Things are getting weird…
My son has been acting strange lately.
He’s been walking. Outside. A lot. If you have a teenage son I’m sure you appreciate how weird this is.
I come home and the TVs off. The Playstation is shut down. And he’s out ‘walking’.
As a dad you start to get worried. What’s he up to. Is he breaking into houses? Is it drugs?
Nope. It’s Pokémon.
My son has been caught up in the Pokémon craze, and now he’s hardly at home. He’s wandering the streets looking for Pikachu or whatever his name is.
So I’ve got mixed feelings about it. We’ve had to have more than a few chats about limiting time on the game machines in our house. And I have to tune in with each game he gets to make sure I feel ok about it.
(I’ve sent a couple back. Man, I can’t believe the stuff they put in games.)
So, part of me is not excited that he’s spending more time on computer games, and becoming even more intimately connected with his devices.
But on the other hand, he’s getting out of the house. He’s exercising – a lot. And he’s meeting people and having real human interactions. So that’s a big plus.
And then there’s this augmented reality technology that has just been released on humanity without any considerations for what negative impacts it might have. No control group studies. No congresses of philosophers to discuss the ethical implications.
Nope. Just here you go humanity. Here’s something that shifts your understanding of reality. You go deal with it.
What could go wrong?
I think it’s the human story, that our technology always marches miles ahead of us. When a new technology arrives, its out there. There’s no scope to stop and think, do we really want guns on the planet?
And so we’re just left to adjust to the change. But there’s no going back. If the technology spreads quickly (and all of them do these days), then the adjusted state becomes your new normal, and there’s no way of unwinding the adjustments that have happened.
I was reading the other day about some scientists who wanted to study the affect online porn had on young men. In the end though they had to abandon their research. They just couldn’t find the subjects.
That is, they couldn’t find the control subjects. In any study you need a control group – a group that isn’t influenced by the thing you’re trying to study, so you can isolate its impact.
But they just couldn’t find any young men who DIDN’T watch online porn on a regular basis. They searched high and low, but they just couldn’t find them. (I know. Who wouldda thought?) The only people men they could find lived on Amish communities, but that lifestyle is too different to work as a control group.
The technology was out of the box. By the time we got to wondering if it was a good thing (or to even try and figure out what impact it had) it was too late. It was too widespread.
I think in a few years we’ll be looking back at Augmented Reality (AR) in the same way. Right now AR is pretty basic – there’s a cartoon Pokemon showing up on your real time camera, as you look at the real world. But you know how quickly technology is moving these days.
Here’s a million dollar idea. A pair of glasses that, when you’re walking down the street, overlays images of naked bodies on the people that you come across, to make it look like everyone in your city is naked.
Or maybe it could overlay the face of Brad Pitt onto your lover’s face. Maybe you could both wear those glasses and experience the unique ecstasy of Brad Pitt making love to himself.
How does the human mind adjust to that?
(Sorry professor, we just can’t find anyone who hasn’t made everyone in their life look like Brad Pitt.)
So I would like to humbly suggest to humanity that maybe we should stop and think about this AR business for a bit. But I know it won’t happen.
And I think the consequences could be scary. But probably not in a predictable way. Take video game violence. There’s was a lot of worry that violent video games would make people violent. But there’s been no evidence that they have.
Because we’re able to abstract. At some point, someone made a video game where you had to save babies falling from buildings. But it didn’t change the game-play. Players just saw it as a game, and figured out strategies to maximise points.
Turns out, thankfully, that we’re pretty good at discerning reality from non-reality. I guess this is a learnt skill. When cinemas were invented, the first shows had images of a train racing towards the camera, or a bandit pointing his gun at the camera and shooting.
People ran screaming from the cinema.
But AR takes us closer to that edge where we can no longer discern between the real reality and the generated reality.
This is a total twilight zone.
My hope is that we might begin to understand the malleable nature of reality. That is, once we’ve understood that we can influence our digital reality, and then our Augmented Reality, I think we’ll naturally start taking an interest in our ‘real’ reality.
How do I change it up? Who’s telling this story anyway? How do I hack it and make it more to my liking?
Becoming the authors of our Augmented Reality is one step closer to becoming the author’s of our own actual reality.
This is a very exciting space.
Potentially we stand at the gates of a great Pokémon Enlightenment.
A man can only hope.
What do you make of this whole Pokémon business?
FOAFL4 says
The commercial implications and applications that could be created from augmented reality is huge. And that’s not including the money businesses could soon make from Pokemon Go…
Kathy says
This is just the start. The whole nature of how we work is changing. Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), artificial intelligence and robotics will all impact upon the future of work. It will make some jobs redundant within the next 10 years (anywhere between 40% and 70% depending on who you read or listen to) and create new ones (social media managers, content creators, app developers anyone). IBM’s Watson is already replacing law clerks. Hamburger assembling robots are making even McDonalds workers redundant.
It will mean that potentially we can live and work anywhere in the world and everyone is our potential customer. No more living close to work, or even in the same state or country as our customers. No more 2 hour commute. Co sharing workplace for small and micro businesses in all areas will become the norm. Self driving cars will proliferate, so that even if you do need to commute, you can be productive during the drive (while putting both taxi and Uber drivers out of work). And we probably won’t even own our cars, they’ll be shared vehicles.
The future’s both scary and exciting, and not just for gamers and gaming.
Anne says
Oh dear I am a grandmother of four and I have two of the kids loving grabbing nan’s phone and playing. Harmless and gets the kids out together. I see groups of up to ten kids doing the pokemon thing. I got to say I love it. YES I also play it for the kids and myself. I dont leave my house at all. This week I have walked up to ten kilometers or more. I love it. So I am not one to ask about this. Sorry but I have a phobia about leaving my house and for the first time in many years I am getting out and about. It has done me a favour. Raining today, long hair turns to ringlets am a little wet but heck its just a game and I dont think you have anything to worry about.
Rosanne says
Well done Anne, good on you! Enjoy it & go find all those rare ones!! 🙂
Rosanne says
My son is 22, he studies Gaming Development. He moved from Engineering to gaming development. He spends his days in his room playing games/studying…. you can’t tell which it is. He only goes to Uni 2 days a week. He rarely exercises. I think that with some boys, maybe even some girls, gaming is an addiction, just like pokies, horse racing etc…
It creates a level of excitement that can’t be replicated with anything else. I have my own business & I send him out to work events at least once a fortnight, but he’s heart isn’t in it so he’s not as good as my other workers but he does just enough to be passable. His out & he’s moving when he’s working but he comes back home exhausted as he’s not used to the activity. The consequences to his health will be devastating. Most kids his age have a job, he doesn’t want to get one.
Through high school & even at Uni I approached the consellors, saying that it needs help, he has an addiction that he can’t overcome by himself, that he won’t even admit to. They would tell him this is your future you need to setup, he would listen, nod but nothing would change. the Uni consellor said he’s an adult & we can’t do anything unless he agrees. When the choice is presented to him to play a game or work or study, he will always play a game.
I wonder how many other parents are in my situation. It seems like there is nothing you can do. You hope that he will grow out of it like my other son did, but still no sign.
At least with Pokemon Go he does go for walks now sometimes which gets him out & I am grateful for that, but I think that he is an example of a bigger problem that exists in our society.