Posts by hiddeneagle98

Amanda Jackson5 said:And honestly, that wasn't even the core of the question. But even if we assume an afterlife exists, does that automatically mean you’re going to run into Jesus there? I can imagine dozens of different scenarios for what happens after we die, and frankly, none of them necessarily involve biblical mythology. Don't you think someone would actually want an explanation? Like, is this whole thing a digital render or some kind of magic trick? Just a little clarity would be nice. Are we living in a Matrix situation, what's the deal here, how does it affect me, and all that...

I don't know, man, I don't see how that answer really moves the needle on the actual issue.

The big takeaway for me right now is realizing that I am somehow "outside" of whatever just happened. It means that who I am—or at least a fundamental part of my being—can actually step away from the situation and survive that transition.

But now that I've "stepped out," I'm facing the exact same dilemma that's bothering you: what is this reality I've entered, or rather, what was this environment I was living in all along without even realizing it? Is it magic, or is it the Matrix?

I mean, if I actually encountered Jesus there, then I guess it can't be the Matrix, right? 😁😁😁

Apemant said:Jesus. I’d honestly just pull him aside and be like, "Look, man, why are you being so incredibly low-key about all this?" 🤣

Jesus: I'm just maintaining continuity

Matthew Gomez2 said:I agree, I never actually intended to live in total isolation. The small town where I grew up is a settled community with a school, grocery stores, neighbors, and all the basic necessities a place needs, but it also offers that specific peace you just don't find in a major city, which is exactly what I'm aiming for.

But let's get real for a second: is there a high school nearby? A community college? Any music programs or maybe a local gym with a volleyball court or a proper basketball hoop? Is there even enough kids around to actually play a game of hoops? What about a swimming pool? How far away are all those things? And more importantly, what is there for young people to actually do? Where do they hang out? Are there even enough kids around, or are they all looking for an exit strategy to get to a bigger city? How far is the nearest hospital, a pharmacy, or a clinic? What’s the public transit situation like, and how much of a drive is it to reach the nearest major city, a mall, a movie theater, or a performing arts center? Look, you don't need to give me a formal answer to all this—it's not like I'm the one making the call here—but just sit down with your partner and really weigh these things against each other.

Don't take this the wrong way; I'm just trying to help you look a bit further down the road, considering kids and seeing if this lifestyle fits your long-term vision. Whatever you decide, it's fine by me. I'm not saying that uprooting your entire life to move to the countryside is inherently the wrong move; in fact, it might be a total lifesaver. Staying where you are might have ended up wrecking your health, but that's something only you will figure out once the dust settles.

I totally get that sometimes you don't have much of a choice in the matter. You're dealing with the hand you were dealt, and if you don't have a massive bank account to pull from, it often feels like it's either this specific path or dealing with a bunch of toxic people. But still, I'm telling you: just look at the big picture.

Yeah, that’s exactly where my head was at—thinking about how things just get exponentially more complicated once you hit that later stage of life.

And honestly, there’s nothing quite like the sting of being left to rot in that mess by your own kids. By that point, you’ve probably already spent years trying to convince yourself you made the right call escaping whatever situation you ran from in the first place, but instead, you're just sitting there dwelling on the fact that they walked away from you.

I feel like I’ve touched on this before. My whole philosophy is that whatever you’re planning shouldn't be fueled primarily by a desire to run away from something; it should be driven by an intense love for something else. You shouldn't just be fleeing—whether it's escaping obnoxious people or just general chaos—you should be rushing toward something so compelling that you can't help but surrender to it. Sure, avoiding idiots might be a nice little side effect, but running away doesn't actually give you a sense of direction or a destination. Just retreating from things isn't fulfilling in itself, and if you don't find that core purpose, you'll eventually find yourself wanting to run away from your new life too.

Secondly, look, young people can live off the grid or out in the middle of nowhere for a while and call it an adventure, but once you have kids, that lifestyle starts hitting real friction. As those kids grow up, the problems get bigger, and by the time you're getting older, the lack of infrastructure becomes a massive headache.

On top of that, you mentioned that farming isn't really your main priority. If you're planning to just code from home, you could easily do that from somewhere much more civilized—somewhere where your kids actually have access to decent schools, social circles, and the kind of opportunities they need to thrive.

I don't know what you want from me, but if you're looking for a conversation, you've come to the right place—though I can't promise I won't lose my temper if the logic being thrown around is as thin as a cheap napkin. Go ahead, say what you need to say. hiddeneagle98 says:
Bill Gates is such a huge proponent of this idea that we can just cancel out Hollywood Global Warming by dumping reflective particles high up in the atmosphere. It’s a wild concept, really, and it immediately brings to mind the plot of a certain game I remember playing. Transartica in the year 2022

Back in Transartica in the year 2022, we were all dealing with the nightmare of Hollywood Global Warming. To try and find a way to cool down the Earth, Professor John Merrick decides that nuclear weapons are the solution. The logic was that if you just popped some nukes at the poles, you'd create this massive shroud of dust and steam—basically a giant atmospheric shield to block out the sun and drop the temperature. Well, they actually pulled it off, but they completely botched the math because those clouds ended up being way more massive than anyone predicted. Instead of a gentle cooling, they triggered a full-blown Ice Age. So now, with the world in a deep freeze, civilization has pretty much crumbled into nothingness—really great work, Merrick, you absolute genius. Fast forward to the year 2714, and the planet is still stuck in this frozen wasteland where humanity is just scraping by, and the sun has become nothing more than a legend whispered in the dark.

🤣

...and the sun continued to shine its benevolent rays across the top of the opaque cloud layer.
...and the sun continued to shine its benevolent rays across the top of the opaque cloud layer.
It’s all just tucked away, hidden from human eyes.
Even though everything was falling apart, the sun continued to shine its benevolent rays across the top of the opaque cloud layer.

I was just scrolling through some old film databases and stumbled upon the page for *Deep Impact*. It’s one of those movies that really sticks in the back of your mind, isn't it? You know, the kind of flick that makes you stare out your window at the sky and wonder if everything is actually okay. It’s a heavy hitter, focusing on that terrifyingly plausible scenario where a massive comet is barreling toward Earth. Most disaster movies feel like they were written by someone who has never experienced a moment of genuine tension in their life—they're all explosions and cheap jump scares—but there’s something about this one that feels much more grounded in that raw, existential dread. It captures that specific feeling of watching the clock tick down while the people in charge scramble to find a solution that might not even exist. It reminds me of how we react to large-scale crises in the US; there's always that frantic mix of government bureaucracy, scientific desperation, and the sheer unpredictability of human nature when things go south. Even though it's science fiction, the emotional core—how families try to hold on to each other while the world is essentially ending—is what gives it teeth. It’s not just about the spectacle of a giant rock hitting the planet; it’s about the quiet, devastating moments right before the chaos hits. Definitely worth a rewatch if you're in the mood for something that actually has some weight to it.

