Virtual Reality and Identity

Description

Immersive virtual environments blur the boundary between real and simulated experience, challenging definitions of identity, reality, and meaning.

Real-World Relevance

Informs policy on digital addictions, virtual economies, digital identity rights, and metaverse governance.

Classification

Domains: Virtual Reality and SimulationEthics and Philosophy of TechnologySocial Engineering and PsychologyCommunication and Information TechnologyGovernance and Political SystemsWarfare and Weapons TechnologySurveillance and Privacy

Scenario Types: Thought experiment / What-ifSatire / Social commentaryPrediction / ExtrapolationEthical dilemmaWarning / Self-preventing prophecy

Outcomes: Ambiguous / MixedTransformativeCautionaryDystopian

Tags: virtual-realitydigital-identitysimulationsubjective-reality-trapsubjective-realityfilter-bubblesideological-impositionworldview-conflictconsensual-reality-breakdownreality-breakdownconsensual-hallucinationepistemologytotal-augmented-realityaugmented-realitylayered-realitydigital-mediationvirtual-afterlife-politicsvirtual-afterlifedigital-hellpost-death-rightsculture-warvr-game-societal-controlvr-surveillancegaming-controlhacker-resistancebehavioral-data

Stories (25)

• A maze of death — Philip K. Dick (1970)
• Burning bright — Melissa Scott (1993)
• City of Golden Shadow — Tad Williams (1991)
• Count Zero — William Gibson (1986)
• Eye in the sky — Philip K. Dick, Dan John Miller (1957)
• Hexwood — Diana Wynne Jones (1993)
• Idoru — William Gibson (1996)
• Mona Lisa Overdrive — William Gibson (1987)
• Mother of storms — John Barnes (1994)
• Mountain of Black Glass — Tad Williams (1999)
• Neuromancer — William Gibson (1984)
• Nowhere Land — Katherine Applegate (2001)
• Only You Can Save Mankind — Terry Pratchett (1992)
• Open Your Eyes — Alejandro Amenábar (1997)
• Rainbows End — Vernor Vinge (2007)
• River of Blue Fire — Tad Williams (1998)
• Sea of Silver Light — Tad Williams (2001)
• Snow Crash — Neal Stephenson (1992)
• Surface Detail — Iain Banks (2010)
• The Dream Master — Roger Zelazny (1966)
• Virtual Hero — El Rubius (2015)
• Vurt — Jeff Noon (1993)
• Warcross — Marie Lu (2017)
• Wildcard — Marie Lu (2018)
• Worlds Within — Rog Phillips (1950)

Related Ideas

• Post-Death Reality Question
• Intellectual Monastic Isolation
• Faith-Powered Deity Reduced to Powerlessness
• Locative Technology and Information Warfare
• Virtual Crime with Real Consequences
• Deconstructed Superheroes in Geopolitics
• Child Combatant with Advanced Technology
• Post-Scarcity Civilization at War
• Hereditary Destiny Weapon
• Code as Law in Cyberspace