As I see it, VR is a super powerful thing, the greatest enabler. With it, we would be able to create theoretically infinite worlds of plenty. A pretty useful way to view this would be making something out of nothing. With VR, you get to value add to your lives stuff that’s technically not present in the natural world.
Of course, the basic premise of all this is that VR must first advance to what I call a ‘True Immersion’ state. That’s where it feels like you are truly nicely present and grounded in the virtual, created world. Yeah, in that sense, VR is really only in its infancy right now. Many, though, dream of its potential!!! Imagine the VR ‘modules’ (my personal name for them) that’ll be enabled by technological advancements. The day when we no longer feel like we’re sitting behind a screen, probably, will be a revolution on par with how humanity became able to generate electricity – dimensionally!! game-changing.
Some people may woefully think that VR is more for entertainment as opposed to an actual real life need. Truthfully, though, not even mentioning how it allows for simulations of real-life stuff in many fields, I believe VR would be practically very important for people in general too. Think about consumerism and waste. That’s a serious problem alright. Think about how we ravage nature and hold an ultimately short-term mindset (think the documentary Seaspiracy, which predicts our fish will be gone by 2048 and with these our so very precious O2). We can do the same with global warming and all the other irreversible stuff, which make the future seem so bleak.
It’s super simple, really. If we’re able to generate our consumerist needs through VR, technically replacing content from the natural world with fictional, created content, we’ll able to save the world. That’s what I was thinking of many years ago, when I wrote a VR-based utopian novel based on the twin pillars of the natural world and the created virtual universe. While I can’t predict the future, I am pretty sure that natural resources won’t be infinite. Ok, getting rid of obsolete methods and finding alternative ones may work. However, there is a big obstacle to innovation, which is that those using the primitive methods, at risk of becoming irrelevant and losing the lifelines they have, will thus attempt to stop you by all means.
But let’s not talk about how our present societal system is lacking and constrained. Let’s just concentrate on the endless possibilities that VR (in its final evolved form) entails. If you want to travel to an overseas country? Lock and load! Cosplay despite not knowing how materials work? A button away! Simulate taking off in a rocket to see outer space? As easy as ABC! Human beings may run out of stuff to do and cease obtaining meaning from practical means-to-an-end matters someday. How can we generate our meaning then? VR, basically. While these worlds may be fictional in the sense that they are created as in man-made, that doesn’t mean we cannot enjoy them, derive fulfilment from them! After all, how real??? is this natural world here? The religious may say that it too is created, an illusion, etcetera. There are different planes of existence out there. And when humanity has reached a point in our progress where a continual growth is no longer necessary, at the end of our collective journey, what will be waiting for us here? Basically, the nourishment of the soul – the technology, VR, will literally write meaning into our lives through the created, technically fictional universes this enables.
Even as VR grants fiction new life, enables it, fiction is what enables VR as it gives it meaning. In yin-yang theory, if we liken yin to form (substance) and yang to function (transformation), we can say that fiction is yin while VR is yang. Both complement and have no actual meaning without the other. Now, how does VR enable fiction? This is basically the content of my sister post under the fiction side of this blog, named fiction unto VR. Finally, I would like to note that my aforementioned content is kind of a condensed version of the societal theorybuilding post on my main blog. Back in high school, I pondered on the question ‘what is the goal of society’, ultimately grasping these insights. Maybe humanity will eventually return together from complexity to simplicity in a 反朴归真 process, renouncing mercenary mentalities while returning to a self-sufficiency in a harmonious coexistence with our environment…