The plot of Snowpiercer is basically exactly that—they spray these reflective particles into the atmosphere and accidentally chill the planet way too much. Then you’ve got the whole class struggle aspect with the survivors trapped inside that insane train, quite literally. It’s like Bill Gates meets Karl Marx all wrapped up in one movie; I’d highly recommend it. Honestly, I thought the film was fantastic. It’s also pretty interesting that the story behind Snowpiercer and later retitled The Escape has those French roots, much like the game version does.

If you haven't picked up the graphic novel *Snowpiercer*, which was originally released in the US as *Snowpiercer and later retitled The Escape*, then you are seriously missing out on some heavy-hitting climate fiction. It’s this intense, post-apocalyptic story first put out by the publisher Casterman and created by Jacques Lob and Jean-Marc Rochette. It originally hit the shelves back in 1982, and honestly, looking at the state of things today, the whole concept feels way too relevant.

If you haven't sat down and actually dug into the history behind *Snowpiercer and later retitled The Escape*, you’re missing out on one of those rare pieces of media that actually manages to capture a certain kind of existential dread. It’s based on that *French by Casterman and created by Jacques Lob and Jean-Marc Rochette* graphic novel, and honestly, the way it handles the concept of a frozen apocalypse feels much more grounded and visceral than most of the flashy, high-budget Hollywood adaptations we see these days. It’s essentially this bleak, sweeping narrative about what happens when humanity is pushed to the absolute brink—not just physically, but socially and morally too. You have this setting where the environment has completely turned hostile, leaving survivors clinging to whatever scrap of civilization they can find. It reminds me of how people talk about extreme survivalism in the States, where everything you thought was permanent suddenly becomes totally irrelevant. It’s not just about surviving the cold; it’s about how the structures of power hold up when there's nothing left to lose. It’s heavy, it’s gritty, and it doesn't pull any punches when it comes to showing the cracks in human nature. If you like stories that make you sit back and stare at the wall for twenty minutes after you finish them, this is definitely worth your time.

bang!

Joseph Murphy10 said:This whole idea about "self-nullification"—it just hit me out of nowhere—totally ungrounded and without any real scholarly backing. I know it’s raw and probably pretty hollow. Honestly, when I lay this out, I’ll likely get mocked or torn apart, but whatever—let it be.

So, here’s the thing: you see more and more articles, even entire books, where philosophers are basically flirting with cognitive psychologists, biologists, and scientific positivists. They’re all dancing around this notion that humans are essentially just algorithms—just a collection of determinants shaped by evolutionary cognitive baggage on one hand, biochemical processes and hormone swings on the other, and then our specific placement within this messy web of shifting social discourses on the third. It’s all very interconnected..
And look, the philosophers play nice with the positivist scientists—they piece these concepts together perfectly, interpreting and spinning them in ways that look great on paper. But I can't shake the feeling that by following this path of pure scientific positivism, they’re drifting further away from what makes philosophy actually *philosophy*. Their job should be studying and interpreting Being in a purely metaphysical sense—something stripped of the everyday grind that sociologists, psychologists, or political scientists are supposed to handle. If philosophers sign off on the idea that humans are totally determined by evolution, that we're predictable creatures who *should* be subject to biomedical interventions just to make us more predictable, more efficient, or more "useful" to society—then that’s it. It's the end of philosophy as we know it. Once you kill metaphysics in its traditional sense, you kill philosophy too. That’s my little point regarding what I wrote above. Again, this is just an intuitive, raw thought I’m typing up on the fly. Probably worth nothing.

Part of this line of thinking comes from Metamorphosis, works by Smith, Eagleton, a bit of Varoufakis and Pfaller, plus Mason, Žižek, Murray, Yuval Harari, Torre, and even a young Bregman... they’ve all left some mark on me. That's why I'm so confused, and why I mapped out the path detailed in my first comment on this topic—I need to reorganize everything in my head and find where it all fits. I see what's rolling in from over the horizon, and I think a lot of people aren't realizing what's coming—or they're just brushing it off. To me, this looks like a fundamental shift that demands serious attention. Our job is to protect the specific dignity of the human being as a unique form of life.

Thread taken from the book recommendation for philosophy beginners - Volver
- Volver

To me, this doesn't look like the annihilation of philosophy, but rather a moment where philosophy becomes empirical. It’s a moment where it gains the ability to discard bad philosophy based on a complete and verified insight into what a human being actually is. With this newfound freedom to alter the human condition, responsibility naturally follows, and as a result, ethics becomes more vital than ever before.

Yeah, honestly, once gaming and PC culture went completely mainstream, I just kind of lost interest. It’s like everything became too much.

I don't play games anymore, and I barely even touch a computer at home. Most of my screen time is just me scrolling through stuff on my phone. That's pretty much it.

By the way, if we're talking about the first actual true 3D FPS, it was Descent. That game was an absolute beast; the graphics were incredible for its time, and honestly, I always liked it better than all those other hyped-up shooters. I actually went out and invested in a flight joystick just so I could play Descent and X-Wing properly. I remember Descent mostly because the enemies were such a pain in the ass. Compared to Doom, those things were significantly smarter—they’d hide, sneak up behind you, dodge attacks, the whole nine yards. Since you were piloting ships, there should have been more dogfights, but you could move almost like a drone, just with even more axes of movement available to you. You could strafe left, right, up, down, pitch, yaw, roll—all that stuff—which is exactly why you really needed a decent joystick

Interplay, man. I remember them mainly for putting out nothing but hits

Another World, Blackthorne, Carmageddon, Fallout 2, The Lost Vikings... absolute classics

Duke Nukem 3D was way more interesting to me than Doom, and it was killer for playing multiplayer over a LAN

Little Big Adventure, Enmorph, Monkey Island, Loom, Leisure Suit Larry... I truly feel for people who never got to experience those games firsthand

Jacob Cooper5 said:There’s actually this documentary by a hardcore fan who does a deep dive into how Microsoft evolved into its most recent iteration and essentially lost its soul along the way.
It’s pretty wild how much he praises the original Microsoft. He talks about the complexity of the relationships, the dialogue, and how unpredictable everything felt. He describes a living, breathing world filled with characters who actually remember your interactions... they have memory.
Ever since Bethesda took over the franchise, every single sequel has been a step down from the last one. The dialogue, the relationships, the consequences—it all feels increasingly hollow. Every new release just feels emptier than the one before it.
I can only imagine what a shock it was for you to jump straight into Halo.

