Résumé David Chalmers maintient que la réalité virtuelle est une véritable réalité. Une version de ce « réalisme virtuel » affirme que les entités virtuelles dépendent ontologiquement d'entités numériques réelles. Nous explorons ici cette suggestion, en proposant un nouveau modèle pour décrire la dépendance du virtuel à l’égard du numérique. En nous appuyant sur la théorie de la constitution de Lynne Rudder Baker, nous défendons que les objets virtuels sont constitués par des objets numériques, lorsque ceux-ci se trouvent dans certaines (...) circonstances favorables. Nous explorons les motivations et les implications de cette approche, que nous considérons comme une forme prometteuse de réalisme virtuel. (shrink)

Much of the excitement about virtual reality and its potential for things like entertainment, art, education, and activism is its ability to generate experiences that are powerfully immersive. However, discussions of VR tend to invoke the notion of immersive experience without subjecting it to closer scrutiny; and discussions often take it for granted that immersive experience is a single unified phenomenon. Against this, we argue that there are four distinct types or aspects of immersive experience that should be distinguished: representational (...) immersion, which corresponds roughly to what is sometimes called “psychological presence”; participatory immersion, which is related to the interactive aspects of VR experience; affective immersion, which has to do with the subject’s emotional relation to the experience; and narrative immersion, which captures the phenomenon of being caught up in the flow of events experienced. We argue that this four-way distinction helps us understand the powerfully immersive character of VR, while also recognizing its continuity with the immersion we experience with media such as novels, films, and music. We also argue that the account of immersion we offer here lets us better understand the connection between VR and empathy, charting a middle course between extreme enthusiasts who view VR as the ultimate “empathy machine” and extreme skeptics who argue that this attitude is misguided. (shrink)

This book explores what it means to exist in virtual worlds. Chiefly drawing on the philosophical traditions of existentialism, it articulates the idea that — by means of our technical equipment and coordinated practices — human beings disclose contexts or worlds in which they can perceive, feel, act, and think. More specifically, this book discusses how virtual worlds allow human beings to take new perspectives on their values and beliefs, and explore previously unexperienced ways of being. Virtual Existentialism will be (...) useful for scholars working in the fields of philosophy, anthropology, media studies, and digital game studies. (shrink)

In June 2016, David Chalmers delivered the Petrus Hispanus Lectures at the LanCog research group, University of Lisbon, on the subject of objects, properties, and perception in virtual reality environments. The paper resulting from these lectures was subsequently published in Disputatio as “The Virtual and the Real” (vol. IX, 2017, No. 46, pp. 309–52). In it, Chalmers defends virtual realism, according to which virtual objects are bona fide digital objects with virtual counterparts of perceptible properties such as colour and shape, (...) and perception in virtual reality environments is typically veridical rather than illusory. This special issue collects responses to Chalmers due to Claus Beisbart, Jesper Juul, Peter Ludlow, Neil McDonnell and Nathan Wildman, Alyssa Ney, Eric Schwitzgebel, and Marc Silcox; together with a detailed response by Chalmers to each paper. You can read the target article (Chalmers 2017, “The Virtual and the Real”) under discussion in this Special Issue here: https://doi.org/10.1515/disp-2017-0009. (shrink)

How can you steal something that doesn’t exist? This question confronts those of us who take an irrealist view of virtual objects and agree with the Supreme Court of the Netherlands that robbery took place when two boys used non-virtual violence to coerce a third boy into relinquishing his virtual amulet and mask. Here we outline this Puzzle of Virtual Theft, along with the closely related Puzzle of Virtual Value. After demonstrating how these puzzles are deeply problematic for the irrealist, (...) we go on to sketch a solution that not only circumscribes the puzzles but also offers a framework by which legal scholars can make sense within existing legal codes of the new phenomenon of virtual theft. (shrink)

Objects appear to causally interact with one another in virtual worlds, such as video games, virtual reality, and training simulations. Is this causation real or is it illusory? In this paper I argue that virtual causation is as real as physical causation. I achieve this in two steps: firstly, I show how virtual causation has all the important hallmarks of relations that are causal, as opposed to merely accidental, and secondly, I show how virtual causation is genuine according to one (...) influential metaphysical theory of causation: the mechanistic approach. (shrink)

The Gamer’s Dilemma consists of three intuitively plausible but conflicting assertions: (i) Virtual murder is morally permissible. (ii) Virtual child molestation is morally forbidden. (iii) There is no relevant moral difference between virtual murder and virtual child molestation in computer games. Numerous attempts to resolve (or dissolve) the Gamer’s Dilemma line the field of computer game ethics. Mostly, the phenomenon is approached using expressivist argumentation: Reprehensible virtual actions express something immoral in their performance but are not immoral by themselves. Consequentialists, (...) on the other hand, claim that the immorality of virtual actions arises from their harmful consequences. I argue that both approaches have serious difficulties meeting the moral challenge posed by the Gamer’s Dilemma. They tend to confuse the morality of in-game actions either with the morality of their real-world counterparts or with the morality of games as objects. Following this critical analysis, I will develop a Kantian argument and defend it against two objections. So far, deontological responses to the Gamer’s Dilemma have been sought in vain. Yet, with Kant, its moral challenge can be met by looking at the gamer’s reasons. From this perspective, the Gamer’s Dilemma is based on a false assumption: the moral status of gaming acts does not derive from a normative equation with their real-world counterparts but only from their justifications. (shrink)

