Choi 1

Technology is cool! . . . Or is it?By: Stephen Choi

24 May 2015

Choi 2

Abstract

Technology has been advancing so fast that no one can ever be bored with all the new shiny things. Those technology includes: robotics and virtual reality. The way robotics is advancing is quite scary because of the high demand, and the fear of losing our jobs to them. Statistically robotics has a 38% growth compared to the prior years. In 2011 there has been roughly 165,000 industrial robots developed, when prior year, it was only 120,000. Technology has come to a point where our humanity is in question. Transhumanism is the belief or theory that the human race can evolve beyond its current physical and mental limitation, especially by means of science or technology. Being human is making mistakes, but transhumanism destroys human mistakes, which makes the individual become “perfect.” Also virtual reality companies such as Oculus Rift, Morpheus, and Samsung Gear, has been developing helmets where they can immerse into a world where they have control. This brings an issues of lack of human interactions. People rather be in their own world than talk to one another. Humans are social human beings, but because of technology it is redefining what humanity is. Although technology may seem cool, we have to be cautious of technology enslaving us.

Choi 3

Wow, Technology!

How amazing is it to have

technology in the world? There is

no way for anyone to be bored with

all these technology that is

surrounding them, which includes:

virtual reality, having a device to

put you in a fantasy world, a world you can control, and also phones have evolved to a point

where navigation systems, video cameras, cameras, and even portable games are not needed

because smart phones has them all. Even cars has been modified to a point where drivers are not

needed. Google has been invested in building a car that will drive on its own. They have started

making prototypes that can drive, break, and recognize road hazards by having a sensor on top of

the car. Although they have accomplish having driverless cars, there are limits, such as: only can

drive up to 25 miles an hour, and only can drive on roads that have been mapped thoroughly

(Associated Press, 2015). Who knows, inventors might build flying cars from the old cartoon

The Jetsons1, how cool will that be? Inventors are also starting to go into robotics, a technology

that people don’t believe that could be possible. But now, inventors have proved them wrong.

1 A cartoon from 1963 that portrays the future with technologies such as: flying cars, robots, aliens, and holograms. (from Wikipedia)

Choi 4

When looking at this

photo, you will most likely

think that these two people

are twins—but believe it or

not, one of them is actually a

robot. The one on the right is

a called a Geminoid, a social

robot that was built to resemble the likeness of a human. For many years, there are sci-fi

fantasies of having an artificial intelligence to be in our world because of movies and games.

There are many movies—such as Star Wars—in the past that depicts the existence of robots as

their comrade or pets and we—as gullible human-beings that believe everything we see—

questions when scientist will develop robots like the movies. Robotics is a fantasy that will come

to reality, whether people like it or not.

About Robotics

However, in order for people to accept robots, there has to be a social aspect to them

because of the eerie feeling an individual will feel when interacting with robots. Roboticists in

America developed robots to be dexterous and have awareness to serve as pets, maids, nurses, or

even factory workers. There are also some robots that can carry out tasks such as assembling

parts like welding car frames or spray-painting parts, which can be more efficient than humans

(Bohannon, 2014). But having a robot that doesn’t have any social attraction will turn off some

people. But now a Japanese inventor, Hiroshi Ishiguro, has created a social robot that looks

exactly like humans called Geminoid2. Researchers have ran tests to see if the robot was

2 The name Geminoid come from a Greek word Gemini, which means twin.

Choi 5

acceptable to humans. In a study, customers chose Geminoid sales person because they don’t

give pressure to buy anything like humans do. The Geminoid has taken care of over 45

customers a day compared to 20 customers from human clerks because the Geminoid never took

breaks. The Geminoid was able to communicate with customers autonomously3, it also was able

to answer questions that customers have and even made suggestions on items they were thinking

of buying. The study lasted over two weeks, and the Geminoid was installed in a department

store in Osaka (Normille, 2014). Having robot clerks in the future is not the only thing that is

amazing about robotics! Academic and medical impacts are also a reason why robotics are so

cool!

Academic Impact + Medical Impact

In a study researchers used a robot with social

interactive abilities called NAO to see if there would be

any affect to preschooler’s personalities and participation.

In one of the evaluation, they noticed that children often

paid more attention when the NAO needed help such as

falling down, they followed up by showing care by giving

the NAO kisses, hugs and cuddling. Researchers has seen

these result from 3-5 year old children and concluded that the 3-5 year old children can easily

interact with the NAO (Ionnou, Andreou, Christofi, 2015). Researcher are planning to use the

NAO robots on children that has autism in the near future to help them bring out their

personalities. Researchers have found that having humanoid robots in classrooms can influence

feelings to children and increase their social behaviors (Ionnou, Andreou, Cjhristofi, 2015). With

3 Means having the power or right to govern itself (from Merriam-webster)

Choi 6

this test it is concluded that the interactions with the NAO robot, kids will most likely build up

their personalities and be more caring for people.

Many problems in the world can be prevented by the advances of technology: for

example, doctors wouldn’t be able to pinpoint a problem in a patient’s organ without using small

cameras to look into the body. Likewise robotics can help society with numerous things such as

disabled patients: robotics experts believes that robots in the future can help blind people go

through crowded buildings. In an experiment they placed a robot pass through areas in a

building, and as the robot moves the system’s software takes pictures of each edge of walls and

compares the new pictures to the old ones. They installed a video camera with infrared depth

sensors to scan areas in 3-D models of walls and objects (Thilmany, 2012). With this experiment

roboticists can find different ways to help disabled patients live life easier.

