The dawn of a new reality? | Massimo Pigliucci, Mazviita Chirimuuta and Anders Sandberg debate VR
73Massimo Pigliucci, Mazviita Chirimuuta and Anders Sandberg debate virtual reality.
What do we gain from the onset of virtual worlds? What do we lose?
Watch the full debate at https://iai.tv/video/getting-everything-losing-everything?utm_source=YouTube&utm_medium=description
Live a life of luxury, travel to the far ends of the earth, dial up any experience you can imagine. According to its proponents, including Mr Zuckerberg, a new reality is on the way. They claim, our future lives will take place as much in the digital world as in physical world with the potential to give everyone access to experiences currently only available to a few. But critics say this is a nightmare not a utopia. Instead of real relationships, we’ll have virtual ones; instead of nature, we will have a simulation. And who will control it? Meta, you can be sure, has a plan.
Should we ignore the hyperbole and recognize it as a science fiction fantasy that is simply a marketing device to motivate staff and shareholders? Or is the digital virtual world an inevitable future that we urgently need to prepare for now? Can we harness its potential or is it a trap that threatens to steal all that is vital, namely real life?
#virtualreality #vr #transhumanism
Maria Balaska is currently a research fellow at the University of Hertfordshire and at Åbo Akademi University.
Anders Sandberg is a researcher, popular science debater, trans-humanist and author of Superhuman: Exploring Human Enhancement from 600 BCE to 2050.
Massimo Pigliucci is a philosophy professor at the City College of New York and former co-host of the Rationally Speaking Podcast. His research interests include the Philosophy of Science and the Philosophy of Biology.
Mazviita Chirimuuta is a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. She is a self-described techno-pessimist and anti-transhumanist.
00:00 Introduction
00:20 Anders Sandberg: Transhumanist
03:01 Massimo Pigliucci: Stoic
05:24 Mazviita Chirimuuta: Techno-pessimist
09:10 What is reality, and what makes virtual reality different?
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