Nicholas Barnard
November 14, 2002
Philosophy of the Internet
Dr. Charles Taylor
What exactly is my presence in the world around me at this time? This is perception. How does that perception become interpreted and understood by my consciousness? How does my consciousness gain access to my perception? How does this all interrelate, and can it be all be deployed remotely via computer or other connections? These are the fundamental questions concerning tele-presence; Dreyfus addresses some of these questions but not all of them
Perception, consciousness, and our physical bodies work in concert to provide us a coherent understanding of surroundings. People are not aware of the functioning of their bodies' consciousness and perception on a daily basis. Merleau-Ponty's observation that people naturally find an ideal location to view the things that they are looking at is an example of perception, consciousness, and our bodies working in concert. For most people this is accomplished via a normally unconscious decision making process, that algorithmically can be represented as:
Beginning of Loop
1. Physical body organs obtain physical sensory information from the outside world, and convert it into a series of electrical signals that can be understood by perception
2. Perception takes the electrical information and compares it against learned norms to translate it into a medium of thought that can be understood by the consciousness and sub-consciousness
3. A sub-conscious process determines if it has received information is at the optimal distance and the body is position at the appropriate distance from the objects perceived to be around it, if not, it determines the best way to move and for a moment this is stored.
4. Consciousness acts on this information (The details of which are beyond the scope of this example)
5. The stored way to move the body from the sub-conscious (step three) is sent back to the body in the form of electrical impulses.
End of Loop
The above algorithm while relatively simple underlies Merleau-Ponty's belief that people find the optimal distance for viewing.is because we have been either hardwired, or trained with the above algorithm that runs and operates in most cases without our knowledge.
It is also important to note that there are similar sub-processes running all the time. People naturally shift their positions, not because of random unjustifiable desires, but because there is a sub-conscious process that has developed to prevent our bodies from sitting on one pressure point for two long. This process recognizes when this about to happen signals the muscles to adjust to ensure that one pressure point isn't deprived of blood as a result of prolonged pressure. The necessity of this process is readily apparent in nursing homes, where the nurses must turn their immobile patients on a regular basis to ensure that they don't get bed sores, which are the result prolonged pressure at a single point.
But to say all of these processes are automated all the time in everyone is a fallacy. These processes are similar to breathing, at most times they are on autopilot, but they can be controlled by conscious effort. Artists of all kinds understand how to find the ideal viewing point, and create images to view from the ideal viewing point.
Artists' ability to determine an ideal viewing point from their perspective is fundamental to many, but not all, artists' craft. A specific art to focus on is photography. A majority of artistic photographers (in comparison to documentary photographers) make their art not by photographing anything unique, but by adjusting the viewing position to push the viewer to reevaluate how they interact with the world.
Photographers force the viewer to reevaluate how they see the world this in many different ways. One method used is to arrange the items in the frame in such a way as to limit the ability of the viewer's mind to properly resolve the depth and the image, as shown in photograph number one. In this photo the dark sign on the left side is aligned with the building next to it. If the viewer has no prior knowledge of the location this arrangement of objects in the frame deprives the viewer of their natural ability to determine the size and relation of objects within the photograph. Stated differently is the sign taller than the building? Is the sign attached to the building?
Another method in which to force the viewer to reevaluate how they see the world is placing objects out of their expected alignment's to the world as shown in photograph three. In this photograph, a seemingly mundane set of college building stairs is manipulated in such a way as to force the viewer to evaluate through a less automatic set of thoughts which way is up, and determine this, not by the tools they are used to, but by a careful analysis of the photograph.
The final method in which we will examine is an artist's desire to illuminate the natural tendency of Merleau-Ponty's optimum viewing distance claim, and place the camera, and the viewer too close or in motion in relation to the object being photographed. Photograph six, is a jumble of shapes, but a very common set of shapes. This jumble of shapes, is clothing in a college dorm dryer, photographed at a viewing angle that is much closer than that expected. Photograph four, utilizes a different method, while the objects photographed, are at a reasonable viewing distance, the camera was in motion, as to obscure the objects photographed, and once again forces careful evaluation of the image. The final photograph, number five, utilizes both of the last two methods, the camera is both closer than normal to the object, and in motion.
These cases show that a skilled photographer can manipulate our perception. This is indicative of the limitations of video tele-presence systems. Stated differently a picture is worth a thousand words, but being there is worth a trillion, as the ability to adjust in an actual environment is something that we take for granted in non-tele-mediated interactions, but is very important to consider in tele-mediated interactions. The two dimensional nature of the product of a video or still camera serves to limit the information that the perceptual centers of our processing centers have to determine the information such as depth and special relationships that we normally use in our everyday world, thus by limiting the availability of information the two dimensional images force us to learn other ways to interpret what is presented to us.