So there is no way that these technological advances can ever be a bad thing! . . . besides

the fact that robots will soon take over our jobs, like Geminoids taking over salesman jobs

because of their efficiency or the fact that people are slowly being brain washed by roboticist to

ignore our eerie feelings about robots. Oh how “amazing” technology is.

Uncanny Valley

To add onto the term of eerie feeling, according to a theory that Japanese roboticists

Masahiro Mori came up with called uncanny valley4, humans are somewhat attracted to robots

with some resemblance to humans, but having them resemble us too much also repels humans

because of the eerie and uncanny feeling—thus the name uncanny valley was made (Rhee,

2013). But Mori believes that uncanny valley is not a big deal because he gives an example of

4 used in reference to the phenomenon whereby a computer-generated figure or humanoid robot bearing a near-identical resemblance to a human being arouses a sense of unease or revulsion in the person viewing it.

Choi 7

having someone shaking a prosthetic hand. At first the person shaking the prosthetic hand will

feel uncanny5 and will think it’s weird. But having them constantly shake the hand every day, the

person will not feel uncanny. The person might not feel warmth of the hand, as if shaken a real

hand, but they won’t feel the strange and eerie vibe from shaking it (Rhee, 2013). Mori

concluded that with, “. . . with time and repetition, the prosthetic hand might move from within

the uncanny valley to outside its borders.” (Rhee, 2013). But this theory is, by Mori’s words,

“. . . pointing out the existence of the uncanny valley was more of a piece of advice from me to

people who design robots rather than a scientific statement,” (QTD in Rhee, 2013) Mori’s theory

is more of his intuition than a scientific term. Mori brought this up to the world because he

notices that human beings are easily manipulated.

Speaking of uncanny and odd, in another development

in progress scientists from Advanced Telecommunications

Research Institute International (ATR) and Osaka University

has evolved the way people communicate. ATR has developed

a different way to communicate with others, with a strange

robotic creature called Telenoid. Unlike other creation Hiroshi

Ishiguro have developed, the Telenoid is quite different, in the

sense, that past robots were based off human features. But in

the Telenoid, the design is very minimal, the size of a baby. The way the Telenoid works is by

having a person sit at a computer with a webcam that has a special program that the ATR have

developed for the Telenoid. The computer captures the voice and the person head movements,

and the information is transmitted to the Telenoid. The idea for this creation was to explore the

depths of uncanny valley. (Guizzo, 2010). The creators purposely made the robot very odd and 5 Strange or mysterious.

Choi 8

uncanny for us to get used to the idea of having robots around us. This is a scary thought,

knowing that roboticist are brainwashing us to get use to the idea of robots. Now robotics is a

threat to our jobs because if robots are accepted and normal in the eyes of people everywhere in

the world, jobs are easily replaced. Robotics will surely impact the economy.

Economic Impact

In the graph shown on the left gives an eye opening statistic of how many industrial

robots have been developed over the

years, as a 38% growth compared to

the prior years. In 2011 there has

been roughly 165,000 industrial

robots developed, when prior year, it

was only 120,000. The phenomenal

growth indicates that every country is

seeing robotics as the next big

market. But what is more interesting is in 2009 the development in robotics was only 60,000 and

the next year it increased to 120,000. The drop from 2008 to 2009 is most likely was caused by

the worldwide economic and financial crisis in 2008. The worldwide economic and financial

crisis, also known as the Global Financial Crisis and the 2008 financial crisis, is considered the

worst financial crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930. The Global financial crisis

threatened the large financial institutes, and caused stock markets to drop worldwide. So robotics

didn’t drop because countries saw that it wasn’t relevant anymore but because of other problems

with the economy. (Financial Crisis, n.d.)

Choi 9

Accordingly, economist fears that robotics would soon take over jobs from humans.

Many scientists believe this argument, MIT economist, Scott Stern, believes that technology has

come to its tipping point: an example that was used to support the job deficiency is the declining

number of 361,000 people working as a bank teller since the recession in 2008. In 1985 there

were 484,000 bank tellers and in 2007, the number declined to 472,000. This was all caused by

Bank ATMs spreading throughout the U.S. But a counter argument was shown when economists

from University of Chicago was surveyed about automations taking over people’s jobs and 88%

wrote that automation was not the cause of unemployment’s and that because of the efficiency

from some of the machines, its lower prices created more demand, which means more jobs. They

believe that the cause of the job deficiency is infinite (Aeppel, 2015). The counter argument

made by economist in University of Chicago stating that the demand of more robots because of

the efficiency creates more jobs for people is a false cause. They’re making a huge leap to an

unproven conclusion because who knows how the robots are made, for all we know, other

industrial robots could be making the parts, and in that case, humans are not needed.

Furthermore, this chart gives a

prediction of the jobs that will be lost by

2025. The graph predicts 13 million jobs

lost to robots in the automotive field, 22

million in the manufacturing field and 9

million in the food service field. From a

capitalistic point of view, it is a good

idea because of the money that is saved

by using robots compared to using humans that require breaks and hourly pay; however, in a

Choi 10

humanist view, this could potential screw people’s lives who works in: automotive,

manufacturing and especially food services. Having 9 million job lost in the food service will be

especially harsh because being in food service doesn’t require a degree or certificate of any sort,

so people that doesn’t have college degree will have a hard time trying to find another job.

