Revealed: The headset that will mimic all five senses and make the virtual world as convincing as re

reply to post by guinnessford


Probably sometime of cartridge system like printers and the such. ENjoy your 50 dollar virtual vacation to Africa because the real Africa has become a war zone were Americans can no longer go to. Destroy the natural beauty of the continent while we look at what could be inside of a helmet.

lol, sorry, that kind of virtual reality isn't QUITE here yet...

Please don't quote dailyfail as a news source any more guys... it's a tabloid.

reply to post by Oceanborn


Well the way I see it you are either asleep or awake.
During your most powerful lucid dream, you believe you are awake.
Of course, while you are awake you believe that you are awake.

It is only after you awake that you are able to look back on the time spent dreaming and recognise it for what it was....A DREAM! It wasn't real!

And then there are those times when we are dreaming and we realize whilst dreaming that it is only a dream, however real it may seem. We then are free!!! Free to explore without hesitation, for it is only a dream.

So I ask you, which one are you??


Row, Row, Row your boat.

okay, yay for the self loathing bs comment, now for on to the good stuff

Man, this machine is a great break through. I for one have alot of friends and family that are not around and i have heard so man stories of unfortunate times because of the distance and inability to travel.

For one, an old bassist of mine is from barbados, and his wife was expecting a baby girl. He tried so hard to be able to leave to go home for the birth but the US wouldn't allow him to leave since he was to leave anyway in 3 months. Or another musician who was in california when his son started to say his first words and he didn't have the funds to go out and come back to continue tour.
Even on a self interest note, i would love to see the world, even through a virtual reality. How cool would it be to see the south pole, and be in 70 degree weather!! Whew i would love it! and damnit so would you!

That would be an interesting theory...

It would be something like Putting a Camera in front of a tv that shows what it is looking at... its like a neverending cycle... so i guess what some of you are thinking that we put this device on a long time ago, and weve created reality after reality after reality, while somewhere in our infinite past we are still there inside of that thing... I have wondered that sometimes, but I think its because of Paranoia from the Matrix Movie... Or maybe paranoia by us asking what is the meaning behind life... where did we come from? Etc.

I like the theory, i could believe in it... But If i look back, do you know how close to death we would be in our old reality? I think Ill keep "this thing on" so that I can enjoy watching the world destroy itself, again and again and again

This sounds indeed like a new legal brainwashing device.

They probably use an advanced version of it already.

Why exactly would we want this? We have our own lives to live. Why would we want to live a virtual one when in the end it wont mean anything, not like reality means anything either, but still. Once taken off we won't know how to communicate properly or socialize anymore.

As if the experience of our reality is made up of only five types of sensory input.

Has anybody seen the movie Strange Days?

All I can say is hook me up! It's not like such an experience would be any less realistic than what we experience everyday. What is reality, really?

reply to post by cognoscente


A young student was taking a morning stroll with his Kung-Fu master
when they came across a a beautiful rare flower.The student remarked to his master "Sifu, this is a most beautiful flower indeed".
"Yes" said the master "but alas, it is not real.

A little further down the path the perplexed young man pointed to the
distant mountain range and remarked, "Sifu, those mountains are as old as time itself, and how magnificent they are".
"Yes" said the master, "But they are not real".

The young man was now as confused as ever. They walked several more miles untill the boy stoped and asked of his master, "Sifu, What is real"?

The Old man looked to him and said.......

"That is real, which lasts forever".

Wow. So it can make you feel like you are really THERE at some beautiful, nature-ish place, with the birds and the babbling brook and the warm sun and --

Hey! Isn't this a scene from SOYLENT GREEN?

Ignoring the obvious conspiracies that would be dreamed up following the revelation of this, it is pretty goddamn awesome!

Imagine if this was the future of home entertainment. How sensational (a very appropriate word for this I think) would it be to watch all your favourite movies as if you were in the movie with the characters. Imagine horror films where you could FEEL the monsters' breath on the back of your neck, or even just smell that popcorn being cooked at the start of Scream.

OR, dare I say it, what amazing and interesting experiences you would have with the more ... risque movies

Then you could bring computer games into the equation. What I would give to play CoD 4 online with one of those on.

Then there's the telecommuniation possibilities. You could do virtually anything without leaving the house!

