Body and Flesh A Philosophical Reader Edited by Donn Welton BLACKWELL [ey BLACKWELL Publishers |16 Virtual Bodies ‘NOTICE: THIS MATERIAL MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT LAW (TITLE 17, US. CODE) Bodies, Virtual Bodies and Technology Don Thde Late wentieth-century “technospeak” includes talk about “VR” [virtual reality and SRL” [real life] within which there is much speculation about virtual bodies. In ‘what should be recognized by now as a familiar speculative projection, the question {5 posed as to whether VR will supplant or replace RL. Such techno-worries are not new: in the fifties the question of “artificial intelligence” replacing human intll- gence was a publicized popular theme; much earlier Luddite-era worries were about ‘machines replacing humans in the productive process ~ here, were the AI analog to bbe retroprojected, one might rephrase the issue as machine muscle replacing human muscle. And I even remember + worry during the early days of Masters and Johnson's sexuality investigations when a colleague of mine wondered whether the male member might not be replaced by sophisticated vibrators, Lite these techno-worries because, not only do they reoccur with each new advance, but because the succtss or failure of the pattern projected often remains ambiguous. For the most part, male members have not been replaced, although the increasingly sophisticated techniques of artificial insemination, stem sperm cell imerspecies implantation, do widen the gap between sex-procreation possiblities land other non-reproductive sexual activity. And the machine-musce replacement of much labor has occurred in many areas of production, so long that i, as the process is one designed within a closed system (roboties); whereas AI seems reduced to indirect applications, again within closed game situations (such a5 chess playing), rather than open context, lifeworld situations. Neither muscle or mind has reached ‘out into the open world except in human-technelogy symbiotic forms. In the cases ‘of human-technology symbioties, both mind and muscle have transformed our Wworlds. But the worry over VR “replacing” RL also fits into this history of techno-worries, and it begins with the standard form of replacement worry. Tn this essay, wish to address the themes of virtual bodies in relation t0 ‘lived? bodies (in the phenomenological and Merleau-Pontean senses) and the roles which are played by the technologies which relate to virtual and lived bodies. By way of, Setting a context, however, I want to begin with several phenomenological excercises in non-technological examples. Non-technological virtuality In the process of teaching phenomenology, I have always employed thought experi~ iments utilizing “imaginative variations,” clearly a Husserlian tactic, One such350 Don thde device which I used for many years was to ask the class (upper division under~ graduates) to imagine doing something which they had notin fact done, but would like to do, and then begin a critical phenomenological description of this imagined What emerged as a pattern over many classes and years was that the action frequently, even dominandy, chosen was Some variant upon flying, with examples often taken from a parachute jump. When asked to undertake the description, a second set of patterns emerged: the classes usually divided between what I cll (after R. D. Laing), an “embodied” and a “disembodied” mode of the parachute jump. ‘The embodied parachutist described take-off, attaining altitude, the leap from the ‘open door to experience the rush of wind in the face, the sense of vertigo felt in the stomach, and the sights ofthe earth rushing towards one as one fell. The disembod- ied describer sees an airplane take-off, climb, and sees someone (identified with himself or herself) jump ftom the door and speed towards the earth. Obviously, in these two cates, where one’s body is located in the selidentification is a major issue A second step in the analysis calls for varying between the two “perspectives.” (One feature which a phenomenological analysis shows is a variation between what could be called fall or multidimensioned experience and a visual objectification of presumed body experience. So, when asked, where does one feel the wind? Or the vertigo in the stomach? Can it be felt “out there” in the disembodied perspective? ‘The answers quickly show a partial primacy to the embodied perspective. One does not feel the wind in the face “out there” or the stomach phenomenon “out there”; indeed, upon being pushed iti interesting to note that disembodied observers admit, (usually) that they don’t see their own faces in the quasi-other who is identified as, themselves. The full, multdimensioned, experience gestalts in the here-body of the embodied perspective, whereas