science are explored, including the implications for the realism vs. empiricism debate, the role of causation in scientific explanations, the nature of causation and laws, the status of abstract and virtual objects, and the objective reality of natural kinds.

The Oxford Handbook of Metaphysics

Author : Michael J. Loux
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 9780199284221
Total Pages : 740 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (842 download)

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Book Synopsis The Oxford Handbook of Metaphysics by : Michael J. Loux

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Metaphysics written by Michael J. Loux and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2005-09-08 with total page 740 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Some of the world's specialists provide in this handbook essays about what kinds of things there are, in what ways they exist, and how they relate to each other. They give the word on such topics as identity, modality, time, causation, persons and minds, freedom, and vagueness.