Furthermore, to support the statistic on the “They took our jobs!” graph, a restaurant in

China located in Ningbo, a city in China northeastern Zhejiang, is filled with tourist because of

the popularization of futuristic waiters. The restaurant owner wanted to save money on labor

wages by using robots instead, that cost about $9400 each. The owner believes that the catering a

robot waiters instead of human waiters (Fox News, 2014). For the owner’s perspective, the idea

of replacing human waiters for robot waiters will not only save money but also draw in more

customers because of novelty of having robots as waiters. But in the workers stand point, not

only is this inhuman but this will screw up workers lives that makes a living off of waiting. We

have reached to a point where having humans serve us is not enough anymore because it’s not

“fun.” Having robots take over jobs that encourages human interactions is killing our humanity.

Human beings are built to be social, and having robots take away that part of being human, does

that mean we are losing our humanity by having robots?

To put into perspective, the movie, I Am

Legend, shows what it will be like living in a world

where there is no one expect yourself. The protagonist

Robert Neville survives a virus that made every

human in the world into zombies, thus making him

alone in the city of New York with his dog

(Lawrence, 2007). There is a scene in the movie

Choi 11

where Neville goes into a blockbusters filled with mannequins (he probably put them there) and

talks to them as if they were real people. When viewers watched that scene, everyone laughed

because they thought he was insane for thinking that the mannequin was human. But that’s the

extent humans will go to have human interactions, because that keeps them feel like they’re still

human.

In this editorial cartoon,

people are lining up for what looks

like an employment office. The irony

is that there is a robot that is trying to

find a job too—which shows that

jobs will be very scarce. As

technology grows as fast as it is

going right now that even robots will

not be needed. This cartoon warns us that Americans has to step up their game if they want a job

because they will have more competition on getting a job—not only from robots but from

foreigners too.

The fear of losing jobs and losing our human interactions from the advances of

technology is not the only thing we should be afraid of: the belief of mechanically rewiring our

bodies to be the “perfect” versions of ourselves called Transhumanism is something that can

potentially destroy what it means to be human.

Choi 12

Transhumanism

Transhumanism is the belief or theory that the human race can evolve beyond its current

physical and mental limitation,

especially by means of science or

technology. The relation between

transhumanism and robotics is

that robotics is the first step to

improve the human body. Having

humanoid robots can help

scientist understand technological implementation to the human body. Having the ability to

mechanically change the body will stir around many questions of whether or not the individual

will still remain human or be defined as a machine. A professor from Florida International

University, Steve Mizarch, claimed that humility will be destroyed by transhumanism, and

potentially destroy our human personalities (Cho, 2015). Humility is what defines a human; we

are beings that makes mistakes and learn from them. Additionally, humility brings out other

emotions that defines humans such as: compassion because realizing that you don’t know

everything leads you to understand that other human beings are in the same boat. But take that

away with transhumanism and make yourself perfect with no mistakes with no relativity to other

human beings, can you really call yourself a human?

In addition, in psychology, there is a concept called interpersonal attraction. There is a

factor in the interpersonal attraction called competence, which is the ability to do something

successful or efficiently, psychologist believes that human’s likability is influenced by their

competence. But studies have been that in problem solving groups, the participants who are

Choi 13

considered the most competent tends to be not liked as much because the person seems like their

superhuman. A sociology professor from the University of Notre Dame named Richard

Williams6 gave an lecture of competence,

There was a study done in which there were four experimental conditions. It had a person

of superior ability who bungled (spilled coffee on himself); a superior person who did not

bungle; a person of average ability who bungled; an average person who did not bungle.

The superior person who committed a blunder was the most popular; next was the perfect

person who did not blunder; then the average person who did not blunder; last was the

average person who blundered. Hence, while a high degree of competence does make us

appear more attractive, some evidence of fallibility increases our attractiveness still

further (Williams, n.d).

Although people like the idea of being competent, the idea of making mistakes time to time show

that they’re human. Being modified to become perfect to a point where the individual will not

make any mistakes will not be viewed as a human, but a machine.

To put in perspective of the

dangers of transhumanism, in the

video game, Deus Ex: Human

Revolution gives gamers simulation

of what it would be like to be in a

world where robots are prime

essences and humans imperfections

are modified to make them perfect. In the beginning of the game, the protagonist Adam Jensen

6 Professor Richard Williams got this example from a book called The Social Animal, Fifth Edition by David G. Myers

Choi 14

was a normal human being working as a security manager in a robotic company that was

researching on augmentation drug that prevents augmentation rejections, then a team of

unknown mercenaries came and stole the research and critically injured Jensen. He then was

placed in augmentation procedure to save his life and make him the ultimate killing cyborg7. As

the game progress, you find out that the unknown mercenaries were a terrorist group that want to

use augmentation as a weapon to control the world’s fate (Eidos Montreal, 2011). The problems

with having technology inserted in our bodies is that we will not have control or privacy in our

lives: one example is in the game, there was a scenario where a person with augmented brain was

hacked and blown up to prevent information to be leaked. What if this kind of things happen

when we have transplanted technology in our bodies? Could the U.S government use this on

their soldiers to prevent any information leaked to other countries if captured? Although this is

just a fictional game, it does bring perspective of what could happen if we are not cautious.