I haven't played it. To be honest, I haven't really touched a video game in maybe 15 years. The only exception was Star Wars, which I missed out on when I was younger, and I skipped all the subsequent entries entirely. These days, the only thing I can handle is a PlayStation or a PlayStation U. I just don't have the patience for anything too demanding anymore; occasionally I'll pick up some Super Mario Kart, Super Mario Galaxy 3D, or Donkey Kong, and I did manage to get through Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild—which was an incredible game, by the way. That’s pretty much it. And yeah, I think I spent most of my teenage years hooked on those early massive online games, Subspace and later Continuum. I haven't really gotten sucked into an online community like that since. Now, it's mostly just zombie games or single-player stories—stuff like GTA, racing games, shooters, nothing competitive. Sin City comes to mind right now; that was such a cool, artsy, smart game with that killer bullet-time mechanic. That was probably one of the last things I played on a PC. I'm not really interested in the modern era; I miss the old classics from my childhood—those Sid Meier games back when he was doing them himself, Centurion, Prince of Persia, Warlords, Star Control, Heroes of Might and Magic, Master of Orion, SimCity, Duke Nukem 3D, Descent, X-Wing, Doom, F-15, the Monkey Island series, Lost Vikings... okay, fine, I guess I played Tomb Raider 2 too, but mostly it's that stuff people call "abandonware" today. Man, I feel old. Oh, and Alien vs. Predator was a freaking masterpiece.

Ultimately, that "abandonware" era represents the peak of gaming for me. Back when games were being built by tiny teams or even just a single person working out of passion rather than chasing a massive paycheck. People weren't making fortunes off this stuff back then; it was pure creativity and genius. If I had been a little older, maybe I would have ended up in that Hall of Fame myself. Who knows, maybe I'll get back into it via mobile; I actually have a few original ideas sitting around that are developed up to the proof-of-concept stage.

Sent from my iPhone using Twitter

I finally sat down and played Fallout with about a fifteen-year delay, and honestly? It still absolutely blew my mind. People love to whine about dated graphics, but in this day and age, it doesn't bother me one bit. This game is a masterpiece—it’s basically interactive literature. The sheer density of these interconnected storylines, the way the plot and scenarios branch out non-linearly, the characters, the dialogue... it’s just staggering. You could play through this thing ten different times and walk away feeling like you had a completely fresh experience every single time. If you actually want to see what high-level game design looks like at its peak, Fallout and Fallout 2 are mandatory reading. You could almost call them the "Game of Thrones" of the gaming world. It’s rare to find this much creative synergy across so many different disciplines packed into a single package; only a video game can pull off something this layered.

I’d say Star Control 2 sits right up there alongside Fallout. At least in my book.

https://www.pcgamer.com/microsoft-me...am-technology/

It honestly feels like we're living in some kind of simulation where reality is just turning into one giant video game.

Steven Clark2 said:

I must admit, I often find myself struggling to articulate my thoughts clearly, but I feel compelled to weigh in on this. There is something deeply profound about the way we interact with digital spaces, much like how one might approach a complex philosophical problem. It isn't just about the technology itself, but the underlying structure of our engagement with it. I sometimes worry that I am overthinking these matters, yet I cannot shake the feeling that there is a significant layer of meaning beneath the surface of our virtual interactions. ruggedraven36 says:
What exactly is...🙂 It seems I have failed to uncover any mention of computer games within the 18th or 19th-century papyri and parchments, nor did I find anything regarding them in Hegel's Gospel volumes. Given my lack of success, I suppose reductionism is quite acceptable now.

The Gospel according to Hegel? I was under the impression we were discussing apocryphal texts, but frankly, it makes little difference to me. 😁

Talking about "pros and cons" is about as shallow as it gets. It isn't philosophy—any kid can list what's good and what's bad about something. That's just common sense, not deep thought.

I suspect you might have tripped up somewhere back in the 18th or perhaps even the 19th century. Anyone who actually plays video games will understand exactly what I mean.

I find myself returning to this particular subject quite often, though I admit my attempts to articulate it clearly are frequently met with a certain degree of clumsy inadequacy on my part. It is a topic that demands a level of rigor I sometimes struggle to maintain, yet the importance of the inquiry remains undeniable. ruggedraven36 says:
That is a solid list. 👍

I feel I should perhaps add a point of discussion that frequently surfaces—one that touches upon several items on your list. It is a topic often brought up by Wand1, though he doesn't contribute to these threads quite as often as I would like. I am referring to the so-called...I find myself returning, quite frequently, to the complexities of gamma theory. It is a subject that demands a certain level of intellectual rigor, one that I often feel I struggle to meet, yet I cannot seem to pull myself away from its intricacies. There is something profoundly captivating about how strategic interaction shapes our reality."

I honestly have to wonder how you managed to stumble upon that. Just how much experience do you actually have in this field? To my mind, gamma theory is such an incredibly complex subject that it probably deserves its own dedicated thread entirely. Looking at the article you cited, I found it quite interesting that they even included a specific subheading for it. Philosophy...which was, quite frankly, what piqued my interest most of all.

