Trevor Batten: Some Personal Remarks regarding "Virtual Reality"
(Text presented April 9th 1998, in the form of a Video Tape by
Toine Otto, at the AKI School of Fine Art, Enschede, NL
as part of an AKI/University-Twente collaboration)
In "The Spirit of the New Machine" Tracy Kidder describes how an
ambitious team of designers developed a commercially successful computer
despite the company's internal politics which initially tried to prevent
it. In the final chapter the author remarks how clever the reactionary
forces of commercialism have been in reducing such a revolutionary
machine as the computer into a safe tool for preserving the status quo.
To be honest, I am not sure that the reactionary forces will win. The
computer does not seem to shed its subversive paradoxes too easily.
The design, production and marketing of Hardware and Software is a
risky business and there have been many commercial victims of
miscalculation. Will Microsoft succeed in gaining a monopoly -and if
they do what effect will this have on society in general? It is even
too early to know, for example, how the fight for control over the
internet and the world wide web will eventually be decided. PC or
Net-computer -chaotic individualism or an ordered hierarchy? Individual
freedom in a consumer paradise or the hell of enforced wage slavery in
a monopolistic capitalism? "Brave New World", "1984", or what? The future
remains, I hope, labile and unpredictable.
Nevertheless, the computer may be unintentionally subversive -it is
certainly not openly revolutionary. The reactionary forces have indeed
largely succeeded in using Pandora's little black box without apparently
actually having to open it! While virtually every aspect of modern life
is becoming more and more dependant on the functioning of the computer
there are very few people who are interested in understanding the nature
of the thing we are so dependant on. Employer, employee and hobbyist are
generally more interested in the computer as a tool for gaining money and
status than as a medium for understanding the world we are creating.
So returning to Tracy Kidder's original question we again ask how it is
possible that so a potentially revolutionary apparatus as the computer
can be packaged and presented as something normal, unimportant and safe?
There are, I believe, (at least) two main means through which this
illusion is performed.
Perhaps the most pernicious -in its pervasiveness, its subtlety and its
effectiveness is the user-friendly interface! Yes I know it is like
telling someone that their lovely, cuddly, pet dog is in fact a killer
infected with rabies. Nevertheless, the Faustian pact between programmers,
marketing managers and clients to keep users as ignorant as possible is
probably about as socially responsible as selling heroin on the school
playground. It is certainly very similar in effect! Otherwise how could
it be possible that a formal, rule based, machine becomes the basis for
a society which is becoming less and less able to understand or accept
the restraints of formal rules. How is it otherwise possible that we
can believe that all our desires should be instantly satisfied without
limit and there are no social restraints -provided we separate our
newspapers from our jampots to prevent the world ending through global
warming? How otherwise could we believe that we can consume and
communicate freely and anonymously when surrounded by electronic servants
that do nothing else but store and process information (increasingly about
us and our consumer habits). How otherwise could we be so stupid as to
believe that we could be master instead of servant of a machine of which
we know nothing but which knows everything about us? Without the
user-friendly interface we would be forced to think about the machine
we were so dependant on! Surely clever people using stupid computers
are to be preferred above stupid people using clever computers -but
how are people to become clever if they are told there is nothing for
them to learn and the computer is designed to support their existing
image of the world.
The second, and possibly related, means of preserving the reactionary
illusion is the return to an artificially created photographic realism.
Unfortunately, our society is still largely bound by the supposed
division between mathematics and language, the objective description
and the subjective expression, the sciences and the arts, and so it
is difficult to trace the interactions between art, science and
technology within society. The perceived effect of the invention of the
photographic camera on visual art is well known -unable to compete
with the mechanically produced images of the interplay of light on
the exterior surfaces of the visible world, the artist began to search
for images that were under the surface of apparent reality. Less
understood are the possible effects of the new, so called, "abstract"
art on the scientific perceptions of reality. Certainly, photography
was not slow in following art. Portraits, of both individuals and
landscapes often tended to imitate the more traditional forms of visual
art -but the use of telephoto and macro lenses, high speed film and
eventually, the moving image all tended to (seemingly objectively)
record things that were earlier impossible to record -and thus help to
prick through the apparent surface of the world around us. Within a
fairly short period, around the turn of the previous century, there is an
explosion of experiment and discovery. The expressionism of van Gogh,
the abstraction of Kandinsky and the cubism of Picasso and Braque
-but also the psychological shock of Freudianism, of the fragmentation
of the atom by Rutherford, the relativity of time and space by Einstein,
the relativity of language by Wittgenstein and the relativity of logic
by Goedel. From the 1860's with the mathematical discovery of
non-Euclidian geometry to the 1960's with the social discovery of
Flower Power there certainly lies an exhausting century of artistic,
scientific, cultural and political revolution.