the visual objectification our-there is spectale-like ‘While both perspectives are possible ~ and I shall show shortly how deeply ‘embedded both perspectives are in our cultural actions ~ there is a dialectic which cca be shown which gives a quasi-primacy to the here-body with respect to full sensory embodiment experience, compared to the quasi-otherness of the disembod~ ied perspective which nevertheless is a possible perspective which as its own advantages. But the dialectic is weighted with sensory richness given to and within the here-body perspective ~ I shall associate this perspective with the “RL body.” ‘The partially disembodied or body as quasi-other perspective is already a kind of “virtual body” in a non-technological projection. ‘This form of virtuality is an image-body. Let us switch for a moment to another popular form of non-technologized virtual body experience. I refer to the much publicized forms of “out-of-body” experiences. Here the desriber, perhaps recalling a situation in an emergency room, claims 10 hhave left his or her body, looks down upon this previous body from some floating perspective, and describes the activities going on. The floating perspective is usually ‘temporary (how many permanently leave the body can't be known!) and the “out ‘of-body” experience returns to a later waking up experience “in” one's own body, Phenomenologically, however, this form of experience is parallel to the previously described embodied/disembodied parachute variation, although the popular liter~ ature does not recognize this, In the out-of-body case, the now visually objectified body ~ the one down there tun the operating table as image body ~ is “identified” with “my body", but under the perspective of not being the “now me” which is implicitly identified with the floating perspective. However, the floating perspective is the “now-me” and the Virtual bodies 351 “shere-body” which is embovled in the new position. I suspect that an interogator could again note that the maltisensory sense of the here-body would locate this in the floating location. The very me/not-me of the body on the table is an indicator of the “virtuality” of the me-as-other-body in this experience, ‘The incredible lightness of being (seated/lying) Let ws push the her-boy ily sensory boy experiences te more is prey {22 ingunate stuaton he stadens are sexed, no unlike the phissopher's Mende patton) andthe sready ony, quasrconscas (ying down) poions iin mae the move to loaing™ postens more ike ‘These are in other SEG, nehay only quastactive siuatons And shough the subjects our two Taratans are ots» pully impaired as Mereau-Pony’s Schneier, who Titan she" inactive bodys they ate fr from wha some of us ell he “sports Su" orate body impli nthe seet norm ofthe Heed ody implict im The Phenomenology of Perception.' It is the here-body in action which provides the centred not of myseen-body. This the RL body im conta to the more fercuve or marginal “VR® bode which make de shift co the quasi-dsenbodied rspestves pore PrP ram ight about the secret norm ofa er-body inaction, it should also be ed that sch + by experience is one whch not simply c-etensie with 2 aty one of one's “aki” "The imentonaliy of boils axon goes Devond one’s edly nt” but only within aria, ited range good example may be (Sten fom marta ars eperience wherein one cn "el" the aimed Blows even from behing and one ae one's own activity Beyond any simple now- point. Oe’ x Min" at bene polymorpha ambigwns and, even wtboUt material extension, the sense ofthe here-body exceeds its physical bounds. ‘A steond ambiguity shuld also be pelminry not, a6 phenomenological crate has long shown: one can simultaneous bth experience one’s here-ody from it inner coe wl sso having» path, Dt only paral, eater” percep thon eansce ny Kan, prt of ny fon visible body fom the foal point of ‘Combining these multableamigitis one can begin t appreciate how com- plex the nes of ua may become The opeing ta siing perspective from The mligimensonedexperens of my hereboiy cowards the image-bods perspectives ie within thse ambiguitis Extending the here-body Heretofore, my examples have differentiated a here-body from a vireual or image- ‘body asa disembodied “over-there” body. The bistability ofthese two perspectives rmay be expanded and made complex in many social and cultural activities. For example, in previous work I have shoven how a reading perspective which makes 2 god's eye view possible, gets worked out within European culture in activities 35 Seemingly distant from bodies in navigational practice. Europeans locate where they ire from 4 disembodied, overhead perspective. Contrarly, the here-body is made ‘central in South Pacific navigational practice which makes all motion and direction, felatvistically referential to the navigator's