Hayles 4a: Becoming more than data
by jalengumbs on Apr.19, 2012, under Uncategorized
“At this point, some readers may object that however functional narrative may be for everyday social intercourse, it leads to serious mistakes when we use it to understand virtual creatures. Not only do these creatures have nothing in their heads; in a literal sense, they have no heads (because they are virtual, and because their morphology is a series of blocks, the uppermost of which we “see” as the head). Attributing desires to these clumps of blocks is as ridiculous as thinking that electrons have motives”
Reading this passage of Hayle’s I thought of our (people) interaction with these artificial creatures such as Sim characters or any other rpg character. People who have an interest in role-playing games (rpg) often create and customize their own character so it becomes a fantasy form of themselves in the game. As players we some times invest time and emotion into these virtual creatures as if they were alive. When do these virtual creatures become more than jus algorithms and data becoming almost a living thing to us? It can be seen in popular video games such as World of War Craft, Sims, and Fable. While “these clumps of blocks” may not have true motives or desires we as players do. We choose to temporarily live through these virtual creatures and we see our desires as being theirs. These visual representations of ourselves can become more than just data and algorithms to players becoming a part of us.
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Almost done…ladedah… | Feeling Newsy
May 8th, 2012 on 6:51 pm[...] Discussion: I had a conversation with Beth Anne and Aja on my entry about artificial intelligence. I also commented on Beth Anne’s post about Hypertext novels and about originality had a little conversation both places. I also was part of a conversation on Aja’s blog about ownership. I also commented on Jalen’s post about virtual creatures. [...]
April 19th, 2012 on 5:11 pm
Virtual creatures are definitely a fascination. Why do you think we want to project on to the creatures so much. Even when I watched the video of the virtual creatures Hayles was referring to, I imagined them as animals. I don’t know why I had to do that.
May 10th, 2012 on 1:50 pm
It is interesting as to why we project on to these creatures so much, and the reasons could be far and many. However, I believe one of the greatest reasons we do is so we can have an escape. It allows us to create an alter life for ourselves where we can do things we never could before.