I came across the above video while researching a few days ago. I highly recommend that you watch it before you read the rest of this post.

The video begins with a few men talking to the camera. It is unclear what they are talking about at first, but it sounds like drugs.

Soon you find out they are not, in fact, addicted to drugs, but to virtual reality. Each of the characters connect to the virtual world via a nose ring that I would assume then connects to their brain, putting them into the new world.

However, one individual learns that the world isn’t actually virtual. The people plugged into VR think that they are playing a video game when they are really being used to control robots in a war zone.

Though the video is entirely fictional, it brings up a grim realization: this is possible. Being too engrossed in a virtual world without bothering to check the facts is a dangerous way to live.

At first, the video made me a little angry. Why demonize a technology that can be used for so much more than mindless killing games? But the more  I thought about it, the more I realized that the video wasn’t entirely wrong.

Any technology, if used improperly can have devastating consequences. The purpose of the video wasn’t to tell people never to used VR. It was simply to remind everyone that even with the rapidly advancing and exciting technologies, it is still important to pay attention to the real world. It was to warn people not to be so blinded by technology that they can no longer distinguish between the virtual and what’s really going on.

As the description of the video says: “Stay connected, but not too much.”

 

Header photo image from: http://www.roadtovr.com/uncanny-valley-explores-a-dystopian-vision-of-virtual-reality-and-drone-warfare/