In addition there are discoveries by Harvard scientist that increased the probability of

human modifications. Harvard scientist have found a way to embed human tissues with nano-

wires so that it can detect electrical signals that comes deep within the tissue (Cyborg tissues

created using nano-wires, 2012). Researchers predict that in the future the wires from the

embedded tissues have a possibility to control behavior. With the cyborg tissues they can use it

for drug tests because the cyborg tissues was created for the neurons, muscles and blood vessels

(Ferguson, 2012). With the discoveries scientist has made with cyborg tissues, the possibilities of

having human modifications is closer.

Global + National

7 A fictional or hypothetical person whose physical abilities are extended beyond normal human limitations by mechanical elements built into the body.

Choi 15

Many scientist in America is afraid of the rise of robots, such as Bill Gates and Stephen

Hawking. Gates gives two situations that can happen with the growth of robotics, one is labor

substitution. With robotics growing, Gates believe that people will not give any effort to

contribute to the world because of the productivity robots will give. The second threat Gates is

afraid of is that humanity will rely too much in the power of robots and they will not use their

brains (Matyszczyk, 2015). Following Gates, Hawking also gives his opinion in robotics: “The

development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race” (QTD in Cellan-

Jones, 2014) Hawking is afraid of the consequences of creating something that will surpass or

even match human beings.

One depiction of a recent hit

movie, Avengers: Age of

Ultron, really portray the fear

that Americans have in

robotics. In this plot, Tony

Stark8 developed an A.I9

called Ultron that can defend

the world with its growing intellectual system that can make decisions on its own and believed

that Ultron could potentially save the world without Heroes. But because the A.I sees the humans

as the prime reason for peace not being achieved, Ultron decides to rebel against Stark and try to

destroy mankind, so that evolution can bring back peace. (Feige, Whedon, 2015). Although the

development of robotic is not even close to this, Americans depiction on robots taking over the

world is one of the popular memes they like to explore. But it does give the viewers the thought

8 A fictional super-hero from the Marvel Comics. Also known as Iron Man. 9 Artificial Intelligence

Choi 16

to imagine the dangers of having an A.I that is smarter than humans are—thus Hawking’s and

Gates’ fear. Movie such as Avengers gives viewers the cautionary tale of how the technology we

build can turn against us, and there’s nothing we can do because if we make an A.I that can

exceed human capacities and think on its own, how can we stop it? Especially because

technology is everywhere in our world, there is no way for anyone to run away from technology.

However, compared to U.S, Japan sees robotics more optimistically and accepts robotics

into their lives. One primary reason why Japan sees robots positively compared to Americans is

the religious view of Animism, which remains as an influential part of Japanese culture.

Animism is the belief that all objects have a spirit—even human made objects. Because of these

differences in culture, the purposes of robots are different. In Japan, the robots are made with the

intent of pleasing consumer everyday life, whereas American’s robots are—ironically—directed

towards military application (Mims, 2010). It is ironic because anything that has do with

improving military power, the U.S will implement it

regardless of fears of robotics. The U.S military has

built an prototype autonomous vehicle called MULE

(Multifunction Utility/Logistics and Equipment) that

was created to carry military equipment, move on its

own using sensor and GPS coordinates, and kill

targets by using sensor that detects the target and calculates its firing solution and wait for a

human operator to pull the trigger in a remote (Sofge, 2009). Unfortunately the project was

cancelled in 2011 for a reason that was not stated. To relate, the movie, Iron Man 2, obviously

made fun of how even though U.S fears something, they will use whatever it is if it improves the

military. In the movie, the U.S military was concerned about Tony Stark’s iron man suit that it

Choi 17

will bring danger to America and—funny enough—told him that it will be better to hand it over

to the military so they can replicate the suit to build super soldier. But imagine if the MULE was

not cancelled and was improved to a point where it can detect whether an individual is a treat or

not and deployed into places like Afghanistan. The amount of casualties that will be lost is

unimaginable, because even though the military finds a way to build a machine to calculate who

to kill, the machine will not be hesitant to kill casualties if the terrorists use them as shields.

As seen in U.S films and video games media has used the topic of humanoid robots to

portray the future and made many variations of stories to portray humanoid robots. Different

cultures portray robots differently: U.S. portrayal, despite viewing them as world killing robots,

also sees robots as servant, and personal robotic butler. For example, Star Wars, the characters

often used the robots as servants, such as R2-D2, a robot with a cylindrical frame that has many

arms and sensors in the body. R2-D2 was used as a personal servant that could: extinguish fire,

slice computers, project holograms, repair ships, and pilot (Lucas, McCullum, 1977).

But in Japan, they often portray robots as a

romantic companion. In a well-known anime,

Chobits, shows a story of the protagonist finding a

Persocom10 in a form of a girl, lying against a pile

of trash. The protagonist soon feels romantically

interested with the Persocom regardless of other

peoples experience with falling in love with their

Persocom—because they had no feeling. But soon they see that the protagonist’s Persocom was

different, in the sense that it had the ability to harbor feelings and act on its own. Together with

10 In this anime the term Persocom means an android used as personal computers.

Choi 18

the protagonist and his Persocom, they explore the relationship between human and Persocom

(Champs, 2002). Compared to the U.S. viewing robots as tools, Japan sees robots as a way of

emotionally attachedment. That could be a reason why Japan has made the first social robots—

Geminoid—to satisfy consumer’s emotional attachment.

