Virtual Reality

Virtual reality has always been an extremely interesting subject to me, and I have been fascinated by the concept in general. Early ideas of virtual reality lead me to ideas of living out dreams in a much clearer fashion then we do in actual dreams. Early examples (relevant to me) were such platforms as virtual boy and red zone, game systems that really only simulated VR by putting you as close to the images as possible.

I've realized that there is really sort of 2 kinds of virtual reality. The first is the traditional sense that we are being "physically" immersed in the environment. But the second is something that has developed over the past few years of a virtual network and representation of people, avatars. Popular in games like Second Life and the ridiculous giant World of Warcraft, people have extended their personal qualities into a digital realm, effectively living their lives in a digital world, a virtual world. The unfortunate downfall to this is when you interact in a digital world is the buffer between people can make people animalistic.

As VR progresses and as I've aged, the social and scientific advantages of VR have become much more apparent to me. The medical community could greately benefit from a virtual environment, able to explore the body or molecular level and gain insight that would be otherwise impossible. There are also huge military applications, though i would not agree with most of them, VR could make combat and reconnaissance much safer for those carrying it out.