E-Learning and Digital Media

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Book review ! The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/2042753017739795
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Heim M, The metaphysics of virtual reality. Oxford University Press: New York, 1993; 175 pp. ISBN:
0-19-508178-1, US$34.99 (paperback)

Reviewed by: Rene Novak, University of Waikato, New Zealand

Breakthroughs in technological advancements have enabled the rise and distribution of
virtual reality (VR) technology in the last three years, rendering it available for public
consumers due to its relative affordability. The rapid expansion of VR devices worldwide
raises metaphysical and philosophical questions that may have not been relevant in the past.
Nevertheless, Michael Heim theorised VR in his book: ‘The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality’,
a quarter of a century ago when this technology was mainly available exclusively to the
military. Other VR content of that time was mostly related to science and even more often
so to science fiction.
Back then Michael Heim outlined several predictions about the technological future of
his world, some concerning VR but many more about the broader changes in the informa-
tion age. For me – someone who is interested in technology developments – it was highly
remarkable to note that many of his predictions have in part or in their entirety been realised
today or are in the process of becoming a ‘reality’. For a book with the title: ‘Metaphysics of
Virtual Reality’, one would expect most of the book to discuss what the title suggests; yet, he
discussed a number of other technological issues before he addressed VR. This endorsed the
feeling of being misled as only the last third of the book in as little as 40 pages addressed the
content of the title. However, I must stress that I equally enjoyed the former two thirds of
the book as I did the latter.
Throughout the book, Heim draws his thinking in correspondence with a range of sig-
nificant personalities summoned from a multitude of paradigms of human existence such as
philosophy (from Aristotle to Heidegger), art (from opera to science fiction writers), religion
(Christianity to Buddhism and Taoism), science (from Cognition to Technology) and
anthropology (from omnipotence to erotic ontology). Having these many voices included
in the 160 pages of the book accounts for a very diverse reading experience but can also
leave you with a slight sense of confusion as to which tradition Heim actually follows.
He speaks about phenomenology but leaves a question mark next to it when referring to
VR and often denotes to Heidegger which leads me to believe that at the heart of it he is a
Heideggerian. Also contributing to this assertion is the fact that the title of the chapter that
starts to disseminate VR is ‘The essence of VR’. The basis of Heidegger’s philosophy lies in
the phenomenological conception of the hidden essence of ‘things’ to be unveiled by the
human conscience. Heim categorised his views on technology as neutral and expressed that
this is the same view Heidegger upholds. It is in this space that an issue arises that is twofold.
Referring to Heim’s views on technology as neutral, based on this book would be as saying
that Dante Alighieri’s heaven and hell are neutral places to spend your eternity at. I would
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rather categorise his view on technology as severely bipolar. He successfully takes the reader
on a journey from a possible technological nirvana to a dark cybernetic place where humans
may survive but their humanity would surely be doomed. Referring to Heidegger’s views on
technology as neutral can also be contested, as while Heidegger talks about a hope for us to
be some day able to open our human existence to the essence of technology (Heidegger,
1996) in his essay ‘The question concerning technology’, he sturdily discloses thinking about
the essence of technology that is far from neutral, but rather quite critical.
As mentioned before, Heim considers several distinct issues concerning technology, more
specifically concerning the information age. His first chapter discusses the disease he refers to
as ‘Infomania’. The reader is taken on a historical journey of knowledge representations from
spoken words, cave drawings, written words and digital information. He gleefully examines
the heavens of computerised information, but quickly crashes us down to the ocean floor to
suffocate under a sea of disjointed and segmented information that is now unable to be
compiled into meaningful knowledge. He further examines this issue from the view of lin-
guistic logic and determines that all language based on computer systems is born from
Boolean logic that undermines human intuition and the spiritual and esoteric way of being.
Hypertext is discussed in the next chapter where its advantages for fast links and searches are
portrayed only to be unmasked as a dark digital essence exposed as an illusion of knowledge
that ‘unsettles the logical tracking of the mind’ (Heim, 1993) within a closed philosophical
system. Here, he also speaks about the importance of learning from real-life experience in an
embodied way which constitutes the embodiment theory first mentioned by Husserl who was
Heidegger’s mentor and the father of phenomenology (Beck, 2015; Husserl, 1999). The next
chapter grapples with the issue of how the computer is affecting thought processing of humans
with tools such as spelling and grammar checks. Next the relationship between human and
computer is disclosed where Heim sets them as opponents from the standpoint of Heidegger’s
critique of technology. Chapter six signifies a shift of the book towards VR by discussing the
human connection to cyberspace through interface. Here, he also introduces the term aug-
mented reality, that is in the forefront of a lot of technological developments of the present.
Reality, truth and phenomenology of cyberspace are being examined in the next part from an
unconventional romantic and erotic ontology. The essence of VR is being highlighted in
chapter eight through his seven divergent concepts of VR, followed by the chapter that
attempts to bind a philosophical tradition to VR and discuss its virtues. The book concludes
with a chapter entailing some final thoughts and a chapter with useful vocabulary.
Michael Heim’s book, ‘The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality’, punctuates several issues
humanity faces in relation to technology in the information age that are particularly relevant
in our present but more importantly he poses intriguing questions concerning our existence
in reality and indeed in virtuality.

References
Beck TJ (2015) Phenomenology and embodiment: Husserl and the constitution of subjectivity, written
by Joona Taipale. Journal of Phenomenological Psychology 46(1): 128–134.
Heidegger M (1996) The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays. Works, New York, NY:
Harper and Row.
Heim M (1993) The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality. New York: Oxford University Press.
Husserl E (1999) Das allgemeine Ziel der ph€anomenologischen Philosophie. Husserl Studies 16(3):
183–254.