Concluding Robotics

All in all, technology like robotics and transhumanism is going to change the perception

of how humanity is viewed, especially with something like transhumanism which redefines what

a human is with the modification of the human structure. It’s inevitable that robots will be the

future of the world, simplicity is something that should be taken out of the dictionary when

defining the world because the world is becoming more complex as the days go on. In the graph

that was shown before, “Worldwide annual supply of industrial robots 1994-2011” it has been

said that the worldwide growth of robotics is 38% from 2010 to 2011 that shows that the growth

of robotics will not decline any time soon. That said people in the U.S needs to fight harder to

grow intellectually, especially with the growth of robotics, it will require more creativity to find

jobs. But knowing the dangers of having robotics and transhumanism will at least have us think

and choose differently of the fate that was portrayed in Avengers: Age of Ultron of the world

being threatened by an A.I. This debate whether robots are accepted or not is something that is

going to pass on by time, because whether people like it or not, robots are coming to our world—

just like the virtual reality systems that seems to be another big market that is coming up.

Welcome to the future!

Choi 19

Welcome to the future, where kids will

stop interacting with you—but why is that bad?

They will stop bugging you! Oh you’re worried

that they won’t make friends? Who needs friends

when you can have cyber friends! The future is

here and coming to you soon. . . But in all

seriousness, Virtual Reality Gaming, a way for people experience a three-dimensional world and

interact with the environment around them (Virtual Reality, n.d) is booming in the gaming

industry. As a gaming enthusiast, VRG (virtual reality gaming) is something that can change the

future for gaming. But some things can be questionable, such as, how much more will this affect

human interactions like it has with robotics and transhumanism? There is already a huge decline

of social interactions with all these technology as it is. The future looks scarier than I thought.

Faulty Claims on VR (Rhetorical Analysis) (GRADE THIS FOR ANALYSIS)

To start off there are many reporters/reviewers believe that virtual reality gaming is

nothing more than a cash cow and they accuse companies that they will only build a device with

bare minimum and effort just to milk money from consumers with little or no evidence.

According to an article by Robert Stone, “Why Virtual Reality Gaming Headsets

Remains A Bad Idea” argues the virtual reality gaming is not a good idea because of the amount

of time companies had to try to perfect the device and thus remains a failure and VRG is just a

scheme for companies to acquire money. This argument already flashes red lights when the

author wrote,

Choi 20

Since it took the world by storm by achieving a $2.4 million cash injection on

Kickstarter, the Oculus Rift has become the leading example of how over-hyped

marketing and inflated statements by celebrity gaming personalities can influence

a generation of potential adopters (Stone, 2014).

Saying that Oculus Rift is overhyped because of marketing and by lies celebrity gamers say to

hype the product is an example of slippery slope because without any evidence that says that

many celebrity gamers lies about the Oculus Rift, no one can specifically say that virtual reality

is bad idea and remains as only an assumption. The article continues and writes,

Research (summarised in an MoD-sponsored human factors document) has shown that as

many as 56% of individuals between the ages of 18 and 38 have one or more problems

which can compromise their binocular vision. Individuals with stereoscopic or binocular

vision defects cope by exploiting monocular depth and distance cues, such as motion

parallax, light and shadows, focus, geometric overlap (interposition), aerial perspective,

relative size and size/shape constancies. Even if it becomes possible to screen out users

with binocular deficits, this may still not be sufficient to prevent usability and

“cybersickness” problems with head-mounted displays (Stone, 2014).

This is a red herring fallacy because the author is using a research that does not really have to do

with the current virtual reality devices. Also the author does not reveal the date of the research,

so for all we know the research could have been done before the time of virtual reality devices

such as: Oculus Rift, Morpheus, and Samsung Gear. To conclude, the article does not provide

any evidence that proves that companies’ virtual reality devices still have problems with cyber

sickness.

Choi 21

To add onto the bad article club, Don Reisinger the writer of, “Why I refuse to believe

VR is the future of gaming”, argues that virtual reality gaming is just hype and because of past

failures with virtual reality, it cannot replace the mainstream gaming. When Reisinger states,

Looking back in time, I can point to a host of companies that have tried to take

virtual reality mainstream and failed, including Nintendo. Each time, the

technology looked promising, but it ultimately failed because the mainstream

didn’t see it as a viable alternative to traditional gaming. (Reisinger, 2015).

Saying that because of past experience and failures, virtual reality gaming will not succeed is

cherry picking because the author is bringing his biased approach from his past experience with

virtual reality system into the argument. The author has to remember that it is 2015 and that the

Nintendo project with virtual gaming was in 1994 (Virtual Boy), time has changed and

technology has evolved. The author is making an assumption based off of his past knowledge of

how virtual reality was and does not bring any proof that the virtual reality gaming still as bad as

the ones from the past. Also the author states

I hate to be a downer, but I just don’t see the form factor working anytime soon.

Until I see something that’s truly game-changing (pardon the pun), I don’t see

how console gaming will get replaced or even threatened by virtual reality

(Reisinger, 2015).