here-body (“Tahiti is approaching us as362 on inge the ocean passes our bow.") But, also, in all these eases I have not included nor attended t0 any technologies as such. Technologies can radically transform the situa tom, including one's sense af one's bod. “This transformation has been descriptively analyzed within classical phenomeno- logy. Heidegger's tool analysis noted that objects, such as hammers, are taken into the ways in which humans project themselves into work practices. In using hammers, the hammer “withdraws” as a separate object and is taken into the action being performed. But, in terms of the language of embodiment, it was Merleau-Ponty who took account of the way in which technologies may be embod ied, asin the blind man’s cane or the woman’s feathered hat. In the first instance, the cane/roadway touch is what the walker experiences ~ his body is extended through the cane which becomes part of his here-body experience, In the more radical sense of the hat feather the sense of her here-body ~ even without a touch ~ {is extended beyond the outline ofthe wearer's body. In all three ofthese examples, ‘one’s sense of embodiment changes although in a reduced and focused way ~ itis a (quasi-extension entailing the here-body, ‘The very materiality of the technology allows this extendability. The tctility which may be had through hammers, canes, and feathers i “real” but also less than “naked” in its perceptbilty. The hardness ~ bbut not the coldness ~ of the nail is experienced through the hammer, the mult dimensional “click” of the sidewalk cement and its textured resistance is felt ‘through the cane ~ but not its grayness; the very draft of wind in a near miss may be felt through the feather — but the extencof the doorway opening remains opaque in its extent. Each of the missing elements can be filled in only by the full bodily sesryavareness which spar ofthe rnary experience ofthe arctan Degrees of virtuality Its in the attempt to overcome these reductions that the newer forms of virtuality take shape. Ultimately, virtual embodiment has a its inner trajectory, to become the perfect simulacrum of full, multisensory bodily action. Once ths is discerned, one tan easily see how far the technologization of virtual reality has to g0. 'A brief look at imaging media i instructive here. Early technologies, such as the telephone and the phonograph, or such as still photography followed by motion pictures, were “monosensory” as ether audio or visual media, Phenomenologically, hhowever, the experiencer constantly experiences multidimensionaly, thus the mono sensory quality of these media easily reveal the technological reductions which are simultaneous with the more dramatic amplifications and magnifications which occur within the auditory or visual media. One could not see the calle, nor could one hear the speaker in the silent movie, An early response to this reductive limitation was to ‘make the monosensory dimension richer — silent movies called for more mime, more gestural significations, chus producing a kind of visual exaggeration, while the singer ‘on the phonograph also could exaggerate vocal gesture. However, a richer technological trajectory for media did not long follow only rmonosensory beginnings ~ within a few decades movies (1889) became “talkies” (1927) and the medium became audio-visual. Bidimensional audio-visual media are ffectively now the “norm” of many communicative media (cinema, television, camcorders, most multi-media presentations including computers, etc.) The ‘audio-visual has become deeply sedimented in our seeing/hearing and thus is culturally taken-forsgranted in our experience, But also this audio-visual plateau has been the norm now for nearly half a century Far lest succes, although again noted from the times of very early media developments, has been attained with respect to tactility, kinesthetic, gustatory, of lfgtory dimensions which were noted as possiblities for media. Theaters with Shaking floors, “smellovision,” have been attempted, but far more dominant are projected synesthetic attempts to induce the multidimensional experince ~ synes~ thet vertigo in cinerama or maxi-theatres, auditory overkill with dolby or sensur~ ound sounds, are the equivalent to early mime and gestural compensations which remain within the possibilities of the audio-visual. T take account of this recent history (which actally begins a the very end of the nineteenth century, accelerating only in the twentieth) because it relates intimately fo technologized attempts at virtual embodiment. Within this history the ambiguity bf the embodied / disembodied or here-body /image-body continues. If, for example, the begin with the here-body variant, then one can quickly see that media employ the same perceptual referencing which