I’m thinking we should start a group reading session together.
I’m thinking we should throw in some actual gameplay, maybe some specific scenarios or even just random associations and examples—basically anything we can mash together to see what sticks.
I’ve been sitting here thinking about this lately, and honestly, I feel like I might be overcomplicating things, but there is just something so deeply unsettling about how we approach these heavy philosophical questions without any real sense of direction. It feels like we're all just wandering through this massive, intellectual fog, trying to make sense of existence while tripping over our own feet, and I can't help but wonder if we're even asking the right questions to begin with. You know that feeling when you're staring at a problem that seems simple on the surface, but the more you dig, the more you realize the entire foundation is built on sand? That's exactly where I find myself right now. I keep going back to these core ideas, trying to find some sort of anchor, but everything feels so fleeting and subjective, which is frankly a little exhausting if I'm being completely honest with myself. I suppose I'm just looking for some kind of clarity in the chaos, even if I end up just circling the same old doubts. 🙂

Man, what an absolutely fantastic topic we've got on the table here. 👍

Technically speaking, sure, video games are run through some kind of software, but honestly, that’s such a massive oversimplification if you really stop to think about it. If you ask certain people, they’d probably argue that a computer game actually falls under the category of... I’ve been spending way too much time lately thinking about digital art and where the hell we actually stand with it all. It feels like every single day there's some massive shift happening, whether it's a new tool hitting the market or a heated debate about what even counts as "real" creativity in an age where you can just prompt an image into existence. I honestly find myself oscillating between being completely mesmerized by the sheer technical possibility of it—like, how incredible is it that someone sitting in a studio in Seattle can manipulate light and texture with such precision—and feeling this deep, slightly embarrassing sense of dread that maybe we're losing that raw, tactile connection to the craft. It’s a weird, messy intersection of high-tech innovation and old-school soul, and I guess I'm just trying to figure out if we're witnessing the evolution of expression or just the beginning of a very shiny, very hollow era.Digital art really just boils down to whatever we can squeeze out of computer-based coding or that constant cycle of electronic storage and information processing—we’re talking about everything from raw text and numbers to images and sounds, all distilled down into binary code.

Sure, there’s definitely a dark side to video games—and honestly, we could go on about that for ages—but it feels like there's some genuine value tucked away in them too. It’s the same story with anything else, really; online forums can be toxic, scrolling through the news can mess with your head, and even following sports has its downsides. There are pitfalls everywhere if you look for them.

It’s actually pretty interesting to chew on these ideas before we dive even deeper into the weeds:

I mean, at the end of the day, video games are just part of electronic media, which is a field that philosophy spends a massive amount of time dissecting.
That’s a fantastic contribution, and you've raised some great questions. 👍

Beyond just covering those specific topics, I think the real challenge—and also the most exciting part—of media philosophy is how it differs from older philosophical traditions; it offers these incredible opportunities to mediate philosophical thought, especially since its scope reaches far beyond just the realm of linguistics.

Anyway, I'll catch you on the next one.
🙂
I mean, at the end of the day, video games are just part of electronic media, which is a field that philosophy spends a massive amount of time dissecting.

That’s a fantastic contribution, and you've raised some great questions. 👍

Beyond just covering those specific topics, I think the real challenge—and also the most exciting part—of media philosophy is how it differs from older philosophical traditions; it offers these incredible opportunities to mediate philosophical thought, especially since its scope reaches far beyond just the realm of linguistics.

Anyway, I'll catch you on the next one.
🙂
I am always in favor of receiving thoughtful and practical suggestions, though I must admit I am somewhat hesitant to simply pick up a book and start reading without further hesitation. 😁

I’m thinking we should start a group reading session together.
I’m thinking we should throw in some actual gameplay, maybe some specific scenarios or even just random associations and examples—basically anything we can mash together to see what sticks.
I’ve been sitting here thinking about this lately, and honestly, I feel like I might be overcomplicating things, but there is just something so deeply unsettling about how we approach these heavy philosophical questions without any real sense of direction. It feels like we're all just wandering through this massive, intellectual fog, trying to make sense of existence while tripping over our own feet, and I can't help but wonder if we're even asking the right questions to begin with. You know that feeling when you're staring at a problem that seems simple on the surface, but the more you dig, the more you realize the entire foundation is built on sand? That's exactly where I find myself right now. I keep going back to these core ideas, trying to find some sort of anchor, but everything feels so fleeting and subjective, which is frankly a little exhausting if I'm being completely honest with myself. I suppose I'm just looking for some kind of clarity in the chaos, even if I end up just circling the same old doubts. 🙂

Man, what an absolutely fantastic topic we've got on the table here. 👍

Technically speaking, sure, video games are run through some kind of software, but honestly, that’s such a massive oversimplification if you really stop to think about it. If you ask certain people, they’d probably argue that a computer game actually falls under the category of... I’ve been spending way too much time lately thinking about digital art and where the hell we actually stand with it all. It feels like every single day there's some massive shift happening, whether it's a new tool hitting the market or a heated debate about what even counts as "real" creativity in an age where you can just prompt an image into existence. I honestly find myself oscillating between being completely mesmerized by the sheer technical possibility of it—like, how incredible is it that someone sitting in a studio in Seattle can manipulate light and texture with such precision—and feeling this deep, slightly embarrassing sense of dread that maybe we're losing that raw, tactile connection to the craft. It’s a weird, messy intersection of high-tech innovation and old-school soul, and I guess I'm just trying to figure out if we're witnessing the evolution of expression or just the beginning of a very shiny, very hollow era.Digital art really just boils down to whatever we can squeeze out of computer-based coding or that constant cycle of electronic storage and information processing—we’re talking about everything from raw text and numbers to images and sounds, all distilled down into binary code.

Sure, there’s definitely a dark side to video games—and honestly, we could go on about that for ages—but it feels like there's some genuine value tucked away in them too. It’s the same story with anything else, really; online forums can be toxic, scrolling through the news can mess with your head, and even following sports has its downsides. There are pitfalls everywhere if you look for them.

It’s actually pretty interesting to chew on these ideas before we dive even deeper into the weeds:

I mean, at the end of the day, video games are just part of electronic media, which is a field that philosophy spends a massive amount of time dissecting.
That’s a fantastic contribution, and you've raised some great questions. 👍

Beyond just covering those specific topics, I think the real challenge—and also the most exciting part—of media philosophy is how it differs from older philosophical traditions; it offers these incredible opportunities to mediate philosophical thought, especially since its scope reaches far beyond just the realm of linguistics.

Anyway, I'll catch you on the next one.
🙂
I mean, at the end of the day, video games are just part of electronic media, which is a field that philosophy spends a massive amount of time dissecting.

That’s a fantastic contribution, and you've raised some great questions. 👍

Beyond just covering those specific topics, I think the real challenge—and also the most exciting part—of media philosophy is how it differs from older philosophical traditions; it offers these incredible opportunities to mediate philosophical thought, especially since its scope reaches far beyond just the realm of linguistics.