How does the integration of mixed reality devices into our cognitive practices impact the mind from a metaphysical and epistemological perspective? In his innovative and interdisciplinary article, “Minds in the Metaverse: Extended Cognition Meets Mixed Reality” (2022), Paul Smart addresses this underexplored question, arguing that the use of a hypothetical application of the Microsoft HoloLens called “the HoloFoldit” represents a technologically high-grade form of extended cognizing from the perspective of neo-mechanical philosophy. This short commentary aims to (1) carve up the (...) conceptual landscape of possible objections to Smart’s argument and (2) elaborate on the possibility of hologrammatically extended cognition, which is supposed to be one of the features of the HoloFoldit case that distinguishes it from more primitive forms of cognitive extension. In tackling (1), I do not mean to suggest that Smart does not consider or have sufficient answers to these objections. In addressing (2), the goal is not to argue for or against the possibility of hologrammatically extended cognition but to reveal some issues in the metaphysics of virtual reality upon which this possibility hinges. I construct an argument in favor of hologrammatically extended cognition based on the veracity of virtual realism (Chalmers, 2017) and an argument against it based on the veracity of virtual fctionalism (McDonnell and Wildman, 2019). (shrink)

Augmented reality (AR) technologies function to ‘augment’ normal perception by superimposing virtual objects onto an agent’s visual field. The philosophy of augmented reality is a small but growing subfield within the philosophy of technology. Existing work in this subfield includes research on the phenomenology of augmented experiences, the metaphysics of virtual objects, and different ethical issues associated with AR systems, including (but not limited to) issues of privacy, property rights, ownership, trust, and informed consent. This paper addresses some epistemological issues (...) posed by AR systems. I focus on a near-future version of AR technology called the Real-World Web, which promises to radically transform the nature of our relationship to digital information by mixing the virtual with the physical. I argue that the Real-World Web (RWW) threatens to exacerbate three existing epistemic problems in the digital age: the problem of digital distraction, the problem of digital deception, and the problem of digital divergence. The RWW is poised to present new versions of these problems in the form of what I call the augmented attention economy, augmented skepticism, and the problem of other augmented minds. The paper draws on a range of empirical research on AR and offers a phenomenological analysis of virtual objects as perceptual affordances to help ground and guide the speculative nature of the discussion. It also considers a few policy-based and designed-based proposals to mitigate the epistemic threats posed by AR technology. (shrink)

Various theorists contend that we may live in a computer simulation. David Chalmers in turn argues that the simulation hypothesis is a metaphysical hypothesis about the nature of our reality, rather than a sceptical scenario. We use recent work on consciousness to motivate new doubts about both sets of arguments. First, we argue that if either panpsychism or panqualityism is true, then the only way to live in a simulation may be as brains-in-vats, in which case it is unlikely that (...) we live in a simulation. We then argue that if panpsychism or panqualityism is true, then viable simulation hypotheses are substantially sceptical scenarios. We conclude that the nature of consciousness has wide-ranging implications for simulation arguments. (shrink)

A number of studies have investigated how immersion in a virtual reality environment can affect participants’ implicit biases. These studies presume associationism about implicit bias. Recently philosophers have argued that associationism is inadequate and have made a case for understanding implicit biases propositionally. However, no propositionalist has considered the empirical work on virtual reality and how to integrate it into their theories. I examine this work against a propositionalist background, in particular, looking at the belief and patchy endorsement models. I (...) argue that the results therein can only be accommodated by a model which recognizes structural heterogeneity, that is, one which allows for implicit biases being both associatively and non-associatively structured. My preferred view – that implicit biases are constituted by unconscious imaginings – allows for this, as well as for heterogeneity at the level of content (propositional and imagistic), a feature which also earn its explanatory keep in this context. I conclude that empirical work on virtual reality and implicit bias gives us a reason to prefer a pluralist model of bias, and that my unconscious imagination model, in its recognizing wide-ranging heterogeneity, is uniquely placed to accommodate the results of work on virtual reality and bias mitigation. (shrink)

Examples of extended cognition typically involve the use of technologically low-grade bio-external resources (e.g., the use of pen and paper to solve long multiplication problems). The present paper describes a putative case of extended cognizing based around a technologically advanced mixed reality device, namely, the Microsoft HoloLens. The case is evaluated from the standpoint of a mechanistic perspective. In particular, it is suggested that a combination of organismic (e.g., the human individual) and extra-organismic (e.g., the HoloLens) resources form part of (...) a common mechanism that realizes a bona fide cognitive routine. In addition to demonstrating how the theoretical resources of neo-mechanical philosophy might be used to evaluate extended cognitive systems, the present paper illustrates one of the ways in which mixed reality devices, virtual objects (i.e., holograms), and online (Internet-accessible) computational routines might be incorporated into human cognitive processes. This, it is suggested, speaks to the recent interest in mixed/virtual reality technologies across a number of disciplines. It also introduces us to issues that cross-cut disparate fields of philosophical research, such as the philosophy of science and the philosophy of technology. (shrink)

