“Terror Valley”: Virtual reality is the only reality

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How do you know the people around you Not a zombie?

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“Uncanny Valley”: Virtual reality is the only reality

Dai Yi

“Uncanny Valley” full movie, duration: 8’53”

The eight-minute short film “Uncanny Valley” (< em>Uncanny Valley) is composed of two worlds from different perspectives. On the one hand, there are homeless people living in slums. They are dissatisfied with reality and are addicted to virtual reality games. “Virtual reality is the only reality.” They forget the troubles of the real world. On the other hand, the characters in the game find that the objects they kill are civilians who died in the war. The game is just a disguise. Virtual reality turns the game player into a war machine through remote manipulation.

If the short film just wants to discuss the game, addiction and war, there is no doubt that these eight minutes are enough to make people think. The film uses the term “Uncanny Valley” in the field of artificial intelligence, showing another possibility. One explanation for the Uncanny Valley is that people will feel inexplicably scared when they see artificial intelligence that resembles a human but lifeless. In fact, it is the “zombie” that has been frequently discussed in the Western philosophical circles in recent years. There are also “zombies” in virtual reality, and it is precisely because the perception of different lives and objects in virtual reality has changed, we cannot judge whether the opponent is a life or a zombie through direct perception. As shown in the film, will those bitter civilians just simulate realistic zombies?

At the beginning of the film, the crying civilians suddenly appeared snowflake-like spots.

Moreover, the short film actually has two details before and after. First, before the title came out, the crying civilians suddenly appeared snowflake-like spots, which means that this layer of reality is also virtual. “Dream Space” or Wang Jinkang’s “Seven Shells”, one is that the Wanderer and the War Machine meet at the end of the film, which has to be reminiscent of the second chapter of Genesis. God created Adam, and the fingers of God and man communicate with each other like electricity. . However, if God is also created, everything is virtual?

The first line of the film is the vagabond’s “virtual reality is the only reality”, so the audience naturally acquiesced that vagabond itself is an objectively existing natural reality, and the game is relatively virtual, but since War can be virtual. What reason do we have to suspect that the wanderers are not virtual?

Just as, who can prove that our world itself is not virtualized? Of course, a sweet answer to this question is that if we cannot perceive a more basic and more realistic world beyond the existing world, then whether our world is virtual or real is just a name and has no practical meaning.

But if Zhai Zhenming argued in “Get real: A Philosophical Adventure In Virtual Reality” (Get real: A Philosophical Adventure In Virtual Reality), from the ontology Theoretically proved the equivalence of virtual reality and natural reality, that is, virtual reality and natural reality are equal to virtual or reality. This question will become weird. People’s daily life has become an addictive behavior. When falling in love, secreting dopamine is addictive. Pursuing knowledge or wealth and enjoying a certain pleasure is addictive. Doing nothing and doing nothing like a vegetable is addictive. Then how do people know that they are real? Are you enjoying your life, instead of a god-level civilization using electrodes to stimulate your brain, making you feel happy like a brain in a tank? To a certain extent, our neurobiology itself is doing such a thing. They dissolve human free will into electrodes and impulses.

And many people, like Neo in The Matrix, choose between the red and blue pills to be real. Of course, this is a manifestation of not understanding what is virtual and what is real. In the movie, people chose it because a prophet told the world from a third perspective that the world you live in is illusory. Such miracles never happen in real life. We might as well examine this with an example of traditional ethics.

Assuming that the neighbor Pharaoh and his wife are very affectionate, Pharaoh himself thinks so, and as a neighbor you also think so, until one day you find that Pharaoh’s wife has sex with someone else. At this time you are facing a dilemma of choice, you can choose to hide it, then Pharaoh’s wife is still very good to Pharaoh, Pharaoh still feels that his wife loves him, and the world is no different to Pharaoh; or you can choose to tell The truth about Lao Wang, of course, is unprovoked. You need some kind of tool, such as video or photos, that is the same third perspective as you to prove it. However, in either case, you are just like the prophet in The Matrix. In the former case, you will blame yourself and feel guilty. In the latter case, you may think that you should help Lao Wang see the real world clearly because of You jumped out of the world of Pharaoh’s perspective.

However, no one can jump away from their own lives and see their lives from a third perspective. How do you know that the people around you are not zombies? Do you love your life?

Will this series of thoughts confuse you, or enjoy it? Descartes said, “I think, therefore I am.” The anthropic principle says that only if you are now, you will think like this. This may be the most wonderful place in our lives. A butterfly meets a boy named Zhuang Zhou and smiles at each other.

Everyone is trapped in the dream of their own life and cannot extricate themselves. It is impossible to quit.

The filming scene behind the scenes of the film. Picture: motionographer

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