PDF - The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality - University of Exeter

gamma rays measures organs and even molecular structures. Taking these data as
input, the computer then reconstructs entire cross sections of the patient’s body. The
visual output must be sharp enough to show a lesion one millimeter long or detailed
enough for doctors to distinguish a left or right cusp of the aortic valve. Medical
imaging differs from interpreting photographs, as the new healing technology requires
less intuitive guesswork based on what the human eye can barely make out. Healing
belongs to the interface.
Our link to the solar system, the stars, and other galaxies comes through the interface.
All areas of the universe come into sharper focus as scientists zoom in on sources
of astronomical data. In the late summer of 1989, scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory
in Pasadena, California, sat before their video screens viewing Triton, a moon
of Neptune, as the Voyager 2 space probe sent radio signals back to earth. Through
representations and simulations, we contact the world we know and even the limits of
what we know.
The interface is taking to the freeway, too, where the automobile is the grandfather
of applied technology. In the near future, motorists will have on-board computer displays
of maps, locations, and detailed directions to any destination. Traffic information
will appear on the car windshield, projected by virtual images above the driver’s line
of sight. The auto interface will provide navigational readouts, warnings about blind
spots, and television reception. Pilots have long used the heads-up displays on jet aircraft,
sometimes even landing in foggy weather by viewing a televised simulation of
the runway. Driving any vehicle may soon mean using a video interface to enhance vision.
This enhancement the developers call reality augmentation, for it superimposes
information on a direct reality percept. The combination "augmented reality" is a step
toward breaking through the interface and inhabiting an electronic realm where reality
and symbolized reality constitute a third entity: virtual reality.
What, then, is an interface? An interface occurs where two or more information
sources come face-to-face. A human user connects with the system, and the computer
becomes interactive. Tools, by contrast, establish no such connection.
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