The prevailing scientific paradigm is that matter is primary and everything, including consciousness can be derived from the laws governing matter. Although the scientific explanation of consciousness on these lines has not been realized, in this view it is only a matter of time before consciousness will be explained through neurobiological activity in the brain, and nothing else. There is an alternative view that holds that it is fundamentally impossible to explain how subjectivity can arise solely out of material processes—“the (...) hard problem of consciousness”—and instead consciousness should be regarded in itself as a primary force in nature. This view attempts to derive, for example, the laws of physics from models of consciousness, instead of the other way around. While as scientists we can understand and have an intuition for the first paradigm, it is very difficult to understand what “consciousness is primary” might mean since it has no intuitive scientific grounding. Here we show that worlds experienced through virtual reality are such that consciousness is a first order phenomenon. We discuss the Interface Theory of Perception which claims that in physical reality perceptions are not veridical and that we do not see the “truth” but that perception is based on evolutionary payoffs. We show that this theory may provide an accurate description of perception and consciousness within VR, and we put forward an experimental study that could throw light on this. We conclude that VR does offer an experimental frame that provides intuition with respect to the idea that “consciousness is first” and what this might mean regarding the perceived world. However, we do not draw any conclusions about the veracity of this notion with respect to physical reality or question the emergence of consciousness from brain function. (shrink)

From an ontological point of view, virtuality is generally considered a simulation: i.e. not a case of true being, and never more than an illusory copy, referring in each instance to its real original. It is treated as something imagined — and, phenomenologically speaking, as an intentional object. It is also often characterized as fictive. On the other hand, the virtual world itself is extremely rich, and thanks to new technologies is growing with unbelievable speed, so that it now influences (...) the real world in quite unexpected ways. Thus, it is also sometimes considered real. In this paper, against those who would regard virtuality as fictional or as real, I claim that the virtual world straddles the boundary between these two ways of existence: that it becomes real. I appeal to Roman Ingarden’s existential ontology to show that virtual objects become existentially autonomous, and so can be attributed a form of actuality and causal efficaciousness. I conclude that the existential autonomy and actuality of virtual objects makes them count as real objects, but also means that they undergo a change in their mode of existence. (shrink)

Virtual objects, such as online shops, the elements that go to make up virtual life in computer games, virtual maps, e-books, avatars, cryptocurrencies, chatbots, holograms, etc., are a phenomenon we now encounter at every turn: they have become a part of our life and our world. Philosophers—and ontologists in particular—have sought to answer the question of what, exactly, they are. They fall into two camps: some, pointing to the chimerical character of virtuality, hold that virtual objects are like dreams, illusions (...) and fictions, while others, citing the real impact of virtuality on our world, take them to be real—an actual part of the real world, just like other real objects. In this article, we defend the thesis that both sides are wrong. Using Roman Ingarden’s phenomenological ontology, we advocate a position according to which a virtual object is a computationally grounded intentional object that has its existential foundation in computational processes, which are compliant with a certain model of computation. We point out that virtuality is framed by some kind of ideal mathematical objects: i.e., mathematical models of computation, which in turn fall, each of them, under their respective ideas. We also refer to the idea of natural computation, which in conjunction with the ontological analysis carried out leads to the thesis that an object can be more or less virtual. (shrink)

In “The Virtual and the Real,” David Chalmers argues that there is an epistemic and ontological parity between VR and ordinary reality. My argument here is that, whatever the plausibility of these claims, they provide no basis for supposing that there is a similar parity of value. Careful reflection upon certain aspects of the transition that individuals make from interacting with real-world, physical environments to interacting with VR provides a basis for thinking that, to the extent that there are good (...) reasons to deny the reality of virtual objects, there are also reasons to place a correspondingly higher value upon the experience of interacting with a VR environment. Chalmers’ assumption to the contrary arises from a subtle misrepresentation of how the phenomenon of cognitive penetration works in the perception of virtual objects, and from an unwillingness to acknowledge how our attitudes toward virtual environments are conditioned by the values we adopt when engaged in gameplay. (shrink)

I defend a how-possibly argument for Kantian (or Kant*-ian) transcendental idealism, drawing on concepts from David Chalmers, Nick Bostrom, and the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction. If we are artificial intelligences living in a virtual reality instantiated on a giant computer, then the fundamental structure of reality might be very different than we suppose. Indeed, since computation does not require spatial properties, spatiality might not be a feature of things as they are in themselves but instead only the way that (...) things necessarily appear to us. It might seem unlikely that we are living in a virtual reality instantiated on a non-spatial computer. However, understanding this possibility can help us appreciate the merits of transcendental idealism in general, as well as transcendental idealism’s underappreciated skeptical consequences. (shrink)