In the 1970's, the 1980's and the 1990's the growing forces of reaction
and counter-reaction begin to clash in complex and often chaotic ways.
In the Netherlands it seems that people waited for 1984 to pass before
introducing the tools which would enable the scenario in the famous
book with that title to be realized. The Macintosh computer was by then
informal enough to be acceptable to the powerful social sector who,
conform the social divisions in society, were so terrified by formal
systems that they had not noticed that they had already abandoned
everything in favour of a kind of social-cybernetics based on the very
systems they were most afraid of. At the same time, the foundation SCAN
in Groningen and the "Hogerschool voor de Kunsten" in Utrecht in
collabouration with the Foundation for Creative Computer Application
in Rotterdam were importing (largely from the University of Ohio and
the Polytechnic in Middelsex) the ability to generate photo-realistic
images and animations. The Media Industry, largely based on a revival of
Renaissance pictorial space and partly fueled by the Ministry of
Economics was getting of the ground. In fact, due to the government
philosophy which became fashionable in this period, which seemed to preach
that the only function of government is to encourage global competition
and cut social spending (except on computers and media), the computerized
Media Industry quickly became almost the only productive industry in
Europe.
Either captivated by the sums of money available, or disgusted
by the triviality of its imagery, most people did not notice how the
computer industry encapsulated the procedures developed with great
difficulty by creative scientists and artists (either living or long
dead) into Hardware and Software which was then sold for use by industry
and later for individuals at great profit. Nevertheless, people gradually
came to believe that creativity involved the possession of techniques and
not the development of skills.
Possibly the technological, scientific, artistic and social changes now
taking place are no less profound than those of the previous period but
they are apparently less visible, and the outcome is probably less
certain. We live in a time of increasing paradox, but then Renaissance
pictorial space is also a paradoxical space. On the one hand, it appears
so natural and "real" while on the other hand it only truly works for
people who have one eye and happen to be standing precisely at the
position chosen by the artist to be his point of view. Similar to the
way that Aristotelian Logic excludes any possibilities which are not
possible within a Euclidian space (which has lost its claim to
exclusivity now for over a hundred years), so does Renaissance space also
falsely create the illusion of being the only true way to represent space
because it literally allows no other perspective.
Not only is Renaissance space limited in perspective -it is also often
false. The apparently realistic church interiors of Saerendam are actually
painted from a viewpoint that requires the viewer to be outside. Even
the famous marriage double-portrait from Jan van Eyck places the viewer
in a position which is impossible without being reflected in the mirror
on the wall.
If the clock is considered to be characteristic of the age of Reason and
the steam engine as being characteristic of the age of romanticism then
can it be pure chance that images based on the limited and illusionary
Renaissance pictorial "realism" generated by a machine based on
old-fashioned Aristotelian logic is becoming so characteristic of our
current age.
Strangely enough, I have no objection to the concept of "Virtual
Reality". In fact I believe it has always been with us and will always
remain with us -as long as there are human beings in existence.
Actually, the truth is even worse, I believe there is only "Virtual
Reality", that it is the only way we can deal with our environment, with
each other and with ourselves. Every story, every book, every image,
every sensory experience and even every scientific theory is in fact a
form of "Virtual Reality". By inventing images, stories, myths, theories
and machines we literally create the world around us. It is our own
invention, not reality, with which we are confronted every day.
Certainly, things happen which are apparently outside our control
-or even outside our knowledge: We may be in an accident and die
without knowing what happened to us or natural illnesses or other
disasters may harm us without our understanding their causes. This is
undeniably so, but without some kind of language or physical medium to
capture and express these experiences they will remain outside our
understanding and even our perception. Even when we are entranced by a
field of stunningly beautiful flowers we should be aware that it is the
specific physiological construction of our eyes that give the flowers
their appearance and that other creatures with other eyes would perceive
the field differently (and without suitable sensors would not perceive
it at all). There is no "Objective Reality" which exists outside
our perception, nor a Platonic "meaning" which exists outside our
language.
Just as our specific sense organs determine our sensory perception of
the world so do our mental and physical constructs determine our
interpretation of these sensory stimuli. I am sure that anyone involved
with the epic dance of Indonesian shadow figures is just as convinced
of the "reality" of the situation as is a participant in a totally
immersive "Virtual Reality" (possibly even more so because the focus
on minimal visual information may make other sensory conflicts less
obvious).
