Simulated Reality

I watched Inception last night. But that is not the point of this post.

Inception did, however, spark a conversation between my friend and I about the depiction of dreams and the subconscious in the film, which in turn reminded me of V.R.: Virtual Reality.

As a child, I recall being told that we were on the advent of virtual reality, that it would be here probably by the year 2000 (or something). It would be a fantastic place where we could fly around with Ronald McDonald in the a rainbow, and we would ride unicorns and eat cookies and everything would be awesome.

It never happened.

And, last night, the more I thought about it, the more I doubted it would ever happen. In an age where auto-tune and plastic surgery make our celebrities look like robots, we’re still scrambling to get out of the Uncanny Valley in constructed realities.

(It’s interesting to note that, as someone who has played video games for longer than he has gone to school, the effect of the Uncanny Valley is not as strong on me as it is on other people. I’m not entirely sure if it’s because I’m used to seeing all sorts of 3d monstrosities on my screen…

…or because I’m innately less offended by it.)

Even though technology powerful enough for the job might arrive eventually, I doubt a simulated virtual reality would ever be immersive enough for us to think it was reality.

Unless this isn’t reality.