In this article, we apply the literature on the ethics of choice-architecture (nudges) to the realm of virtual reality (VR) to point out ethical problems with using VR for empathy-based nudging. Specifically, we argue that VR simulations aiming to enhance empathic understanding of others via perspective-taking will almost always be unethical to develop or deploy. We argue that VR-based empathy enhancement not only faces traditional ethical concerns about nudge (autonomy, welfare, transparency), but also a variant of the semantic variance problem (...) that arises for intersectional perspective-taking. VR empathy simulations deceive and manipulate their users about their experiences. Despite their often laudable goals, such simulations confront significant ethical challenges. In light of these goals and challenges, we conclude by proposing that VR designers shift from designing simulations aimed at producing empathic perspective-taking to designing simulations aimed at generating sympathy. These simulations, we claim, can avoid the most serious ethical issues associated with VR nudges, semantic variance, and intersectionality. (shrink)

The Gamer's Dilemma challenges us to find a distinction between virtual murder and virtual pedophilia. Without such a distinction, we are forced to conclude that either both are morally acceptable or that both should be morally illicit. This paper argues that the best way to solve the dilemma is, in one sense, to dissolve it. The Gamer's Dilemma rests on a misunderstanding in the sense that it does not distinguish between the form of a simulation and its surface content. A (...) greater appreciation of the way structural features of a simulation affect subject experience will help us see why only simulations of murder and pedophilia generating virtually real experiences are likely to be seen as wrong. I argue that a simulation’s structural elements powerfully affect how subjects experience simulated content and hence is an important, and previously neglected, variable necessary to dissolve the Gamer's Dilemma. Properly understood, virtually real simulations of murder and pedophilia are both likely to be treated by players as morally wrong. Similarly, virtually unreal murder and pedophilia will be less likely to be judged as wrong. Subject judgments are thus consistent once a simulation’s structural variables are accounted for. The Gamer's Dilemma dissolves as a dilemma once we acknowledge these structural features of simulations and how they affect experience and moral judgment. (shrink)

Despite reservations over the status of esports as sports, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has, for policy reasons, encouraged International Federations to pursue links with providers of ‘virtual and simulated’ sports, in part by the introduction of an event, the Olympic Virtual Series, first held in 2021. In providing an account of ‘virtuality’ and ‘simulation’, we query the theoretical basis of the Olympic Virtual Series. In particular, we query the IOC’s use of the term ‘virtual’ in the description of two (...) very different activities: what it calls ‘physical virtual sports’ (which we argue are simply Olympic-type sports – real sports! – and should just be called ‘sports’) and ‘non-physical virtual sports’ (which we argue are not sports at all, and should be recognized for what they are – computer games). (shrink)

Before David Chalmers’ new book Reality+ even hit the shelves, media outlets were showering it with praise, dubbing it a “mind-bending philosophical investigation” (The Guardian) and “the most alar...

This article argues that reality and virtuality are still very much phenomenologically distinguishable, although this might not be the case forever. I argue for two main types of virtuality – one inherently involved in the dynamic horizons of perceptual experiences, while the other is all of our experiences of digital images – in order to show that a particular possible instantiation of the latter type, namely “pure” mixed reality (MR), might come to blur and collapse various experiential categories in the (...) future, not least real and irreal, like never before. To show this, there are three main sections. First, I outline my understanding of the two basic types of virtuality, as understood from a classical phenomenological analysis. Second, I give an account of the most important family of “virtual technologies” relevant to the question at hand, namely virtual, augmented and mixed reality (VR, AR and MR respectively) technologies. After homing in on MR, I explain what “pure” MR is and how, through tactile holograms, this might change even basic experiential distinctions going forward, and not necessarily for the better. (shrink)

According to phenomenal functionalism, whether some object or event has a given property is determined by the kinds of sensory experiences such objects or events typically cause in normal perceivers in normal viewing conditions. This paper challenges this position and, more specifically, David Chalmers’s use of it in arguing for what he calls virtual realism.

Debate over the normativity of virtual phenomena is now widespread in the philosophical literature, taking place in roughly two distinct but related camps. The first considers the relevant problems to be within the scope of applied ethics, where the general methodological program is to square the intuitive (im)permissibility of virtual wrongdoings with moral accounts that justify their (im)permissibility. The second camp approaches the normativity of virtual wrongdoings as a metaphysical debate. This is done by disambiguating the ‘virtual’ character of ‘virtual (...) wrongdoings’. Doing so is supposed to provide illuminating ontological distinctions that inform ethical aspects of the debate. We argue that each approach faces its own set of issues, and as a result, motivates consideration of an alternative. The alternative we suggest turns inquiry concerning the normativity of virtual wrongdoings into a distinctively conceptual question. Rather than asking whether some action is right or wrong, or whether some virtual phenomenon counts as a particular action at all, we argue that research into the normativity of virtual wrongdoings may be guided by reflecting on whether a concept that originated and developed within a non-virtual context should be exported into a foreign virtual domain. We consider this approach and several objections. (shrink)

Are the objects and events that take place in Virtual Reality genuinely real? Those who answer this question in the affirmative are realists, and those who answer in the negative are irrealists. In this paper we argue against the realist position, as given by Chalmers (2017), and present our own preferred irrealist account of the virtual. We start by disambiguating two potential versions of the realist position—weak and strong— and then go on to argue that neither is plausible. We then (...) introduce a Waltonian variety of ictionalism about the virtual, arguing that this sort of irrealist approach avoids the problems of the realist positions, fits with a unifying theory of representational works, and offers a better account of the phenomenology of engaging in virtual experiences. (shrink)

David Chalmers argues that virtual objects exist in the form of data structures that have causal powers. I argue that there is a large class of virtual objects that are social objects and that do not depend upon data structures for their existence. I also argue that data structures are themselves fundamentally social objects. Thus, virtual objects are fundamentally social objects.

