From: minerva!diego@beaver.cs.washington.edu (Diego Montefusco) Subject: Re: PHIL/INFO: Virtuality Date: Wed, 15 Jul 92 13:06:20 CET In <9207150700.AA22268@milton.u.washington.edu>, on Jul 15, you wrote: > From: cmcl2!acfcluster.nyu.edu!drennan@uunet.UU.NET (XIXAX) > Subject: PHIL/INFO: Virtuality > Date: Mon, 13 Jul 1992 03:29:28 GMT > Organization: New York University > > [Stuff deleted] > > I guess my first question is: Is not most of what is described as Virtual > Reality just alternative ways of interfacing with a machine? I think infact that VR is an ALTERNATIVE WAY OF INTERFACING. I think this is the point. If it is the best way, or at least a better, remains to be seen, even if I think so. Professor Gardin, from the University of Milan, says that even when you are using a Macintosh-like word processor (and, more in general, a direct manipulation interface) you are interacting with an Artificial Reality: you have a virtual paper and a virtual pen, mimicking only some of the real-pen real-paper aspects, and creating other characteristics real ones don't have (moving text around) - he calls those tool PERFECTOR (actors which add capabilities: another example is a Draw-Line tool which allows you to draw perfectly straight lines, even if your hand quivers...) I like this point because it shows how VR is not a major break with past, only an evolution of a trend already clear, with better ways of interfacing. And I like this. So, from a interface point of view, VR is just a direct maniulation interface: you reach out and grab a data, a file, or a CPU to assign it to a different task in a multiprocessor environment... We can gain again (eh eh), at a higher level, that PHYSICITY in manipulating computers we had when programming old ENIAC, by moving around cables and plugs... > is there no worry that VR might find itself > on the heap with AI? Meaning, the study of sensory input, as it progresses, > might reveal that it is much much more complex than previously imagined, > leaving the goal not closer, but further away. (My (humble) view of AI) I agree with your opinion about AI. Quoting someone else of this group (that probably will answer) the difference is that NOW, with millions of dollars you CAN have an almost sci-fi virtual reality (photorealism, fast update, high HMD resolution with adaptive gaze- directed rendering and increased definition, force feedback, 3D sound...), while, even with LOTS of money, even in AI best days, you were NOT able to have a thinking machine... Again, I am just quoting, perfectly agreeing. Diego ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Diego Montefusco minerva!diego@hp3.sm.dsi.unimi.it Via Pirano 4 20127 Milano montefus@ghost.dsi.unimi.it ITALIA -----------------------------------------------------------------------------