The thing about virtual reality devices is that it was never intended to replace consoles at all, but

actually to enhance the experience WITH the consoles. Look at the design of, for example, the

Oculus Rift, it has to be connected to either a console or a computer. So for the author to say that

he doesn’t see console gaming being replaced by virtual reality proves that this article also has

Choi 22

slippery slope because the author is concluding that virtual reality is going to replace console

gaming with no evidence that states that virtual reality systems will be a console on its own.

The Rise of Virtual Reality

Virtual Reality Gaming was a dream for gamers; for years companies tried to make an

ideal machine where VRG (Virtual Reality Gaming) could be achieved, but they always had

trouble making the machine to have stable images and that causes nausea for the gamer. One

example is Nintendo’s Virtual boy they released on January 6th 1995; their initial release was a

failure because of the high price of the machine and because of the discomfort caused by the

gameplay. Not until the company Oculus11 VR came up to the market, VRG was a hopeless

dream. Oculus VR, a company that started off as a startup, showed promise to the community of

virtual reality enthusiasts. At first Oculus VR had the same problem as other companies, but

when Oculus VR collaborated with Valve, they have fixed the problem and showcased their new

prototype to E3—a popular convention for gamers—and the audience loved the demonstration

(Ruben, 2014). Virtual reality, where many people believed as a dead dream, was revived by

Oculus VR. Since then, Mark Zuckerberg, the creator of Facebook, has bought out Oculus VR

for about $400 mil in cash, $23.1 mil Facebook shares, and $300 mil if they meet the milestone

goals in the future (Dredge, 2014). Seeing that Facebook has bought out Oculus Rift gives a

notion that big companies—such as Facebook—are taking out competition of other soon-to-be

big companies to stay big and important. Other big companies, such as Sony, has made their

rendition of virtual reality that actually succeeded to compete with Oculus Rift called Project

Morpheus12. Not only is virtual reality is coming into games but also into mobile devices; Sony’s 11 The word Oculus is eye translated from Latin. Which is understandable of why Oculus VR’s logo is a picture of an eye. 12 Morpheus is a god of dreams from a Greek mythology that has the ability to mimic any human form and appear in dreams. The narcotic morphine came from root word Morpheus, which is defined as an addictive drug. Dreams and virtual reality is something that is addictive to the brain.

Choi 23

Project Morpheus is starting to explore other platforms that other companies are such as

Samsung’s collaboration with Oculus of the mobile powered Gear VR, and re Vive headset from

HTC-built device powered by Valve’s Steam (Webster, 2015).

Other than gaming, virtual reality is expanding into other fields, Oculus VR has involved

themselves into making a virtual reality movie called Lost. The movie, Lost, will be about five

minutes long, and the story will progress as the viewer makes the decisions, so depending on the

decisions, the story can be three minutes long or it could be 10 minutes. The project will be a

computer generated VR experience that will be directed by Saschka Unseld, a former Pixar

animator who created a 2013 short, The Blue Umbrella (Bishop, 2015). Virtual reality can

change the whole movie making industry if the Lost project becomes successful because it’s

something new and original in the movie industry.

Samsung has also collaborated with Oculus to create a mobile friendly VR device called

Samsung Gear VR. The device links into Samsung’s new phone, Galaxy Note 4, and the user can

immerse themselves into the virtual world. The idea for the Gear VR is so that VR can be

mobile, so there is no need to have a PC or console to plug into, just your phone. First the user

must download the Oculus app to obtain the most experience. Some things the user can do is

watch movies, and play games (Stein, 2014). Gear VR is not as advance as the Oculus Rift or

Project Morpheus, but it is the cornerstone of making more mobile VR device. But creating a

virtual reality gear that is mobile could create issues, as in decrease the social interaction even

further than how it is now.

Reality vs Virtual Reality

Choi 24

Seeing this image of the kid being so immersed in the virtual reality to a point where he

doesn’t even know how he is physically,

brings up the question, can the media use

virtual reality to distract us from what is really

going on in the real world? People—especially

in America—already is distracted from media

with news that doesn’t talk about anything

relevant to the world. Who knows, they could

create a world for us that seem to be all good to distract the real problems of the world. These are

the things we—as human beings that should worry about our future—should be worried about.

Even without virtual reality, people in America is so sucked up in their own world, and are

clueless of what is happening around the world because the media only show them what they

want to see—which is peace and harmony. A quote from Charles Simic, writer of “A Reunion

with Boredom” really brings this together, “It brought about a sudden and unmistakable

realization that we are only puppets jerked this way and that way by whatever device we think

we are operating” (Simic). With virtual reality becoming big and something that media can use

to control the things we can see, will make us into puppets that thinks we are still in control.

Speaking of having lack of control of our lives, South Korea has a Confucius belief

which consists with concept of: loyalty, filial duty, respect of age, status, and deep respect for

academics; but because of this philosophy it created several social issues: which includes people

feeling as if they are incompetent because of the hierarchy in their work and stress from

expectations to do well in school (Ham 2014). For that reason Koreans often tries to escape from

reality and engage themselves in video games. South Korea has become one of the countries with

Choi 25

the biggest suicide rates: with a 280.7% jump from 1990 to 2010 with 22 deaths per 100,000

people (Ham 2014). One of the reasons of the high rates in Korea is because Koreans feel as if

they have no control in their own lives, because everything in their lives is controlled by the

Confucius philosophy and once they realize that the technology they used to escape is just a

virtual reality and something that can be controlled, Koreans do the one thing they know they

have control over—kill themselves.