As David J. Chalmers claims, “virtual reality is a sort of genuine reality, virtual objects are real objects, and what goes on in virtual reality is truly real.” In this paper, I will suggest that the philosophical hypothesis that we might live in a simulation can be considered to be the last and most nihilistic episode in the series of narrations about the true and apparent worlds that Nietzsche sketched in The Twilight of the Idols. I will argue that Nietzsche’s (...) prediction about the obliteration of the apparent world has actually been fulfilled by Chalmers, and I will show why his theory must be considered one of the many fables that humans have been producing in order to organise the world according to their own ends. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In the following article, I examine Martin Heidegger’s philosophy of dwelling with a view to its importance for the concept of ‘place’. It is my interest to show how a phenomenological concept of place can elucidate the phenomenology of virtual reality. I begin by contextualising the investigation through a presentation of Jeff Malpas’ concept of the non-autonomy of the virtual, and argue for a clearer understanding of the notion of causal non-autonomy. Furthermore, I argue that the autonomy or lack (...) thereof of virtual reality should not lead to the conclusion that virtual reality cannot be experienced and examined as a self-standing entity; that in order to properly understand virtual reality, we cannot limit ourselves to the reductionistic view presented by Malpas, but must account also for the phenomenology of experiencing virtuality – and under such a phenomenological consideration, the distinctions made between non-virtual and virtual reality are made more diffuse. I then argue that we can plausibly accept that places may exist in virtual reality, despite current technological and practical limitations. In addition, I go on to consider some possible metaphysical differences between virtual and non-virtual places. (shrink)

Are virtual objects real? I will claim that the question sets us up for the wrong type of conclusion: Chalmers (2017) argues that a virtual calculator (like other entities) is a real calculator when it is “organizationally invariant” with its non-virtual counterpart—when it performs calculation. However, virtual reality and games are defined by the fact that they always selectively implement their source material. Even the most detailed virtual car will still have an infinite range of details which are missing (gas, (...) engines, pistons, fuel, chemical reactions, molecules, atoms). This means that even the most detailed virtual object will still have fictional aspects. Rather than argue that virtual objects are, or aren’t, real, it is preferable to think of overlaps and continuities between the fictional and the real, where even the most painstakingly detailed virtual reality implementation of a non-virtual object is still art: a human process of selection and interpretation. Virtual reality should therefore not be philosophically understood just as a technological implementation on a trajectory to perfection, but as a cultural artifact which derives its value in part from its simplification and difference from its source material. (shrink)

In this paper, I will argue that with the emergence of digital virtual worlds (in video games, animation movies, etc.) by the animation industry, we need to rethink the role and authority of mathematics, also from an ontological point of view. First I will demonstrate that the application of mathematics to the creation and description of the digital, virtual worlds behaves in many respects analogously to the application of mathematics to the description of real-world phenomena from the viewpoint of the (...) history of science. However, from other aspects, the application of mathematics significantly differs in this virtual world from the application to real-world fields. The main thesis of my paper is that the role of mathematics in the digital animation industry can be ontologically different from its usual role. In the application of mathematics to digital virtual worlds, mathematical concepts are no longer just modelling tools, forming a subordinated, computational basis, but they can direct and organise, and even create non-mathematical theory, something that we can call, for example, digital physics and biology. I will study this new, creative role of mathematics through some concrete phenomena, specifically through gravity. Our conclusion is that the animation industry opens an entirely new chapter in the relationship between (digital) sciences and mathematics. (shrink)

In the debate about actions in virtual environments two interdependent types of question have been pondered: What is a person doing who acts in a virtual environment? Second, can virtual actions be evaluated morally? These questions have been discussed using examples from morally dubious computer games, which seem to revel in atrocities. The examples were introduced using the terminology of “virtual murder” “virtual rape” and “virtual pedophilia”. The terminological choice had a lasting impact on the debate, on the way action (...) types are assigned and on how moral evaluation is supposed to be conducted. However, this terminology and its theoretical consequences, while sometimes resulting in correct results, lead to absurd results when applied across the board. It will be suggested that these absurd consequences can be avoided by a different answer to the question what people in virtual worlds are doing. Alleged virtual actions are first and foremost the creation and modification of data-structures and the resulting output in computer hardware. Such modifications of data structure and imagery can be performed with different intentions, purposes and styles, which will influence the type and moral evaluation of a user’s actions. This reinterpretation allows for a more complex analysis of the moral reasons for praiseworthiness or blameworthiness of actions in virtual environments. This analysis takes not just harm and effects on character into account but the peculiar ways in which speech acts can be morally wrong: e.g. agitatory, deceptive, bullshitting. (shrink)