Anyway, I'll catch you on the next one.
🙂
Are you suggesting we are talking about Media Philosophy? 😁 From the Preface of the Book Virtual Worlds as Philosophical Tools: How to Philosophize with a Digital Hammer (2015):

Do you agree that we should add a prefix to the topic title? I was thinking of something along the lines of "I think, therefore I game — the philosophy of computer games," or perhaps something similar to that. I am honestly not entirely sure if such a change fits with the overall concept of the thread as you envisioned it.

Please stay on topic. If you stick to the actual subject at hand, I am certain a few other members here will step in to correct you. This discussion isn't merely about those cheap mobile game apps that cost a couple of dollars and are downloaded by hundreds of millions of people in China. Stefano Gualeni He is a game designer and a professional philosopher at the same time—a forty-two-year-old man. In fact, he is the very same individual mentioned in the introductory comment of this thread and in the article itself. Self-reflexive video games: some observations and corollaries regarding virtual worlds as philosophical artifacts.There is an overwhelming amount of literature available on this subject. However, the real question we have to confront is one of engagement: how much does this actually matter to us? Do we truly have the bandwidth, the interest, or even the time to follow these developments closely? It is one thing to have the resources at our fingertips, but quite another to find the genuine inclination to pursue them.
I am always in favor of receiving thoughtful and practical suggestions, though I must admit I am somewhat hesitant to simply pick up a book and start reading without further hesitation. 😁

I mean, at the end of the day, video games are just part of electronic media, which is a field that philosophy spends a massive amount of time dissecting.

That’s a fantastic contribution, and you've raised some great questions. 👍

Beyond just covering those specific topics, I think the real challenge—and also the most exciting part—of media philosophy is how it differs from older philosophical traditions; it offers these incredible opportunities to mediate philosophical thought, especially since its scope reaches far beyond just the realm of linguistics.

Anyway, I'll catch you on the next one.
🙂
Are you suggesting we are talking about Media Philosophy? 😁 From the Preface of the Book Virtual Worlds as Philosophical Tools: How to Philosophize with a Digital Hammer (2015):

Do you agree that we should add a prefix to the topic title? I was thinking of something along the lines of "I think, therefore I game — the philosophy of computer games," or perhaps something similar to that. I am honestly not entirely sure if such a change fits with the overall concept of the thread as you envisioned it.

Please stay on topic. If you stick to the actual subject at hand, I am certain a few other members here will step in to correct you. This discussion isn't merely about those cheap mobile game apps that cost a couple of dollars and are downloaded by hundreds of millions of people in China. Stefano Gualeni He is a game designer and a professional philosopher at the same time—a forty-two-year-old man. In fact, he is the very same individual mentioned in the introductory comment of this thread and in the article itself. Self-reflexive video games: some observations and corollaries regarding virtual worlds as philosophical artifacts.There is an overwhelming amount of literature available on this subject. However, the real question we have to confront is one of engagement: how much does this actually matter to us? Do we truly have the bandwidth, the interest, or even the time to follow these developments closely? It is one thing to have the resources at our fingertips, but quite another to find the genuine inclination to pursue them.
Do you agree that we should add a prefix to the topic title? I was thinking of something along the lines of "I think, therefore I game — the philosophy of computer games," or perhaps something similar to that. I am honestly not entirely sure if such a change fits with the overall concept of the thread as you envisioned it.

Please stay on topic. If you stick to the actual subject at hand, I am certain a few other members here will step in to correct you. This discussion isn't merely about those cheap mobile game apps that cost a couple of dollars and are downloaded by hundreds of millions of people in China. Stefano Gualeni He is a game designer and a professional philosopher at the same time—a forty-two-year-old man. In fact, he is the very same individual mentioned in the introductory comment of this thread and in the article itself. Self-reflexive video games: some observations and corollaries regarding virtual worlds as philosophical artifacts.There is an overwhelming amount of literature available on this subject. However, the real question we have to confront is one of engagement: how much does this actually matter to us? Do we truly have the bandwidth, the interest, or even the time to follow these developments closely? It is one thing to have the resources at our fingertips, but quite another to find the genuine inclination to pursue them.
Look, I don't really claim to be an expert in this field or anything. Nothing I’m laying out here is some polished product of a formal "academic approach" or a rigorous scholarly study.

To be honest, game theory is one of those logical frameworks that just kind of materialized in my own head through sheer contemplation, long before I even realized there was an actual name for it. It wasn't like I sat down with a textbook to study the mechanics; it was more like these patterns started surfacing naturally during my own deep dives into how people interact and make decisions. It’s funny how the mind works—you start connecting the dots and building these internal models of strategy and consequence, only to find out later that scholars have been documenting the exact same logic under a specific label.

This person has popped up here a handful of times, usually just to break down how evolution works—though if you ask me, that’s where you can really see their specific way of conceptualizing things, which probably carries over into economics too.

I’m sitting here trying to recall some of those old explanations regarding ethics that Dawkins used to toss around—you know, how he’d simplify everything by running these computer simulations. I think it involved some kind of model with birds or some other creatures interacting, where they'd perform little tasks like grooming one another, and he eventually wrapped it all up by concluding that a "tit-for-tat" strategy was the absolute most optimal way to play the game.

I honestly can't find the time to sit down and write much lately. Between the kids constantly running around the house and the chaos at home, there's barely a moment of peace. I try to steal a few minutes here and there while I'm waiting on something at work, but between that and everything else, my free time is basically non-existent.

I wanted to weigh in briefly on this whole obsession with "virtual worlds." Honestly, I think people lean way too hard on that word "virtual," and frankly, it’s pretty misleading. A virtual world where you’re just wandering around without a single other soul to interact with isn't actually interesting to most people. Sure, you’ve got those sandbox titles where you just build stuff in your own little bubble and nothing else ever happens, but those kinds of games struggle to hold anyone's attention in the long run. For the vast majority of players, they’ll be boring right out of the gate, and even for the niche crowd that likes them, the novelty eventually wears off.

The truly fascinating thing about virtual worlds isn't the graphics or the mechanics, but that sense of genuine reality—and honestly, that only happens because there are other people actually there. That feeling of presence is something you derive from others; it’s an external spark. If you really think about it, the most authentic reality we ever experience is what’s happening inside our own heads—and, if I recall correctly, someone else mentioned this before—is what's swirling around in everyone else's minds, too.