Conclusion

Furthermore, the issue of human interaction declining because of technology and how

escaping reality seems better than actually having interaction with people is something that

virtual reality can be seen as a problem. With something that can allow human beings to escape

reality and go into a perfect world that is controlled by the individual can really effect the

person’s perspective in real life. With technology already having people—especially in America

AND Korea—engaged so deeply in their phones that they do not even see what’s in front of

them when walking, shows how technology has absorbed our attention to a personal world that

does not exist. Look around the streets of Seattle, everyone will be engaged in their phones, even

if they walk in pairs. Even in Korea—where technology is way advanced than America—walks

around with their eyes stuck on their phones and not even acknowledges a person is right in front

of them by bumping into each other, most likely because they want to escape their reality and

immerse themselves to a world that they can control. Now that companies such as Samsung—

funny how it is a Korean company—coming up with devices like the Gear VR, will decrease the

interaction with people even further, heck, people will not even see what is going on right in

front of them because the device will cover their whole face. There can be argument saying that

Gear VR will not be popular because it will be weird seeing a big device stuck on their head. But

Choi 26

once a popular celebrity wears the Gear VR, everyone will have it—look at Beats headphone, no

one ever wore those things in public until celebrities started wearing them. But the issue is, will

virtual reality confuse an individual of what is real and what is fake? Nowadays CGI13 is so

realistic that it is hard to depict what is real and what is CGI. Yes, there can be arguments saying

that then gaming in general can confuse an individual of what is real and what is fake. But virtual

reality is different, the individual gets to interact in a way where they make movement similar to

real life and with the head gear, they are engaged in a world they can see in a full range of

motion by the movement of their head. All in all whether it’s virtual reality, robotics, or

transhumanism, the fact is we are screwed, everything is being redefined such as: jobs and

humanity. Nowadays humility is not a definition of humanity, but human perfection is what

humans are meant for, which is a scary thought because being human means you make mistakes.

Jobs requires more of a creative and unique way to get, because now robotics can do things

humans can but more efficiently. Yes technology is cool, having driverless cars, virtual reality,

and robotics, but isn’t it time for us to think of how these things will effect humanity in the

future? Will we be lost and enslaved by the technology we have created?

13 Computer-Generated Imagery

Choi 27

References (APA)

Aeppel, T. (2015). Jobs and the clever robot --- experts rethink belief that tech lifts employment as machines take on skills once thought uniquely human. [scholarly source] Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition. DOI: 1657789579

Asaka, M (Director). (2002). Chobits. [Anime]. Japan: Madhouse

Associated Press. (15 May 2015). Google driverless cars heading public streets. Detroit Free Press. http://www.freep.com/story/money/cars/2015/05/15/google-car-public-streets/27357251/

ATR Hiroshi Ishiguro Laboratory. (n.d.) [Image of Hiroshi’s robot] http://www.paams.net/sites/default/files/ca-geminoid-wide-20130801161421272866-620x349.jpg

Bishop, B. (26 Jan 2015). Oculus is now making its own reality movies. The Verge. http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/26/7896179/oculus-vr-story-studio-original-movies-sundance

Bogue, R. (2014). The role of artificial intelligence in robotic. [scholarly journal] The Industrial Robot. 41(2), 119-123. DOI: 1510597235

Bohannon, J. (2015). Meet your new co-worker. [scholarly source] Science, 346(6206), 180-181.

Cellan-Jones, R. (2014). Stephen hawking warns artificial intelligence could end mankind. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30290540

Cho, H.J. (5 Feb 2015). Beyond human: transhumanism. Highline College. https://people.highline.edu/acaster/105/writing_105.htm

Cyborg tissues created using nano-wires. (2012) U.S. News and World Report. DOI: 1077517296

Dredge, S. (22 July 2014). Facebook closes its $2bn oculus rift acquisition. what’s next? theguardian. http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jul/22/facebook-oculus-rift-acquisition-virtual-reality

Choi 28

Eidos Montreal. (2011). [video game]. Deus ex: human revolution. United States: Square Enix

Feige, K. (Producer), Whedon, J. (Director). (2015). Avengers: age of ultron. [Motion pictures]. United States: Walt Disney Studios.

Ferguson, W. (2012). Cyborg tissue is half living cells, half electronics. New Scientist. 215(2880). http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn22217-cyborg-tissue-is-half-living-cells-half-electronics.html#.VUaj3PlVhBe

Fischer, E. (2010) [Editorial Cartoon]. Frugal in Recession. https://www.cartoonstock.com/cartoonview.asp?catref=efin1920

Fox News. (2014). This restaurant replaced humans with robot waiters. http://nypost.com/2014/12/04/this-restaurant-replaced-waiters-with-robots/

Guizzo, E. (2010). Telenoid R1: hiroshi ishiguro’s newest and strangest android. http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/humanoids/telenoid-r1-hiroshi-ishiguro-newest-and-strangest-android

Ham, S.B.  (7 Dec 2013). 온고지신 (溫故知新, “Ohn Gho Ji Shin”) : South Korea’s Flunkyism. Highline College. https://people.highline.edu/acaster/105/writing_105.htm