I noted in Pacific navigation. The “viewer is actually seated in the theater in a fixed postion, but the imaged “world” is then ‘et in motion and referenially aims a che “viewer.” ‘The tracks ofthe roller-coaster slide, as i were, under the viewer's seat, until the apogee is reached, then ting to Show « downwards, vertiginous acceleration, the synesthetic “fall” begins. Here the imaged version of “Tahiti comes to me” is the roller-coaster descent which rushes Towards mein screened quas-realism, In contrast, were one to see a shot ofa roler- ‘ouster from “out there” so that one sees the screaming riders, the synesthestic effect either disappears or is muted (occurring if 2 all inthe here-bod position). It {3 the other whois seen to have the vertigo. The virtual “realism” is enhanced when the imaged environment refers back to the seated viewer. “All these effects presuppose the privilege of the mostly motionless (seated) viewer. “They are the technological equivalents to the assembly line or other relatively closed System within which the technologies may perform the limited actions which ae dhe Tuchine worlds we know. For the viewer to become an actor ~ one must move into the equivalent of the screen-theatre environment. This becomes a posible trajectory for an (embodied) virtual boo. Earlier attempts to inject more interactivity may be noted in the range of simulators ‘which originated with military technologies. During the early days of ‘World War I, it was noted that if fighter pilots could somehow survive the frst five air batles, their chances of long-term survival became much higher. If, therefore, fone could simulate what needed to be known before actual battle, the chances for Survival might improve. It was this plan which resulted in the first Link Trainers ‘hich allowed dogfight practice to occur inside an early vircul reality situation. The ‘Taner had a projected scene on the cockpit window, the entie trainer moved with the control stick, sounds and as much realism as possible were injected, Today these tffects are made highly sophisticated in contemporary military and industrial simu Iators which are used to train pilots, tank personnel, or drivers. Roadways, runways, ‘unexpected critical situations, all rush towards the participant, (the seated) viewer, with as much realism as the imaging process can summon. Here, though, the tuation iz much more interactive in that simulation controls call for actual bodily action which itself enhances the synesthetic effec and adds atleast restricted tactile Kkinesthetic aspects to the experience ‘Commercial entertainment applications followed ~ the video gumes in parlors or homes, with mostly boys and their dads plugged into projected scenarios of aliens,354 Don Ihde realistic “Russians” or other enemies which fil virtual realty entertainment tech~ nologies. (My son and I both play Flight Simulator, with some interesting differ- tnces ~ we both prefer the Lear Jet as the airplane of choice due to its high maneuverability and capacities which are built into the program {compared to the Cessna or the WWI biplane). Buc our attitudes are different ~ I had a quasi-sweat ‘when T got lost over an Iowa cornfield and ended in a crash. Mark seems to enjoy AGeliberately smashing into Chicago's tall buildings on take-off, and then repeating, With the disembodied perspective, the scenes ofthe crash from the quasi-distance of that perspective as the plane parts fall to earth. “Lives,” afterall, are infinitely repeatable in virtual reality. 1 wonder if Nietzsche thought ofthis possibility in his theory of repeatable infinite choices? Or, isthe doctrine of eternal recurrence simply an anticipation of video-game culture?) ‘Yet, phenomenologically, this admittedly more ational technological space is but 4 small step from previous more passive audio-visual situations. The flyer remains Seated and the sereen-world backprojects the framed action to the viewer. Action remains minimal in the movement and synesthetic amplification of the body through the “joy stick.” Tt betokens only @ small movement into bodily action with minimal kinesthetic and tactile components now enhancing the audio-visual. I's all hand-eye coordination, enhanced in the context of hypergraphics, sound effects, and Synesthestic amplifieation. (We remain far from “virtual food,” and as early smello- vision showed, the compressed time-frames of theatres are not enough to remove and add smell in sequence asin the more durational spans of ordinary life.) Tn terms of present virtual simulations, we have but one more step to go ~ the step to the technologically “wired” body cages which include “face sucker” goggles, floves, and pethaps even strapped-in motion cages as shown in the recent film ‘Lawnmower Men. These developments display a slightly