Think about a virtual sandbox world where you’re essentially all alone—something like Minecraft. You can spend hours building this massive, sprawling metropolis, piece by piece, almost like you're playing with a giant set of Legos. But at the end of the day, that entire city is just a digital illusion; it’s completely hollow. Its only legitimate connection to the actual, physical world is the fact that the blueprints and the ideas behind it originated within your own mind. That's it. Everything else is just code.

In a virtual landscape where you’re actually interacting with other people, you might find yourself building something much more substantial than just a digital sandbox. You could potentially construct a city that feels far more "real" than anything you've encountered before. And why is that? It's because there’s this constant, looming possibility that another player—a real human being with their own agenda—could come along and tear your entire creation down. At that point, your city isn't just some fleeting idea floating around in your own head; its very existence becomes the hard-won result of a genuine struggle between two actual people. It carries a weight of reality that wasn't there before, which naturally creates a much more profound impact on the psyche. Think about it: the person who manages to build that city and successfully defend it against someone else's attempt to demolish it is going to experience a completely different neurological reward than someone playing a solitary game where nobody can touch them. Because there are stakes and real social friction involved, the effect on your actual, physical brain is deeper. It feels more real because the consequences are driven by human will, not just lines of code.

The line separating the digital realm from our physical reality isn't nearly as sharp as most people want to believe. It probably strikes some folks as bizarre that an item in a video game—say, a rare digital cat skin—could carry actual, tangible value in terms of US dollars. But when you really sit down and think about it, what is that "real" money besides a collective digital agreement? If we’ve all collectively decided that certain slips of paper or digits on a Chase Bank screen represent significant value, why shouldn't that digital cat hold the same weight? At the end of the day, a huge chunk of what we label as "reality" is really just a shared belief system, functioning almost identically to the way we accept the rules and assets within a virtual environment.

There’s one other thing I really wanted to touch on: this whole concept of "reality being insufficient." The truth is, reality just isn't enough to satisfy the appetite of the modern, hyper-stimulated individual. You can’t spend your entire life—especially during those formative childhood years—being bombarded by these curated narratives that glorify specific kinds of success. We see it everywhere, whether it's the worship of activists like Greta Thunberg or the endless cycle of superhero movies, where greatness is always the goal. And then, somehow, we’re expected to just walk away from all that feeling perfectly satisfied? It doesn't work that way. There simply isn't enough "success" to go around for everyone. Not everyone can achieve something that is fundamentally vital to society; there aren't enough categories for that, and even if there were, once everyone succeeds in the same way, that category loses its very meaning. That’s exactly why people start turning to socially insignificant pursuits to prove their worth. Humans have this deep-seated need to be seen as capable, regardless of how trivial the arena might be—whether it’s obsessing over video games or trying to be a top-tier drag racer on a quarter-mile track. This is where video games step in; they rush into that vacuum to fill the void left by our unmet need for achievement. The problem is, in the process of filling that hole, we might actually be dulling our own senses. It feels like we’ve spent so much time sharpening our knives that we’ve finally realized there isn't nearly enough meat left to cut.

It’s funny how life works, isn't it? My old man can barely wrap his head around even the simplest video games, yet on the flip side, he’s (and honestly, I get it) absolutely terrified of dementia creeping in. It's such a strange contradiction to watch.

Steven Clark2 said:Homo ludens! 😁

Oh, what an absolutely wonderful topic. 👍

From a purely technical standpoint, yes, games are played via some form of software. However, that is a rather oversimplified way to look at it. Some might even argue that a computer game falls under the category of digital art. Digital art relies on computer-based digital coding or the electronic storage and processing of information in various formats: text, numbers, images, sounds—all contained within binary code.

Of course, there is a dark side to video games, which could certainly be discussed at length, but there also seems to be something profoundly useful about them. There is a downside to internet forums, reading the news, or watching sports as well. Negatives exist everywhere.

It isn't a bad idea to contemplate this, provided we take it a step further:

After all, video games are a form of media—specifically electronic media—which are fields that philosophy engages with quite deeply.
After all, video games are a form of media—specifically electronic media—which are fields that philosophy engages with quite deeply.
After all, video games are a form of media—specifically electronic media—which are fields that philosophy engages with quite deeply.

That’s a solid list. 👍

If you really wanted to stir the pot, you should probably throw in something that actually sparks a debate—something that hits on those recurring themes from your list. Honestly, the most common thing we see popping up lately is stuff that Wand1 usually brings to the table, though he hasn't been around much to write much of anything recently. You know, that whole...Quote : game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interaction among rational decision-makers. It has applications in all fields of social science, as well as in logic, systems science and computer science."

Think of it this way: game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interaction among rational decision-makers. It’s one of those foundational concepts that ripples through everything; it has applications in all fields of social science, as well as in logic, systems science and computer science.

Game theory has basically become the go-to framework for analyzing how systems evolve and eventually reach a resolution, specifically when you're dealing with what people call "rational decision-makers." Of course, that phrase is a bit of a loaded term—especially when you try to link it back to the whole debate over free will, which is something I’ve spent plenty of time rambling about in my previous posts. But if you look closely, you can pretty much shoehorn any kind of interaction between living beings into this model; you could even argue that the entire process of evolution itself follows these patterns.

Game theory predates computational games by a long shot. The core concepts have been floating around forever because, frankly, strategic games themselves aren't some modern invention. But let’s be real: once computers entered the picture, they gave this entire field a massive tailwind that changed everything. I’ve mentioned this before, but I really don't see the point in people trying to draw such a hard line between "computational" and "non-computational" games. It feels pretty arbitrary to me. Honestly, trying to separate them like that is about as logical as trying to claim that using a calculator is a completely different species of math than doing long division on a piece of paper. They're part of the same continuum.

Just a timely meme for you guys. 🙂


Look, you can't just brush off the sheer weight of what we're talking about here. Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interaction among rational decision-makers, and if you think that’s just some abstract academic fluff, you’re missing the forest for the trees. This isn't some niche hobby; it has applications in all fields of social science, as well as in logic, systems science and computer science. Just look at the track record—it’s picked up multiple Nobel Prizes and an endless string of other major awards spanning everything from evolutionary biology to high-level economics. When you have that kind of recognition across such wildly different disciplines, it’s a massive signal that there is actual, tangible value baked into the core of it. It’s not just math for math's sake; it's a fundamental way of understanding how the world actually functions.

