In the article, Why is Virtual Reality Interesting for Philosophers, Metzinger explores points of contact between philosophy and technological virtual reality research and proposes an extensive set of new research targets, together with some concrete examples. The article argues two major themes: (1) there is no such a thing as a self but a self-model; (2) the embodiment can be realized in a technological way rather than within the boundary of a biological body.

Metzinger first brings up the philosophy of mind, advocating that there is no such a thing as a “self” but a “self-model.” The very simplest sense of self has three dimensions: self-localization in space, identification with a body image (e.g., avatar), and the having of a perspective. The aggregate of these three dimensions is what he refers to as the self-model. He then mentions the notion of “phenomenal transparency.” The idea is consciousness is like a window. Seeing through it, we see the pink cherry blossoms in bloom and puppies shaking hands, which gives us the direct experience of existing in this world. However, we don’t see the window itself. Consciousness, in this regard, is like a high-dimensional windowpane. Likewise, technological VR is also the unperfect representation of possible worlds and selves, with the aim of making them appear even more realistic — ideally, by creating a consistent self-model in the user (p. 3). In this light, VR content and phenomenal content are both predictive representations of the actual state of the world. Predictive representations are illusions that are unreal and counterfactual. Metzinger claims that a perfect VR would lead to an artificial consciousness (p. 4) that resembles the subjective consciousness in terms of its integration into the actual world and its function as a medium for people to perceive the world.

Metzinger then argues that several representations of objects external to the body can transciently be integrated into the self-model (p. 12). Apart from consciousness, another important concept in the philosophy of mind is embodiment. When we say conscious states such as the knowledge/concepts are embodied, we mean that the cognitive states of an organism are determined or at least strongly influenced by the type of body. Advanced VR technology seeks not only to create the classical place illusion but also targets the deepest layers of human self-consciousness by utilizing techniques for virtual embodiment and robotic re-embodiment in other human bodies (p. 6). Metzinger presents a PSM-Action (phenomenal self-model action) experiment to explain this concept. The test subject lies in a nuclear magnetic resonance tomograph whose motor imagery is translated into movement commands that can control a far remote robot “directly with their minds” via the internet, seeing the environment through the robot’s camera eyes (p. 11). Undoubtedly, this is an innovative form of embodiment. It is not saying that our self-consciousness jumps into an avatar or robot, but there are causal feedback loops for complex actions. The starting point of the entire action is now not the flesh and bone, but only the conscious self-model in our brain (p. 11). In the PSM-actions test, the researchers simulate an action in the self-model and a machine to perform it. This experiment also strongly supports that the human being in essence is not a “self” but rather a self-modeling organism (p. 7). The self is that agent which possesses the body. For Metzinger, this feeling of owning a body and being an authentic self results from a neurocomputation going in the brain called a “self-model.” Anything that falls within the self-model, we have a sense of ownership over it, and this is the basis of our mistaken belief in free will. VR technology’s ability to “invade” this self-model, such as creating an embodied illusion, will radically change some of our entrenched common-sense beliefs in the future.

Metzinger’s view is not particularly new, actually. He acknowledges that Buddism has already said the same thing long ago (p. 15). The idea that there is no ego, no particular “self” owns our body, and we are the sum of our physical body and its associated mental functions resonate with Buddhist wisdom of “emptiness.” Metzinger’s interest in Buddism is easily visible. He believes there is a specific mode of conscious state — meditation or contemplation — that does not involve any agentive phenomenal self, and things are experienced neither as real nor as unreal (p. 16). He even suggests VR researchers think of if there could be something like “amnestic re-embodiment” that can make users forget the fact that they currently are in VR (p. 8).

This article is incredibly mind-blowing. When I read this piece, I got reminded of an ancient Chinese philosophy story. It seems that dream always stimulates philosophers’ curiosity. Once upon a time, Chuang Tzu dreamed that he was a butterfly, flying about enjoying itself. Suddenly he awoke, and veritably was Chuang Tzu again. He did not know whether it was Chuang Tzu dreaming that he was a butterfly or the butterfly dreaming that it was Chuang Tzu. It is hard to tell the distinction between dreaming and waking experience. This is a case of what is called the transformation of things. Descartes’ dream argument conveys a similar idea (p. 8). Both of them want to blur the boundary between reality and illusion. In Virginia Woolf’s novel, a woman catches sight of a black mark on the wall. She cannot immediately identify the mark, which provokes a sequence of daydreaming about its identity. She wonders if it might be a nail, a hole, a leaf, or something protruding from the wall. Ultimately, a voice interrupts her stream of consciousness, drawing her back to the “reality” that the mark has been a snail all along. The woman awakes from her dream to identify the mark. Is it possible for her to awake again to find something else? Our implicit belief that we are awake might be mistaken. We can never rule out that we are now dreaming.

Since Chuang Tzu is indistinguishable from the butterfly, and they are interchangeable, the same is true for right and wrong, life and death in this world. Who am I, and who are you? Is there a real me? Are you an authentic being or just a person in my dream? Metzinger thinks there are no absolute answers to these questions. A normal reader has to lose a fair amount of sanity and ration to appreciate such insight.

Metzinger’s idea of the self-model is profound because he does not focus on a specific part of people’s self-conscious mechanism but places it in a more extensive system and examines them as a whole. He explains the historical development of the biologically grounded self-model in the human operator’s nervous system that has been optimized over millions of years of biological evolution and possesses unconscious as well as conscious content layers. The most intuitive layer should be the organism controlling its body parts, connecting sensory perception with corresponding body movements. Metzinger also mentions another unconscious/subtle content layer, such as our immune system. This idea sounds pretty much like the theory of evolution that all species are related and gradually change over time. Metzinger imposes a further elimination on the human ego, challenging the standard view that the self is an intrinsic, unchanging entity that is somehow separate from the rest of the world.

Self-model is a liberating model for understanding ourselves. Because if we think we have a fixed, permanent essence throughout our life until we die, we are trapped in a sense. And that is also why human beings are afraid of death. Instead of turning to religions for help or expecting future VR technology to continue our self-models in an afterlife through virtual re-embodiment, I think the real message Metzinger wants to leave us with is that, my true self is not something out there that I will have to go searching for, as a mystery, and maybe never ever find. What we need to do is to think of ourselves as a process that we can shape, channel, and change. This is very significant, particularly at this stage of life I am at after suffering so many external uncertainties during the pandemic. Maybe I will be surprised at the fact how much I have grown and developed over recent years. And I might suddenly recognize that what I am experiencing is actually creating my true self. I want to quote my favorite line from This Is Us to make a conclusion here: “take the sourest lemon that life has to offer and turn it into something resembling lemonade.”

Reference

Metzinger, TK. (2018). Why is Virtual Reality Interesting for Philosophers? Frontiers in Robotics and AI, 5(101). DOI: 10.3389/frobt.2018.00101

When Philosophy Meets Virtual Reality was originally published in AR/VR Journey: Augmented & Virtual Reality Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.