But, what about three-dimensional stored images and interactive images? The three-dimensional images and movies that are provided by the common 3-d systems in use provide their images by isolating each eye and providing a different image to each of them, thus creating a three-dimensional image of depend on providing a preset variety of images, that the viewer cannot move around the image, and have the image adjust to the viewer's location.
In the November 2002 issue of “Technology Review” David H. Freedman describes holographic motion video systems currently in development that “Twelve years ago everyone thought this was completely impossible…” (p. 50-51) While these systems are possible, any real implementation still proves to be impossible. A “...single high-resolution hologram can easily use more than a terabyte of data.” (p. 53) While storing this data is a feasible task, this is to create one single high definition image without any updating, to provide even a low frame rate of 20 frames a second would require “…churning through 20 terabytes worth of information every second…” which is one-hundred thousandth of the rate of today's fastest PC's. This is just to provide a realistic three-dimensional image, and not even to provide the multi-channel experience that Dryfus suggests at the end of the chapter.
But all of these Herculean efforts are aimed at providing information to our physical sensory organs in a manner in which to fool perception. Our physical sensory organs are not the only way in which to input visual or other information. Michael Abrams states in the December 2002 issue of “Wired” that:
Our sense organs are mere input devices - wet USB ports. The basic premise, known as plasticity, is that the brain can adapt to new data channels by rewiring itself. It's a short step from there to sensory augmentation and substitution. New devices are extending pilots' perception of space, giving rudimentary sight to the blind, … “A nerve spike is a nerve spike,” says Paul Bach-y-Rita, professor of rehabilitation medicine and biomedical engineering at the University of Wisconsin. “…the Brain doesn't give a damn where the information is coming from.” (p. 046)
The question arises then, why bother creating tele-presence by providing information to the sense organs, and maintain an extra layer of interpretation that must be fooled, and provide tele-presence directly to the brain? While this is a far off concept it is not unthought-of of it is just the currently the domain of science fiction. There are many fictional works, which describe people plugging into a virtual reality where all of the sensory input is provided via computers and the resulting actions are executed on a virtual representation of a body in the computer world.
The most notable example of this concept is the movie, The Matrix, wherein a majority of the human populace is in a large computer driven simulation, forcefully plugged into the computerized simulation. This simulation is so realistic that most of the participitants are wholly unaware that they are within a computer simulation. (It is interesting to note that we have no way to prove or disprove that we currently are enslaved in similar system, the matrix as represented in the movie is nearly indistinguishable from our reality.) Those who have been separated from the simulation, can enter the simulation at will and because they are aware of the existence of the simulation can manipulate their virtual self images in a manner that is inconsistent with our understanding of how we can manipulate our physical bodies.
There are several other examples of sensory input being provided directly to the brain. One notable late seventies movie is Brainstorm, in which scientists develop a system to record someone's perception of the world, and then replay it for that person, or even someone else. While this is not an interactive experience in the sense that the viewer can change the action that is being replayed, the characters did exhibit the same obsessive tendencies that people exhibit with television, to an exponentially magnified degree.
The question still exists does a tele-presence system created by directly interfacing with our brain provide all the information that we receive from someone while in their actual presence? While it is impossible to actually explore this question, as these systems do not exist, I hypothesize that a direct brain connected tele-presence system would not provide all the same information. My explanations delve into the realm of religion and Meta-physics.
Many cultures and religions recognize that connections between people exist on a level that is not fully perceivable. These connections are stronger to specific people, and are “unexplainable.” The most rational explanations of these connections are provided by Unitarian Universalists. Minister Elizabeth Ellis, states in the Unitarian Universalist pamphlet “Spirituality: Unitarian Universalist Experiences” that “…spiritual life can bring us into touch with the interdependence of existence of which we are a part…” In the same pamphlet, a co-minister Makanah Elizabeth Morriss states that “…I allow myself to feel and experience the connections of life—seen and unseen—and to probe more openly and deeply into the energies of ultimate meaning that they offer.”
Perhaps these connections do not need to be tele-mediated, but instead will mediate themselves over the distance without the need to a computerized connection. People have reported connections and the ability to gain valid knowledge about people with whom they have a connection over great distances, without any traceable form of communication, perhaps then the connections that make presence so compelling, with find their own way into tele-presence.
In exploring tele-presence, it is natural to divide the experience into multiple different parts, and replicate them all, but it is the gestalt of the experience, sound, vision, meta-connections, tactile senses, smells, and a multitude of other inputs and outputs in which we communicate with each other must be put together as a whole, and not in a piecemeal fashion to achieve the full effect of presence, if this is not achieved we are left with a fragmented awareness and not fully in a physical presence, or tele-presence.