Are those judgments that we make on the basis of our memories immune to error through misidentification? In this paper, I discuss a phenomenon which seems to suggest that they are not; the phenomenon of observer memory. I argue that observer memories fail to show that memory judgments are not IEM. However, the discussion of observer memories will reveal an interesting fact about the perspectivity of memory; a fact that puts us on the right path towards explaining why memory judgments (...) are indeed IEM. The main tenet in the account of IEM to be proposed is that this aspect of memory is grounded, on the one hand, on the intentionality of perception and, on the other hand, on the relation between the intentionality of perception and that of memory. (shrink)

According to David Chalmers, the virtual entities found in Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) environments instantiate virtual properties of a specific kind. It has recently been objected that such a view (i) can’t extend to all types of properties; (ii) leads to a proliferation of property-types; (iii) implausibly ascribes massive errors to VR and AR users; and (iv) faces an analogue of Jackson’s “many-property problem”. My first objective here is to show that advocates of virtual properties can deal (...) with each of these objections. The other goal of this paper is to examine the consequences of Chalmers’ theory in the particular case of AR. If we countenance virtual properties, AR highlights that non-virtual objects can possess both non-virtual and virtual properties. With AR, it also appears that a same non-virtual object can have different and even incompatible properties across augmented environments. Lastly, considering properties in light of AR highlights the risk of an “augmented solipsism”, and calls forth interesting questions about the persistence conditions of non-virtual objects in AR environments. (shrink)

The 'Gamer's Dilemma' is the problem of why some actions occurring in video game contexts seem to have similar, albeit attenuated, kinds of moral significance to their real-world equivalents, while others do not. In this paper, I argue that much of the confusion in the literature on this problem is not ethical but metaphysical. The Gamer's Dilemma depends on a particular theory of the virtual, which I call 'inflationary', according to which virtual worlds are a metaphysical novelty generated almost exclusively (...) by video games. Actions performed in virtual worlds really belong to the kinds of action they appear to—'virtual murder' is a kind of murder. Inflationary theories are contrasted with 'deflationary' theories which, in effect, consider video games purely as systems for generating images, and thus the gamer as a consumer of media images. Inflationary theories struggle to explain why video games produce this unique metaphysical novelty; deflationary theories fail to do justice to the intuition that there is some significant difference between the gamer and the consumer of other media forms. In place of either, I sketch a theory of the gamer as performer, primarily by analogy with stage and cinema actors, which I suggest captures more of the moral complexity of the gamer's action. (shrink)

I reply to seven commentaries on “The Virtual and the Real”. In response to Claus Beisbart, Jesper Juul, Peter Ludlow, and Neil McDonnell and Nathan Wildman, I clarify and develop my view that virtual are digital objects, with special attention to the nature of digital objects and data structures. In response to Alyssa Ney and Eric Schwitzgebel, I clarify and defend my spatial functionalism, with special attention to the connections between space and consciousness. In response to Marc Silcox, I clarify (...) and develop my view of the value of virtual worlds, with special attention to the case where we experience these worlds as virtual. (shrink)

Cartesian arguments for global skepticism about the external world start from the premise that we cannot know that we are not in a Cartesian scenario such as an evil-demon scenario, and infer that because most of our empirical beliefs are false in such a scenario, these beliefs do not constitute knowledge. Veridicalist responses to global skepticism respond that arguments fail because in Cartesian scenarios, many or most of our empirical beliefs are true. Some veridicalist responses have been motivated using verificationism, (...) externalism, and coherentism. I argue that a more powerful veridicalist response to global skepticism can be motivated by structuralism, on which physical entities are understood as those that play a certain structural role. I develop the structuralist response and address objections. (shrink)

According to a common philosophical intuition, the deep nature of things is hidden from us, and the world as we know it through perception and science is, just like a dream, shadows, or a computer simulation, somehow shallow and lacking in reality. This “intuition of unreality” clashes with a strong, but perhaps more naive, intuition to the effect that the world as we know it seems perfectly real. Shadows, dreams, or informational structures appear too unreal to be identical to the (...) world as we know it! This clash between the two intuitions forms the basis of the “problem of reality.” In the late nineteenth century psychiatrists encountered patients they referred to as “metaphysician doubters” who constantly questioned the reality of the world. This essay draws on studies of these patients in order to reject, and indeed diagnose, the intuition of unreality and recent metaphysical doctrines drawing on it, such as structuralism, digitalism, and virtual realism. (shrink)

What is the status of a cat in a virtual reality environment? Is it a real object? Or part of a fiction? Virtual realism, as defended by D. J. Chalmers, takes it to be a virtual object that really exists, that has properties and is involved in real events. His preferred specification of virtual realism identifies the cat with a digital object. The project of this paper is to use a comparison between virtual reality environments and scientific computer simulations to (...) critically engage with Chalmers’s position. I first argue that, if it is sound, his virtual realism should also be applied to objects that figure in scientific computer simulations, e.g. to simulated galaxies. This leads to a slippery slope because it implies an unreasonable proliferation of digital objects. A philosophical analysis of scientific computer simulations suggests an alternative picture: The cat and the galaxies are parts of fictional models for which the computer provides model descriptions. This result motivates a deeper analysis of the way in which Chalmers builds up his realism. I argue that he buys realism too cheap. For instance, he does not really specify what virtual objects are supposed to be. As a result, rhetoric aside, his virtual realism isn’t far from a sort of fictionalism. (shrink)

