I wrote this at the start of the month as more of an idea than a reflection. But, given what’s been going on over the last few weeks it’s semi relevant now. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to simulate well enough that you experienced the same feelings…..
How far away are we from true ‘Virtual Reality’?? I’m talking about a completely immersive experience (not just visual/aural). The problem of ‘Time Travel’ may be solved by this. How can you truly replicate the real thing? That’s the challenge!! There would be the replication of smells, temperature/humidity, wind, touch and other senses I haven’t thought of. There would need to be the ability to walk in any direction without physically moving, a bit like a 360 degree treadmill (that feels natural), and how would that replicate texture under foot (i.e. grass, mud, concrete).
I recently did a ‘walk the plank’ type challenge that had me walk along a plank on the floor. Logically a very simple process. They gave me a VR headset which replicated the plank being a beam on top of a skyscraper. The brain reacted as if it was real and my legs were jelly. So, the trick is to fool the brain as that is the thing that processes all of our inputs.
You can’t obviously beat actually experiencing anything in real life but the opportunity to create something very close is just around the corner. The environment is one thing, interacting with ‘live’ objects is another. How would this change travel? Could you get close to experiencing certain destinations purely by VR? That would be my focus (i.e. replicating the feeling of water/swimming with dolphins would be tough), but exploring or flying over the Grand Canyon/Great wall of China??. Then there’s the headset, that needs to go, a bit like replacing glasses with contact lenses.
My Inner Self 