Grezkev
The Red Guards
EoN.
188
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Posted - 2013.04.17 17:33:00 -
[1] - Quote
The Robot Devil wrote: I just had a discussion about New Eden being real or not real with a co worker. I said that New Eden is real but not tangible and she says it is just a game. Yes, we play a game and it is not a possession that you can touch but does that make it less real? All of our actions in New Eden have a connection to everyone who plays and every item is unique. There may be copies but there is only that one item and if it is destroyed it is gone forever. I asked her if it is more or less real than a digital song, book, movie or even bank account. Paper money only has value if you believe it has value and other people agree. So, do we fly fake internet spaceships and shoot fake internet tanks or are they real items that have real value?
Ahhhhh Philosophy!
Basically sounds like a classical Plato v Aristotle argument. You being Plato.
You're saying New Eden is real because it is a cognitive manifestation in your mind (an experience; you've experienced New Eden in some form....in the same way Plato's prisoners in the cave experienced shadows instead of real objects). Plato used the "allegory of the cave" to explain his argument; a depiction of slaves trapped in a cave and forced to view the shadows of objects as opposed to the objects themselves (we are to assume they are bonded and prevented from moving).
Plato argued that what is in our mind is more real to us than the physical world, simply because our mind is actively *interpreting* the world, rather than experiencing it. Your eyes merely take in light, your ears merely absorb sound waves, and your nose merely smells chemicals. In other words, you're blind and left to experience the world through a "lens"...the lens of your narrow eyes, ears, and nose...all of which we know cannot see the complete light spectrum, hear the complete sound spectrum, nor smell every single chemical.
Aristotle argued that what Plato says is true, we are "slaves to the senses"...but he argues that we ultimately have to play out our realities on a real world. I can believe God exists....you can believe he doesn't. To both of us, the truths are absolute and real. But when we come to discuss the topic together, we come into conflict. Aristotle points out that this existence of "conflict" thus means that the REAL WORLD (the objective experience) is more real than what is in your mind. In this sense, New Eden is *not* real because its "reality" would come into conflict with others who perceive it merely to be a video game.
The money aspect you mention goes a bit deeper into philosophy since Marx was the first major philosopher to try and deduce a purpose for "money" (which he called the "universal equivalent commodity"). |