Violent video games (VVGs) are a source of serious and continuing controversy. They are not unique in this respect, though. Other entertainment products have been criticized on moral grounds, from pornography to heavy metal, horror films, and Harry Potter books. Some of these controversies have fizzled out over time and have come to be viewed as cases of moral panic. Others, including moral objections to VVGs, have persisted. The aim of this paper is to determine which, if any, of the (...) concerns raised about VVGs are legitimate. We argue that common moral objections to VVGs are unsuccessful, but that a plausible critique can be developed that captures the insights of these objections while avoiding their pitfalls. Our view suggests that the moral badness of a game depends on how well its internal logic expresses or encourages the players’ objectionable attitudes. This allows us to recognize that some games are morally worse than others—and that it can be morally wrong to design and play some VVGs—but that the moral badness of these games is not necessarily dependent on how violent they are. (shrink)

The gamer’s dilemma offers three plausible but jointly inconsistent premises: (1) Virtual murder in video games is morally permissible. (2) Virtual paedophelia in video games is not morally permissible. (3) There is no morally relevant difference between virtual murder and virtual paedophelia in video games. In this paper I argue that the gamer’s dilemma can be understood as one of three distinct dilemmas, depending on how we understand two key ideas in Morgan Luck’s (2009) original formulation. The two ideas are (...) those of (1) occurring in a video game and (2) being a virtual instance of murder or paedophelia. Depending on the weight placed on the gaming context, the dilemma is either about in-game acts or virtual acts. And depending on the type of virtual acts we have in mind, the dilemma is either about virtual representations or virtual partial reproductions of murder and paedophelia. This gives us three dilemmas worth resolving: a gaming dilemma, a representation dilemma, and a simulation dilemma. I argue that these dilemmas are about different issues, apply to different cases, and are susceptible to different solutions. I also consider how different participants in the debate have interpreted the dilemma in one or more of these three ways. (shrink)

A central debate in the philosophy of virtual reality (VR) focuses on the reality of virtual items. Broadly, there are two main disagreements. Some views accept a metaphysical orientation to VR, and disagree on the reality of virtual items. For instance, David Chalmers (Disputatio 9(46):309-352, 2017, Disputatio 11(55):453- 486, 2019, 2022) defends digitalism, the view that virtual items are real digital items. Neil McDonnell & Nathan Wildman (Disputatio 11(55):371-397, 2019), by contrast, defend fictionalism, which maintains that virtual items are unreal (...) fictions. Other views, like Grant Tavinor’s (2021), reject the metaphysical orientation, argu- ing that focusing on the reality of virtual items is a mistake. In what follows I evalu- ate these two disagreements. I argue that experiences of virtual items depend on episodes of picture perception. Recognizing this reveals that the current debates are either easily resolved in favor of one view, or are not disagreeing about the reality of virtual items, but about what virtual items are. (shrink)

If I see, hear, or touch a sparrow, the sparrow seems real to me. Unlike Bigfoot or Santa Claus, it seems to exist; I will therefore judge that it does indeed exist. The “sense of existence” refers to the kind of awareness that typically grounds such ordinary judgments of existence or “reality.” The sense of existence has been invoked by Humeans, Kantians, Ideologists, and the phenomenological tradition to make substantial philosophical claims. However, it is extremely controversial; its very existence has (...) been called into question. This paper aims to clarify the nature and reality of the sense of existence by studying a psychiatric condition in which the sense appears to be disrupted: depersonalization disorder (DPD). (shrink)

According to a common philosophical intuition, the deep nature of things is hidden from us, and the world as we know it through perception and science is somehow shallow and lacking in reality. For all we knwo, the intuition goes, we could be living in a cave facing shadows, in a dream or even in a computer simulation, This “intuition of unreality” clashes with a strong, but perhaps more naive, intuition to the effect that the world as we know it (...) seems perfectly real. Shadows, dreams, or informational structures appear too unreal to be identical to the world as we know it! This clash between the two intuitions forms the basis of the "problem of reality." At the turn of the nineteenth century psychiatrists encountered patients they referred to as “metaphysician doubters” who constantly questioned the reality of the world. This essay draws on the study of these patients to reject, and indeed diagnose, the intuition of unreality and recent metaphysical doctrines drawing on it, such as structuralism, digitalism, and virtual realism. (shrink)

The simulation hypothesis is a view of the nature of reality, suggesting that our world is likely a computer simulation created by an advanced civilization. In contrast, illusionism is a theory about the nature of phenomenal consciousness, arguing that phenomenal consciousness is an illusion and can be fully explained in physical terms. I argue that if our world is a simulated construct, illusionism could be incorrect. Specifically, even if our phenomenal experiences can be explained as illusionism suggests, advanced civilizations could (...) still create subjectively indistinguishable experiences by constructing a psychological system external to our world. Since we cannot determine which scenario we belong to, the illusionist explanation is not universally valid. Furthermore, I argue that even if the simulation hypothesis is impossible, illusionism remains flawed. Consequently, while the simulation hypothesis may function as a mere assumption, it exposes the inherent limitations of both illusionism and physicalism. (shrink)