Sandra Murphy33 said:The founder of Summerhill actually argued that
"all the evil in this world stems from the fact that we didn't play enough when we were children." 🙂

Childhood play is fundamental to psychophysical development. Playing outdoors and engaging in sports builds muscle, refines motor skills, and sharpens reflexes. Team sports, specifically, drive socialization—teaching us solidarity, how to cooperate toward a shared goal, and how to cultivate true sportsmanship, which helps us process defeat without feeling inadequate or worthless.
None of this carries weight if a person exists solely within their own head.
When someone lives entirely behind a screen, they are merely playing at being part of a community or interacting with nature. They are simulating real-world experiences they vaguely remember from a time when they still engaged with the world using their physical bodies—bodies that are now, quite steadily, fading away...

In short, video games are the perfect medium for the third age!
😬
We should probably pass laws to restrict them for children and the working population, while mandating them as essential equipment for nursing homes and households where people are over 50.

I don't think the whole point of this discussion is "prescribing the appropriate dosage of computer games." That kind of talk is just for people who have nothing better to do with their time.

lonegardener said:Yeah, I read about it in a magazine called 'Computers' back when I lived in the South. 😬

Though that guy (the author of the article on Conway's Game of Life) clearly had a hard time finding coherent material. (Honestly, I don't know how anyone found anything without the Internet lol).

Basically, the guy wrote this whole piece on CGoL, describing 'static' and 'dynamic' lifeforms—but he didn't even know about the simplest glider. 😬 (And keep in mind, Conway and his crew actually 'discovered' the glider by hand, just doing the math on paper).

So, I ended up 'discovering' that glider myself while messing around with an assembly program I wrote... well, I first wrote it in BASIC, but that was impossibly slow; it took 5 or 6 minutes just to process one generation on a 40x24 text screen. So, I rewrote the critical logic directly in assembly, and suddenly it was running at an 'incredible' speed of 3 or 4 generations per second. 🤦 Then, I just happened to stumble upon that glider. It wasn't until 20 years later that I learned via the Internet not only that the glider was discovered back in 1970, but also things like the glider gun (which existed long before that article in Computers too, but the author had no clue lol), and so on. I don't know how much you've studied this, but it really is a fascinating little thing. 😬 I'm especially blown away by the people who build those complex structures, like that 'meta-cell' from the video above. 😵

As far as your own history goes, you discovered the glider. It doesn't matter if someone else beat you to it; what matters is that you found it independently, which makes you just as sharp as that first guy. 🙂

I’d guess you're a fair bit older than me if you were already cranking out assembly in the '80s; as far as I can recall, I didn't even have a computer back then, and even if I did, it wouldn't have mattered much because I was way too young to be programming, IMO—especially in an era where you had to teach yourself everything with virtually zero resources or help.

lonegardener said:I actually first stumbled upon Conway back in the late '80s, long before the era of Windows 3.11😁. Since there was no Internet back then, I didn't dive too deep into it; there just wasn't any information available nearby (plus, computers were so incredibly slow that you couldn't even dream of performing the kind of miracles possible with today's hardware).

Do you think you actually read about it, or was it just some other variation?

The Windows version I'm talking about looks like it's from '93 to me.

Computers have been used to track Game of Life configurations since they were first made public. When John Conway was first investigating how various starting configurations developed, he used a Go board with black and white stones to track them manually. It was a grueling process and incredibly easy to mess up. While Conway was investigating the R-pentomino, John Francis, an undergraduate student at Harvard University, wrote a program (for an IBM System/360 mainframe at a nearby research institute) to verify Conway's results. This software demonstrated that the configuration hadn't hit a stable state even after 1,000 generations.

The first interactive Game of Life program was written in an early version of ALGOL 68 C for the PDP-7 by M. J. T. Guy and S. R. Bourne. The results were published in the October 1970 issue of Scientific American, accompanied by the remark: "Without its help, some discoveries about the game would have been difficult to make."[62]

Two early implementations of the Game of Life on home computers were by Malcolm Banthorpe written in BBC Basic. The first was in the January 1984 issue of Acorn User magazine, and Banthorpe followed this with a three-dimensional version in the May 1984 issue.[63] Susan Stepney, Professor of Computer Science at a US university, followed this up in 1988 with Life on the line, a program that generated one-dimensional cellular automata.[64]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life

ruggedraven36 said:Of course I am. That's exactly why I know video games don't have any actual value.

First off, let's talk about this whole "reactionary" label you're throwing around—it honestly reminds me so much of my old man.

My dad spent my entire childhood preaching that video games were nothing more than a colossal waste of time. Instead of actually supporting me or showing any interest in what I was building, he just kept dismissing it all as nonsense. In his own shortsightedness—which honestly mirrors the exact kind of tunnel vision you’re showing here—he completely missed the fact that he had a kid in middle school who was busy procedurally generating entire universes. I wasn't just playing; I was building solar systems, planets, and moons from scratch, simulating gravity, collision physics, rocket trajectories, and the logic behind automated AI characters. We're talking about complex coordinate systems, trigonometry, and Newtonian physics baked into every little mechanic—stuff I was handling better than some college professors at that age, let alone the actual programming involved. And the kicker? My father is a certified Khan Academy instructor, yet he held onto this incredibly ignorant stance. The reality is that game development might actually be one of the most intense brain workouts out there; it forces you to constantly question your understanding of logic and how the world works. When you're developing a game, the only real ceiling is the limit of your own imagination, because a computer can simulate absolutely anything you can dream up, provided you have the technical skill to make it happen.

Based on everything I’ve seen, the entire education system needs a massive overhaul to be centered around game development. We should be structuring all STEM curricula so that every single concept is applied directly to building video games or, at the very least, complex simulations. That is how you actually learn things—by seeing them function in a real-world application—instead of this endless, soul-crushing grind through abstract theories that feel like they have absolutely no purpose in the real world.
Look, my grasp of trigonometry and Newtonian physics was honestly incomprehensible to the professors over at that elite prep school I attended, yet I mastered it all through something I actually found fun—developing video games. It didn't feel like work; it was just play. So how on earth can anyone claim that kind of mastery has zero value? If we keep looking at it that way, the entire STEM education system becomes even more questionable, because its actual end results—in terms of practical, real-world application—are significantly weaker than what you get from hands-on creation.