different tactic with regard to the here-body referencing previously noted. One of the shortcomings of other ‘Simulation forms has to do sith the "framing," which has always differentiated the artificiality of the technologically imaged from the wider world, The video-game, even with a very large screen, remains “framed” by the screen. And, while the Screen may even surround the viewer in maximal settings, the quasi-depth of the screen remains a detectable film-artfact. Everything is “in front of” the participant. In the tactics ofthe technological cage, one follows a direction developed earlier in sensory deprivation experiments. One “surrounds” the participant with the tech= nological cocoon which is equivalent to making one’s “world” much closer and more ‘encompassing. The mini-TVs up close to the eyes, the body suit, the wired gloves, all enclose the participant in the up-close environment ofthe technologically encased tnvelope from the RL world, ‘This enclosure, however, is not neutral nor “trans- parent” —its vestigial presence may produce both a sense of icreality and disorientax tion, of a kind of claustrophobia which is known to produce nausea in some participants. Again, the effects are similar to those of sensory deprivation experi~ rents in the seventies. But whereas the deprivation experiments damped out the body/world differences, the VR version makes the world a hyper-world, ‘Once again, phenomenologically, the VR cage remains but a degree of virtuality of the open, but framed version in the video-game. It does ~ so far primitively ~ introduce tactility and kinesthetic effect into the medium, and thus is a step beyond the merely audio-visual, seated context, But even with tis greater degree of actional possibility, most VR programs ~ except for the most expensive and sophisticated ~ lack the feedback found in full bodily engagement. Actions taken usually ack the sense of “contact.” And the price remains that of losing (o a greater degree, the virwat voutes we ‘openness of the RL world in order to attain its effect. VR. vertigo remains an Soulaung vertigo. It remains VR “theater.” It 8, however, a very specal kind of theater, Is audience is individual (although there are also settings in which multiple players engage), its world programmed with the usal logic tres of choi (oone of Misch provides the ambiguities or openness of RL) which while complex, do nat adapt to learning novel possibilities Tere we reach one horizon from which the original techno-worry fed Could VR replace RI? Only if theater could replace actual ife. Yet, only the bumpkin rashes rer the stage to reseve the maiden from the villain. ‘The late twentieth century is apparently filled with willing bumpkins! Like theater, however, VR developments Contain devices which “enhance” and distract from RL contexts Imaging the technologically polymorphic possibilities, Morphing things in the VR “world” and the use of hypergraphic techniques which tie bright colors and lighting effects are part ofthe theatricality of current VR, (It is {nteresting to note in passing that the contemporary version of the Ing-standing vrjatomaton worry” of Cartesian philosophy has been changed. ‘The older Cartesian ‘worry mas about whether or not we could be deceived by a cleverly cortrived robot, J yook-alike. The new worry i about whether hyper-reality is such that reality isn't Enough anymore,” a5 my undergraduates say.) Movie versions of VR and other Simulations are indicative here: in the film Lawnmower Man the eponymous char~ eter has 4 VR sexual encounter with his other, in the movie both he and she are “Shorphed” into fantastic shapes and interactions ~ projected in ths case a8 image ‘bodies in the second perspective for the movie viewers ~ ending with an imaged Georgia O'Keefe-ike “orgasm” climax. In the end, however, how diferent is this Romtother movie techniques which add romantic music, off-center shots, and Suggestive body-parts? The difference is simply one of non-human morphed shapes and the suggestion that the technologies make hyper-sex different, VR isa latecomer theatrical development which forefronts techno-imaging, Timaging, now technologically embodied, makes polymorphy ~ rarticulaly of visual shaping ~ a forefront phenomenon, I have already aoted the morphing of hhoman body shapes in Laennower Man, but there is a continuum of variations, all ‘of which do different degrees of morphing with respect to the VR/RL. portrayal of, dies, Roger Rabbit refined older cartoon /human interaction by making the “ioon”” fave a three-dimensional, and thus presumably more “Iife-ike” characteristic for the fictive being, Here the toon/human (image) world is a hybrid. Farther to the “Night” and into a kind of presumed “realism”, are the newer computer effects ‘which make presumed real