The study of the ontology of virtual actions is essentially an examination of the nature of actions in virtual environments directly. This article first examined traditional research on the subject and then showed that these researches ignored findings about the nature of virtual actions. Previous studies have dealt with virtual action mostly from an ethical, psychological, or legal framework and focused on the individual or social effects of virtual action. In addition, these studies discuss not the virtual action itself, but (...) its effect or consequences. Based on these findings, in this study, it was emphasized that a virtual action should be investigated through two different types at a minimum, and an alternative method was developed for studies on virtual actions. According to this method, which is called the Sophisticated Action Model, it has been argued that in virtual action research, firstly the subject performing the action and then the environment in which the action takes place should be analyzed. It is claimed that the difference of virtual subject and environment will also differentiate the ontology of virtual action. In this context, the focus of the article is on the fact that an action augmented by any virtual action has completely different ontologies. The status of augmented actions within virtual actions is considered superior to other virtual actions. The fact that augmented actions, which have such an important status among virtual actions, were ignored in previous studies makes these studies on virtual actions incomplete and flawed. The nature of augmented actions takes virtual actions to a completely different atmosphere. The article concludes by emphasizing this distinctive nature of augmented actions, the ontological separation of virtual actions, and the importance of the Sophisticated Action Model for further studies. (shrink)

David Chalmers a récemment soutenu que la réalité virtuelle est réelle, plutôt que fictionnelle. Dans cet article, j’examine les implications ontologiques de ce « réalisme virtuel ». Comme je le suggère, cette position s’associe naturellement à une ontologie algorithmique, qui identifie les objets virtuels à des structures de données comprises de manière fonctionnelle. Je présente ensuite plusieurs objections à cette ontologie algorithmique. Tant que celles-ci ne sont pas réglées, la question de l’identité des mondes et des objets virtuels reste encore (...) en suspens. (shrink)

Kirjoituksessa argumentoin, että metafysiikka on ollut valistusta, vaikka se edelleen kaipaa lisää valistumista, kun valistus ymmärretään avoimena prosessina, joka ei ole ajasta ja paikasta riippuvaista. Käsittelen ensin sitä, mitä metafysiikka ja valistus ovat. Sitten lausun länsimaisen metafysiikan historiasta hyvin lyhyesti. Päätän esseen argumentoimalla, että metafysiikka on valistunutta siinä mielessä, että klassisen substanssi-ominaisuus-skeeman sokeasta seuraamisesta on pitkälti päästy eroon. Metafysiikka kaipaa kuitenkin lisää valistusta ja kriittistä tarkastelua, jotta vapaudumme täysin kyseisen skeeman ja modernin predikaatti-logiikan johdatuksen aiheuttamasta kolmesta ongelmallisesta suositusta (tausta)oletuksesta: (1) (...) perustavat partikulaariset yksilöoliot ovat (periaatteessa) laskettavia, (2) ne eivät ole relationaalisia ja (3) ominaisuudet ovat ontologisesti riippuvaisia kantajistaan. (shrink)

Several different quantum gravity research programmes suggest, for various reasons, that spacetime is not part of the fundamental ontology of physics. This gives rise to the problem of empirical coherence: if fundamental physical entities do not occupy spacetime or instantiate spatiotemporal properties, how can fundamental theories concerning those entities be justified by observation of spatiotemporally located things like meters, pointers and dials? I frame the problem of empirical coherence in terms of entailment: how could a non-spatiotemporal fundamental theory entail spatiotemporal (...) evidence propositions? Solutions to this puzzle can be classified as realist or antirealist, depending on whether or not they posit a non-fundamental spacetime structure grounded in or caused by the fundamental structure. These approaches place different constraints on our everyday concepts of space and time. Applying lessons from the philosophy of mind, I argue that only realism is both conceptually plausible and suitable for addressing the problem at hand. I suggest a role functionalist version of realism, which is consistent with both grounding and causation, and according to which our everyday concepts reveal something of the true nature of emergent spacetime. (shrink)

Technological artefacts have, in recent years, invited increasingly intimate ways of interaction. But surprisingly little attention has been devoted to how such interactions, like with wearable devices or household robots, shape our minds, cognitive capacities, and moral character. In this thesis, I develop an embodied, enactive account of mind--technology interaction that takes the reciprocal influence of artefacts on minds seriously. First, I examine how recent developments in philosophy of technology can inform the phenomenology of mind--technology interaction as seen through an (...) enactivist lens. Second, I show how an enactive account of remembering can improve operationalizations of the memory palace mnemonic through virtual reality devices. Third, I draw on virtue ethics to argue that an enactivist approach allows us to better grasp the morally shaping aspects of artefacts by looking at social robots. Fourth, I fend off an underlying metaphysical concern about enactivism by arguing that an embodied, enactive account is compatible with the multiple realization of cognitive processes. This principle is often seen as a crucial test favouring accounts such as extended functionalism over enactivism and I argue that some forms of enactivism pass this test as well. Finally, I conclude by considering what the future relationship between enactivism and functionalism may have in store for the study of mind--technology interaction. (shrink)