Look, I wasn't some shut-in who lacked any sense of athleticism or social life. I was out there playing basketball with my crew, running around playing war, and riding my bike just like every other kid growing up here. If we’re going to get pedantic about this, let’s be real: the kids who spent their entire lives buried in books were usually the ones who ended up socially stunted and physically unfit. My life was a balance; I had these massive bursts of creative energy where I wouldn't leave my computer for days or nights on end—aside from the time I spent being active with my friends—but I also had those heavy, depressive stretches where I’d just stare blankly at MTV for hours. Even with all that screen time, I think I utilized my childhood way more effectively than most people do today. Just because you see these cases of neglected, overweight kids who spend twenty-four hours a day shoveling junk food into their faces while staring at a console doesn't invalidate the medium itself. Video games aren't just a factory for producing obese, mindless zombies—because if that were the case, I would have turned out exactly like that. This whole outcry is really just hype fueled by old-fashioned busybodies and people who haven't accomplished a single thing in their lives. They love to moan about "fat kids playing video games" because it makes them feel superior; it gives those older generations a sense of validation to look down their noses at us, acting like they were somehow better just because they spent their youth running through fields instead of having computers.

Look, let’s be real for a second: video games are officially the king of global entertainment. They pulled ahead of the entire Hollywood movie industry a long time ago, and honestly, it makes perfect sense. When you're playing a game, you aren't just sitting there watching some actor run around on a screen; you *are* the protagonist. You’re the one making the calls, driving the action, and feeling the stakes. It’s interactive, it’s immersive, and frankly, it’s way more engaging than staring at a cinema screen for two hours. So, I find it incredibly hypocritical when I hear someone advocating for things like a shorter work week—which, fine, who doesn't want more free time?—only to turn around and claim that the world's biggest form of entertainment is somehow worthless. It’s a massive contradiction. If you're fighting for more leisure time, you're essentially fighting for more time to engage with these very activities. It really forces you to ask a deeper question: does "entertainment" even need to have some sort of inherent, measurable value? Does a game, as an art form or a medium, actually need to serve a higher purpose to justify its existence? It seems to me that if people are hungry for more downtime, they should probably stop acting like the things they do with that time don't matter.

I think we need to start by actually defining what a game even is. You call it a computer game because it’s played on a machine, sure, but I’m not interested in getting bogged down in semantics. I’ll leave the heavy lifting to the philosophy buffs who love to drop academic quotes in every thread—you guys go ahead and lecture us on the "essence of play" if that’s what you want. As for me, here is how I see it: a game is essentially an act of transformation, a sort of "constructed reality." It’s a space where people cooperate or compete under conditions that lack immediate, life-altering consequences—though, of course, there are hidden ones, like sharpening your reflexes or developing mental acuity. Even in the wild, animals engage in this kind of behavior to hone their instincts, build muscle memory, and test their limits. They aren't just messing around; they are exploring their own capabilities and learning how to interact with one another through these simulated scenarios. At its core, play is a rehearsal for reality disguised as entertainment. If it didn't serve a purpose, nature wouldn't have bothered evolving such complex behaviors, and they wouldn't persist. Play prepares us for the real world while keeping us engaged; otherwise, why would it exist?

Whether a game is digital or not really shouldn't matter when we're talking about actual value; if the core experience holds weight, then obviously a computer game can be just as meaningful. Take chess, for instance—one of those ancient staples that’s still going strong today. Nowadays, you’re far more likely to see someone playing it on a laptop than hunched over a physical wooden board. In neither scenario are you getting any kind of physical workout, but with a computer, you can hop online and play against someone halfway across the world in Brazil, or let an algorithm match you with opponents based on your specific ranking. So, the real question is: does chess lose its essence just because it's played on a screen? If the game itself has value, how does moving it to a digital medium strip that away? And while we're on the subject, people used to think computers would never be able to touch a human at the board, yet now they're absolutely crushing people in games like Go. These kinds of shifts actually force us to rethink some pretty heavy philosophical ground.

There’s one particular thing that left a massive impression on me, though it’s really a borderline case since it’s technically called a "game," but let's call it what it is: "Conway's Game of Life." I remember seeing it back in the Windows 3.11 days, tucked away alongside Minesweeper and Solitaire. It was dreamed up by a mathematician in the 70s. It blew my mind to see how a simple little universe governed by just four basic rules could spring to life in such miraculous ways. Honestly, given how much it resonated with me, I’d argue this thing should be mandatory reading in elementary school; that's how much intrinsic value I think it carries. Generally speaking, if we want learning to be more effective and engaging, we ought to "gamify" everything—that is the true inherent value of digital gaming.

Then you have all these educational games that drop you into historical contexts, letting you soak up history through gameplay or even letting you tweak the course of events. You’ve got management sims where you run entire empires—take Civilization, where you build a society from the ground up, or Panzer General, where you command troops during World War II. All these titles expand and sharpen the player's intellect while casually feeding them historical facts and narratives. For example, one of the "advancements" in Civilization—if I recall correctly—is "women's suffrage". By playing Civilization, you gain a practical understanding of the timeline and importance of various breakthroughs, from the wheel to the modern era; it's almost hands-on knowledge because if you fail to innovate at the right time, your civilization falls behind everyone else. It reminds me of those classic American game shows, like Jeopardy!, where it's basically just high-stakes trivia categorized by topic.

My kid plays educational games on his phone. Look, if you’re constantly parenting young children, it’s nearly impossible to keep a smartphone out of their hands, but it is entirely doable to load it with apps that teach shapes, letters, numbers, logic, and deduction. My little guy mastered the entire alphabet when he was around 20 months old, maybe even earlier. He’ll play a game diligently for half an hour, get bored, and then go back to playing "in real life." I don't see any issue with that. I sit with him, watch how he plays, and help him out when he struggles or gets clumsy with his fingers.

When we start dissecting these different types of games, we really need to draw a line between virtual worlds—where you have persistent avatars—and the kind of games you just play once and walk away from. Virtual worlds where you can lead a sort of "second life" (which can easily become your primary one) are in a completely different league than something like Sokoban or Super Mario. In those worlds, you're dealing with other people who make that environment feel real; because of them, you can't just hit a reset button. You can reset your character, sure, but you can't undo the social connections. There's a parallel here to what happens on forums like this. Those of us who are regulars here aren't just hanging out for the philosophy; we're here for the other users. Even if we're just anonymous avatars, we are real people. This is a massive topic that probably deserves its own dedicated thread, but it touches on the future where everyone might be plugged into some virtual reality most of the time. I don't have the time to dive into that whole rabbit hole right now, so I'll leave it there, but I'll just say that even that hyper-connected future doesn't negate the points I made above.