entities hyper-rea. Jurasic Park compater-generates Tome very lifelike dinosaurs, and more recent, Tosser magnifies tomados into hhyperwinds. To the left are the already ireal morphings which either show “eal- jane looking oddities such as the parasitic alien animals in Alem, or abstract, fvaporative (spiritual?) forms, such as the high speed travel morphing in science Fiction - Stargate, warp speed in Star Trek, ee in one sense, “morphing” is more ¢ revival than an innovation. It isa return to premoderity inthe sts of cultural belies that things actually cout transmote or Einorph,” For devils to inhabit human bodies, for human witches to take on animal shapes, fr the possibilities of monsters, prodigies, and freaks, all wer premodern ‘Smorphs.” Imaging, particularly techno-sophistcated visual imaging, re-invents thispolymorphism of bodily possiblities. Its culture is a bricolage, where boundaries and distinctions are blurred, parts interchanged, hybrids produced, In this context, the body, bodies, are but one target. Morphing, rapid exchange of the embodied and disembodied perspectives, on to the horizons of gender blurring (these are enhanced in the more reductive and still mostly monosensory internet contexts where linguistic morphing is the norm), are all part of the same cultural ‘movement. In one respect all this could be harmless, simply a new variant of ancient fascination with the bizzare and with curiosities. It echoes the earliest history of pre- cinema camera obscura theater wherein paying customers would come to see the ‘magic lantern back-projected images of devils and ghosts upon the screen, or perhaps, it even goes so far back as to reach to Plato's pre-cinema cave wherein images of images were the only “realities” for the dwellers prior to Platonic sun therapy. Tn each case, however, the ilisions are harmless only so long 2s the experiencer knows the difference between theater and daily life, so long as one living RL does not become bumpkin-lke, and take VR as the “real.” This would be the Platonic solution, For Plato it was the liberation from the cave and the emergence into sunlight which taught the difference. But in a broader, more phenomenological sense, both RL and VR are part of the Lifeworld and VR is thus both “real” as a positive presence and “part” of RL. Virtual bodies as techno-fantasy | want to conclude this foray into virtual bodies with something of an epistemolo- tical moral: VR is a phenomenon which fits neatly into our existential involvements with technologies. Here the question is a deeper one involving our desires and fancases which get projected ino our technologies. Concerning the existentait of our technologies, particularly those which implic- sxe embodiment, Ihave earlier made this point: ‘The direction of desire opened by embodied technologies also has it postive and negative thrusts. Instrumentation in the knowledge activities, notably scence, is the gradual extension of pereption into new realms. ‘The desire is to sce, but seeing is seeing through instrumentation Negatively, the desire for pure transparency is the Wish to escape the limitations ofthe material technology, I platonism returned in a new form, the desire to escape the newly extended body of technological engagement Inthe wish there remains the eoxradicton: the user both wants and doesnot want the technology. The user warts wha the technology gives but doesnot want the limits the transformations that a technologically extended body implies. There s fundamental ambivalence toward the very human creation of our own earthly tools” ‘This contrary desire applies with particular pathos and poignaney to desires and fantasies of body. And whereas the VR/RL distinction gets blurred, seemingly crossed, or fantasized about, there is another aspect of technology /bodies which is ‘more than play, more than theater and ordinary life. That is, of course, the way in ‘which we increasingly literally incorporate (pun is deliberate) technologies. Prostheses, from the simple tooth crown to an artificial limb, are base level ‘examples, Techno-fantaies.remanticize prosthetic amplifications as. “bionic” which theatrically are precisely the actwaization of the existential contradictions concerning technologies. Roboccp, Bionic Man, Terminator all have more powerful tn ee ee oper t scien a ee ee ahr oa eh oe iit mre end es ee we at rs ac ea and ahs ih ye eS rg Sh yo an eee ely ig on ym fe Temas kn a ee ea sc ame ete og Notes 1 Maurice Melen-Ponty, Phesmrolgy of Percept, tans. Clin Smith (London: Rowedge tnd Kegan Pol, 1952), 12 Mactn Heidegger, Bang and Tine tans. John Macquarie and Edward Robinson (New York Hlarper and Row, 1962), sections 15 and 16, pp. 95-107, 3. Dom Ihde, Teinlogy aad the Lijeworld (Bloomington: Indiana University Pres, 1990), pp. 14,