"Reality" is not virtual -it is relative!
Obviously, there are specific situations when coloured images are
essential, but in general, most people seemed to experience black
and white TV as being "real" until confronted with the "reality" of
colour television, which literally gives a new dimension to viewing.
The limitations of black and white television presumably forced the
program makers to use only images that do not depend on colour in order
to be understood, so the viewer will only see images that reinforce a
belief in the unimportance of colour. The appearance of colour
television then means that both program makers and public must be
re-educated to understand the importance of colour. The new types of
program which now become possible (nature, fashion, interior decoration
and art) demonstrate the importance of colour and reinforce the new
vision. Presumably, people who were, for some reason, highly sensitive
to the importance of colour would not find television an acceptable
medium until it was able to transmit colour.
However, we should not fall into the trap of believing that because we
can only perceive and conceive the world in terms of our model of the
world that our models are "reality" and we can disregard the world outside
the model. The world is (by definition) not our model. It will always
behave differently because the world is always modified by our model of
the world. Our model of the world needs to include the modifications
it causes and so must reflect itself in its own reflection. So in order
to be complete the model must invoke itself in an infinite regress. The
unexpected will therefore always be with us, we will unintentionally
create it while intentionally or unintentionally creating the rest of
the world -but it is the creativeness of our models that will determine
how we experience the unexpected and how we shall deal with it.
We should perhaps also be careful of making our dreams and our metaphors
too concrete for then they will cease to be dreams and metaphors and
they will lose their creative magic. Even the most pragmatic of people
should then understand that when things loose their creative magic there
will be nothing new to tempt the palate of the hungry consumer. Without
the creative magic of the weavers of dreams and metaphors there will be
nothing to sell and nothing worth buying and without the dreams of the
consumer there is no reason to buy.
The computer is based on Aristotelian logic and on Euclidian space and
yet it enables us (if we wish and if we dare) to explore other kinds of
logic in other kinds of space. It is the reincarnation of the western
male phantasy of an intelligence without a body and yet it enables us to
simulate and to extend the body and to explore the importance of body
and the interaction with mind. Programming a computer is essentially
mapping mind into body. It is the culmination of a tradition of logic
based on a fragmented dualism and yet to program it efficiently means
to search for pattern and unity. The computer was the plaything of the
military and its pervasive sensors and information processing
capabilities may make it invincible although it may be completely
vulnerable if power and communication channels fail when under serious
attack, so we are forced to redefine war as the struggle for control over
information and not over land. The computer is the plaything of the
businessman and yet it may make human labour redundant and force us
to totally redefine our economic principles. The computer is the
plaything of the scientist and its simulatory powers force science
to be redefined as an experimental exploration rather than an empirical
observation. So what will happen when the computer becomes the plaything
of the artist?
Despite the problems and the paradoxes involved, modern media technology
bases itself on a pictorial space which came into fashion as a result of
the fall of the Roman Empire in Constantinople, a space which has been,
with justification, rejected by artists for more than half a century.
The computer is clearly a Goedelian machine, full of paradoxes -but we
live in a Goedelian age. We must learn to reject our beliefs in an
objective "Reality" which is only sustainable because it appears constant
and consistent -as parallelled in Renaissance geometry. We should also be
careful not to lose our understanding of the power of that which remains
invisible outside our model. It was the invention of the abstract
calculus which initially destroyed the fragile unity between visual and
mathematical space developed in the Renaissance -just as it was the rise
of abstract painting which made the Euclidian space of traditional
mathematics so unattractive to the artist. It is the power of our ability
to create and to understand abstract patterns that will determine our
future.
I am sure that there are military, scientific, cultural and entertainment
reasons for creating and using simulations of sensory experience that
are virtually indistinguishable from those that are natural. However we
should be careful to understand the difference between a simulated
and a natural environment. We should never let our concept of space be
limited by outmoded forms of image making. If "Reality" means "the Primal
Abstract and Undefinable Chaos which escapes our model" then "Virtual
Reality" implies "Virtual Abstraction" and it may be interesting to
explore. If "Reality" implies an equivalence with sensory appearances
then "Virtual Reality" is not interesting -because Non-virtual Reality
is much richer. We should also be aware of the need to preserve our
dreams and our metaphors. Surely it is how "Virtual Non-reality"
becomes "real" that is truly fascinating for both the scientist
and the artist!
Trevor Batten
Amsterdam, November 1997