Of course this opens up the problem of people being so ridiculously lazy these days (I say as I sit with days old dirty glasses and plates around me). If any of you have seen Wall-E, you know what potential a device like this has.

Both good and bad.

/end ramble.

There was a time when I would have given almost anything for one of these.

I had extremely noisy neighbours, and no amount of polite requests would persuade them to let me have a night's sleep.

I so wished for a virtual, quiet version of my living room so I could read my books in peace. Or a virtual, quiet version of my bedroom so I could sleep.

My only query would be about the programmes or programmers and their accuracy. Especially if you wanted to go back into another historical period.

I'd love to know how they plan on developing the software for this. How do you program something that mimics individual experience.
I'm confused.

The mail isn't that much of a bad source..

I, for one, think this would be awesome, I can't believe the developers best idea for gamers was second life... thats for losers not gamers.

£1500 is a bit steep but I think I'd shell out for one if I had the chance try one out first!

I can see it now... Doom 5, Quake 6, F.E.A.R 4 (omg that would be tooooo scary ;-P), Duke Nukem Forever (hahah whoar e we kidding? )

Originally posted by guinnessford
my question is how will the smells be synthesized?

This is what scares me. Very valid question. If it is true VR and they are somehow tapping into your brain they can trigger your brain to make you think you are smelling say 'roses' or 'dog crap' and so on. What concerns me is if they can do that then what is there to say that they can't implant imagery into your mind to begin manipulating what you feel is real or not? Or manipulate your thoughts and memories to make you believe that one thing happened when in fact it didn't.

Or, the ultimate, to create an army of Manchurian Candidates. Not possible? Why? Because the CIA said that their experiments didn't work? Do you really think they would admit it if they did work?

I love my gaming and the more realistic the better but I will pass on anything that is as invasive as this.

Good thread - I'm starring and flagging. And not because of the content of the article, but because of the OP's take and comments.

The fact that the Daily Mail is a tabloid and that the story is therefore likely to be mostly fabricated is moot. This technology, whether in actual existence at this point or not, is not only possible, but "on the horizon".

As we learn more about the language of the brain, the means of simulating 'sensory data' become closer and closer. We will one day be capable of creating an interface to the human mind that will be a 'perfect', undetectable virtual reality.

Now... Here's what I've said in a couple of similar threads lately: if you agree with what I've said in the above paragraph, there is NOTHING that should keep you from believing that it may have already happened.

So, let the specifics blur a bit - use your imagination - think "outside the box" (or outside the meatbag, if that wording pleases you). I'm not suggesting you're already wearing a helmet. I'm not suggesting that you're a pasty, pale human in a pod connected to "the matrix" either. I might be suggesting that you're not "human" at all - anymore than someone playing Donkey Kong is "Mario".

When we talk about our universe being a "simulation", people balk and point and laugh and say "you watch too many movies". The problem is semantics. We don't really have a better term for it, but what we're trying to describe is the nature of the 'multiverse'. For whatever reason (built-in fear of removing the helmet?) most of us are resistant to the notion that this isn't "real". What could be more 'real' than carbon? If someone hits me with a rock, I feel it.

Semantics again. "Real". When you play Donkey Kong, you know that Mario (and to a much lesser extent, "you") will die if you touch one of those barrels. It's not real, but try telling Mario that. Guide him right into one of those barrels. He'll still die. It's real to him. But wait, he's not real. But isn't he just an extension of you? You're real, right? Mario doesn't know about you, and due to the 8-bit nature of his universe, he's not likely to become 'self-aware' anytime soon.

But our universe has a few more than 8 bits. We are self aware, and our awareness is capable of expanding, so for thousands of years we've been questioning the nature of our universe and our 'interface' with it. And we have questions about its designers, and what might exist 'outside'. And one of those questions is about whether or not we have a cosmic counterpart that is much more than a carbon-based meatbag.

Which brings us full circle. That cosmic counterpart, or "soul" would probably think of the third dimension as being a "simulation" - for lack of a better term.

As above, so below.

[edit on 3/5/2009 by Teratoma]

reply to post by dariousg


Ok, not to be rude but, did anyone actually READ the article???
It points out in black and white and in the Kings English how the smells are synthesized.

Apparently thru some sort of tube loaded with different chemicals.
It has nothing to do with tapping into your neural network. Boy would that be scary.