The Metaverse will allow people to be anyone—any gender, any race, any species. Virtual bodies put the “trans” in transhumanist.
As the name implies, the goal of transhumanism is to transform human beings into superbots through technology. Like all delusional ideas, the end result will be disastrous. Ray Kurzweil, the Google-sanctioned prophet of this techno-cult, predicts that by 2045 (or 2049, or whatever) our souls will exist in a liminal state between the physical and digital worlds.
Right on cue, the Metaverse arrived to fulfill yet another of his dismal prophecies.
“The Singularity will represent the culmination of the merger of our biological thinking and existence with our technology,” he foretold in his 2005 scripture The Singularity is Near. “There will be no distinction, post-Singularity, between human and machine or between physical and virtual reality. … [O]ur experiences will increasingly take place in virtual environments. In virtual reality, we can be a different person both physically and emotionally. In fact, other people (such as your romantic partner) will be able to select a different body for you than you might select for yourself (and vice versa).”
More sober voices in the transhumanist movement approach Kurzweil’s predictions with caution. The same goes for futurists who avoid the “trans-” moniker altogether. Despite those reservations, they’re all facing the same direction. One way or another, we’re gonna fuse with machines.
“VR isn’t simply a new form of media; it sweeps away the barriers of all previous forms,” Wired editor Peter Rubin evangelized in his 2018 book Future Presence. “[W]e have the ability to become the art—to be part of a world, even to be a character. … [I]t promises to upend every industry you can name.”
The Metaverse couldn’t have come at a better time. As real-life droids take over decent jobs, unemployed schmoes can shoot at robots in virtual reality. A population lost in digital hallucinations doesn’t need brain implants or drugs to keep them pacified. If the VR realm is fun enough, people will keep themselves on lockdown.
Clawing for ZuckerBucks
Ever since Facebook staked its claim on the Metaverse last month, dozens of tech companies have tossed their brainscan helmets in the ring. As I wrote last summer, and reiterated last month, this craze is not a one-off.
Microsoft is now hyping its own virtual workspace. Roblox is enticing the youth with advanced virtual reality games. Reddit’s KarmaLab is coaching companies to thrive in meta-space. Nvidia is offering up custom avatars. Companies like The Sandbox are selling virtual real estate as NFTs.
All across Asia, virtual influencers—computer-generated popstars whom fans treat like people—are preparing to take the Metaverse stage. Even the Chinese tech firm Tencent wants in, pending CCP approval. Wall Street investors are pouring gazillions into this lunacy. Big capital ensures its development in some form or another, however corny it turns out to be.
For those who enter the Metaverse through high-end equipment, I have no doubt the experience will be thrilling. There will be fantastic adventures in alien environments, epic battles as robots or wizards, and whole battalions of gametes lost to first-person 360° porn.
That thrill is the first major problem. After decades of goofy graphics and simulation sickness, VR is now officially awesome. Just as LSD molecules will slide right into your serotonin receptors, easy as you please, the new head-mounted displays trick the brain into experiencing a virtual world as if it were real. VR fans call this state “presence.”
Stereoscopic screens and precision headphones create the illusion of depth. Because these visual and audio fields track with your physical body’s motion—detected by external cameras and synced with onboard gyroscopes and accelerometers—you become “embodied” in the VR experience. Add a fully motorized artificial vagina, and there goes your weekend. Fast-forward a decade or three, and there goes a future generation.
“Given VR’s mind-bending capacity to elicit emotional reactions with a simulation, intimacy can be found with a program or a recording.” Rubin exults in Future Presence, “[T]he emotional, cognitive, and psychological reactions we have in virtual worlds promise to change us in some fundamental ways.”
The second problem, which will afflict millions, is a chronic…
Read full story [icon name=”arrow-right” prefix=”fas”] The Transhuman Roots of the Metaverse – by Joe Allen