I, Geminoid (2010) [scholarly source] The Wilson Quarterly. 34(3) DOI: 612781538

[Image of cyborg] (n.d). http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/1/15773/1766673-6333578_95.jpg

[Image of Helmet] (n.d.) http://www.doolwind.com/images/blog/virtual_reality_helmet.jpg

[Image of kid in VR helmet] (n.d.) http://michigandaily.com/files/imagecache/blogtease/vr.jpg

[Image of MUSE] (n.d.) http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/photos/uncategorized/2007/04/30/lm_mule.jpg

[Image of Persocom] (n.d). http://www.tebeosfera.com/imagenes/documentos/3/4/documentos-F789-452-362-134.jpg

[Image of Plug unto someone’s neck] (n.d.) http://sheattack.com/myblog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/virtual_reality_s011.jpg

[Image of Telenoid] (n.d.) http://www.geminoid.jp/projects/kibans/Images/Telenoid-R4-front2.jpg

[Image of transhumanism] (n.d.) http://www.getholistichealth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Transhumanism.jpg

[Image of Ultron] (2015). http://cdn.screenrant.com/wp-content/uploads/Avengers-Age-of-Ultron-Trailer-1-Ultron-Avengers-Logo-620x370.jpg

Choi 29

[Image of woman in technology] (n.d) http://www.wall321.com/thumbnails/detail/20131115/women%20computers%20technology%20short%20hair%20science%20fiction%20artwork%20sitting%20wires%20screens%20tea%20cup_www.wall321.com_11.jpg

[Inside of Geminoid]. (n.d.) http://www.rpp.com.pe/pict.php?g=-1&p=/picnewsa/881567.jpg

Ioannou, A; Andreou, E; Christofi, M. (2015). Pre-schoolers' interest and caring behaviour around a humanoid robot. [scholarly source] TechTrends 59(2). DOI: 10.1007/s11528-015-0835-0

Lawrence, F. (Director). (2007) I Am Legend. [motion pictures]. United States: Warner Bros. Pictures.

Lucas, G (Director), McCallum, R (Producer). (1977). Star Wars Trilogy. [motion pictures]. United States: 20th Century Fox.

Matyszczyk, C. (2015). Will robots take our jobs and overpower us? Bill Gates has some concerns. http://www.cnet.com/news/bill-gates-says-robots-represent-a-twin-threat/

Mims, C. (2010). Why japanese love robots (and americans fear them). http://www.technologyreview.com/view/421187/why-japanese-love-robots-and-americans-fear-them/

NAO robot]. (2011). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nao_ (robot)#/media/File:NAO-Robot.jpg

Normile, D. In our own image. [scholarly source] Science, 346(6206), 188-189.

Reisinger, D. (8 Mar 2015). Why I refuse to believe VR is the future of gaming. Slash Gear. http://www.slashgear.com/why-i-refuse-to-believe-vr-is-the-future-of-gaming-08372592/

Rhee, J. (2013). Beyond the uncanny valley: masahiro mori and philip k. dick's do androids dream of electric sheep? [scholarly source]. Configurations. 21(3) DOI: 1528524663

Rubin, P. (20 May 2014). The inside story of oculus rift and how virtual reality became reality. Wired. http://www.wired.com/2014/05/oculus-rift-4/

Schnipper, M. [n.d.] Seeing is believing: the state of virtual reality. The Verge. http://www.theverge.com/a/virtual-reality

Shuster, B. [n.d.] Could virtual reality revitalize the economy. Wired. http://www.wired.com/2014/10/virtual-reality-economy/

Sofge, E. (17 Dec 2009). America’s robot army: are unmanned fighters ready for combat? Popular Mechanics. http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/a2653/4252643/

Stein, S. (17 Dec 2014). Samsung gear VR review: virtual reality is here, and it runs on smartphone. CNET. http://www.cnet.com/products/samsung-gear-vr/

Choi 30

Stone, R. (10 Aug 2014). Why virtual reality gaming headsets remains a bad idea. Life hacker. http://www.lifehacker.com.au/2014/08/why-virtual-reality-gaming-headsets-remain-a-bad-idea/

They took our jobs! (n.d.). [Pie chart]. Our rising overlords: what is driving the coming upheaval (2011). http://www.zdnet.com/article/our-rising-robot-overlords-what-is-driving-the-coming-upheaval/

Thilmany, J. (2012). Make way for robots. Mechanical Engineering. [scholarly source] 134(5). DOI: 1017883299

Virtual Reality. [n.d.]. What is virtual reality gaming? VRS. http://www.vrs.org.uk/virtual-reality-games/what-is-vr-gaming.html

Webster, A. (3 Mar 2015). Sony’s project morpheus VR headset will launch in 2016. The Verge. http://www.theverge.com/2015/3/3/8136121/sony-project-morpheus-release-date

Financial crisis of 2007-2008. [n.d.]Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%9308

Williams, R. (n.d) Lecture 08 – social psych: interpersonal attraction. University of Notre Dame. https://www3.nd.edu/~rwilliam/xsoc530/attraction.html

Worldwide annual supply of industrial robots 1994-2011. (n.d) [statistic chart]. All Time High Robot Market 2011: $25.5 billion. (Aug. 30, 2012). http://robotland.blogspot.com/2012/08/all-time-high-robot-market-2011-255.html