From: jont@cs.su.oz (Jonathon Tidswell)
Newsgroups: alt.sex,alt.cyberpunk,alt.irc
Subject: Re: Virtual Ethics
Summary: try it and see
Date: 13 Apr 92 10:45:57 GMT
Reply-To: jont@cs.su.oz (Jonathon Tidswell)
Organization: Basser Dept of Computer Science, University of Sydney, Australia

In article <65174@apple.Apple.COM> chmilar@Apple.COM (Michael Chmilar) writes:
|kim3@husc10.harvard.edu (Jason Kim) writes:
| 
|>You see, first of all, 
|>since in a VR world a person can take whatever form he or she desires, the
|>feeling that we present-day people experience of not being able to make our-
|>selves look good will disappear. If Mary has what it takes to attract Bubba
|>and she knows it, her confidence in herself will be such that she won't care
|>about not looking like Kathy Ireland in the physical world.
| 
|>Which brings me to my second hypothesis. I think that everyone on such a net
|>will learn to value the *substantial* things in others, rather than just their 
Experience makes me disagree.

|>physical charm (insubstantial because it is accidental and temporary)
|>thus leading to a greater maturity of society. I think this will be especially
|>true in light of the fact that *everyone* will be able to make themselves
|>look "perfect" (by modern standards). If everyone can look like the ideal
|>model, then the value of having an ideal appearance drops to nothing, and the
|>value of looks as a criterion of personal worth drops to nothing.

Again, I wish to disagree.
*I* build mental pictures of people I havent seen, whan talking to them in a VR
enviroment.
( normally totally wrong, but that is just a comment on my personal sterotypes )

[ ... ]
 
| In any VR world, if there is mass communal interaction, there will be some
| notion of fashion.  Fashion may be based on this mechanism:  I have some
| unique trait (tall/short, thin/fat, able to spew out large prime numbers
| quickly, good color sense, etc.) which I manage to convince other people
| is cool and worthwhile, so it becomes fashionable.  Not everyone has the
| same ability.
| 
| Therefore, cliques will still exist.  So will prejudice.  don't make the
| mistake of thinking that a brand new VR world will be utopia.  The only
| way that could happen is to have some totalitarian VR government which
| enforces utter equality.
 
An excellent point, I hope nobody is advocating such a situation.

|
[ ... ]
| 
| This will be the same in a VR world.  If you say that less capable people
| will be assisted by an AI "agent", then the more capable people will also
| get agents that again give them an edge.  How will these agents be obtained?
| You will probably have to buy them.  Capable people will be able to get
| the "money" needed for good agents more easily than less capable people.

Capability, is the whole question anyway.
What is each person capable of ? ( earning money/dancing/massage/... )
 
| Is this starting to sound familiarly like the real world?  Surprise, surprise.
| Reality isn't the way it is for totally arbitrary reasons.  It is only
| semi-random.
| 

May I suggest if you havent already, that you try one of the several multiuser
real time net talk programs.
One in particular ( Internet Relay Chat IRC ) has a large contigent of people
who seem to spend their time arranging for virtual sex ( and presumably having
virtual sex ), it also has a lot of people who meet in real life ( and get
married in real life after meeting on talk systems ).
[ There is was a thread in alt.irc about relations that went real :]

It has some obvios benefits and draw backs, the worst draw back is that too
many people take it too seriously. It is only VIRTUAL reality.

Hint: read other peoples fiction in alt.sex, or create it with a partner real
time .... ( needless to say I spend more time on irc than rn/nn/xrn/... :)

Caveat: it isnt the "thing" for all, so dont flame me if YOU dont like it.

regards
Ernie on IRC.
--
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jonathon Tidswell              | jont@cs.su.oz.au  ( Ernie on IRC )
Basser Dept. of Comp. Science  | >> This space intentionally left blank. <<
Phone: +61 2 692 4802          | Disclaimer: I think my thought are my own.     
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk