Laudal, 'One Global Community - Many Virtual Worlds', Arachnet Electronic Journal on Virtual Culture v3n03 (August 31, 1995) URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/serials/aejvc/aejvc-v3n03-laudal-one Electronic Journal on Virtual Culture ________________________________________________________________ ISSN 1081-3055 August 31, 1995 Volume 3 Number 3 EJVCV3N3 LAUDAL One Global Community - Many Virtual Worlds by Thomas Laudal Stavanger, Norway thomasla@oslonett.no ABSTRACT: The technology associated with Virtual Reality will change our understanding of what "information" is, and blur the distinction between reality and virtual reality - between the real world and the emerging virtual worlds. These effects are not dependent though on perfect interfaces, or extreme processing power, they are rather byproducts of the deceptive quality of the multimedia technology which already exists. Virtual worlds will be part of our global community where identification and political participation (democracy) traditionally has been linked to local territory. Will we see Virtual Worlds undermine identification and political participation, or may they offer new means of identification and participation? CONTENTS: 1. THE ANATOMY OF VIRTUAL WORLDS 2. CONVERGENCE BETWEEN THE VIRTUAL AND THE REAL 2.1. PREDICTABILITY AND ORIGIN AS DISTINGUISHING CRITERIA 2.2. MATTER AND ENERGY AS DISTINGUISHING CRITERIA 2.3. VIRTUAL AND REAL WORLDS 2.4. ROBOTS AND REAL COMMUNITIES 2.5. ROBOTS, TIME AND SPACE 2.6. SUPPLEMENTING UNIVERSAL LINEAR TIME 3. OUR COMMUNITY 3.1. EXPANDING PUBLIC SPACE 3.2. DEMOCRACY: THE NEED FOR GLOBAL AND ISSUE-SPECIFIC CONSTITUENCIES 3.3. REDISTRIBUTION AND SOLIDARITY 1. THE ANATOMY OF VIRTUAL WORLDS This essay concerns the development of Virtual Reality (VR) and its long term effect on our society. As a starting point, I have tried to envisage the totality of all coded information in the VR-worlds of the future. This bird=B4s-eye perspective enables us to see the qualitative differences between various categories of information and to describe the various categories of information which belongs to still unknown technologies. By allowing our selves to name these categories, we may focus on the major implications VR will have on human beings self-image and ultimately, on the human beings position as the controller and superior intellect on the planet earth. In the last part I will discuss how this information technology might influence our community, and particularly our capacity to act collectively and promote an egalitarian society. To follow these lines, we need a description of likely future elements of the VR technology. The main areas of improvement in hardware, software design and user-interfaces are pretty easy to name: There is no disagreement among experts that the basic capacities, like processor speed and the amount of memory will continue to improve. The disagreement concerns the pace and limits of these improvements, not the direction. - This is why it is possible to make a sketch of certain parts of our future information society, without residing to free fantasy. The following text presuppose that the increasing capacity of computers will continue in more or less the same pace as today in the next century to come <1> : Let us call all forms of coded information for "information objects". An information object may be "any amount of coded information which is treated, or regarded, by human beings as discrete entities, with certain functional properties". I propose the following main categories of information objects: CONTROLLERS Objects which controls or steer something in a way which allows the effects which it causes in its environment to be determined in advance. This is the traditional notion of linear computer programmes today; codes which defines a stream of output which again causes predictable effects in its environment. The controllers will act as "machine language" (the modules which all other information objects consists of) analogous to genes in living species in the real world. "To programme" would mean to use controllers (which will include natural language) - to communicate, or instruct, other objects in the real or virtual world. The current linear programmes, including their syntaxes, is a subcategory of controllers. Examples: The authorises vocabulary allowed in a specific network, or a routine to swap two pieces of data. The emergence of standardised product nomenclatures like the UNCCS in UN and the CPA in the EU could be seen as the first primitive attempts to include natural languages in open transnational computer networks. COMPOUNDS Objects which are designed, not merely to control, but also to interact with someone - or something - in its environment. A compound may have no predetermined effect on any element in its environment. I propose three subcategories of compounds; static, dynamic and organic: STATIC COMPOUNDS An information package which, when it is "used", do not include any dynamic elements or moving parts. The static compounds is analogous to "matter" in the real world. There will be classes of static compounds. Non-standard compounds will in some cases be defined as "pollutant", and be outlawed should it come into the "ecosystem" of the computer networks. There will be a hierarchy of static compounds based on their internal structure such as the hierarchy of the chemical elements in the real world today. Examples: Texts, pictures or three dimensional spaces, like interiors in buildings not yet built. DYNAMIC COMPOUNDS This object may be regarded as the virtual "machine". Dynamic compounds consist of controllers and static compounds. Some of the man-made programmes will be a subgroup of dynamic compounds. All sequential processes, like the process of building predesigned material objects, will be controlled by dynamic compounds. A virtual factory will consist of programmes which may be changed by natural language instructions, and it will be able to simulate all processes and make virtual models of all objects we would want. Examples: Simulation of a aeroplane engine, or a virtual spaceship which displays a real-time view from the cockpit based on cameras deployed in the real world. ORGANIC COMPOUNDS Information objects which themselves are changing in a way which makes it impossible to describe them by a finite number of properties. They are capable of "learning", from experiences or, in other words, grow to develop fundamentally new sets of abilities. No human being, nor any group of human beings, would be able to fully control an organic compound. - The only way would be by completely destroy it. Some of the organic compounds will have a critical role in our information society. Destroying these organic compounds could therefore have disastrous consequences. I propose two subsets of organic compounds: VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS One could imagine virtual environments as the "biosphere" with laws which defines virtual "ecosystems" - the "operation systems" of the virtual worlds. There are yet no examples of this type of information objects. ROBOTS These are the virtual individuals, or virtual "species", which we judge to be sufficiently autonomous to view as discrete entities surrounded by a virtual environment. Sooner or later virtual viruses and virtual one-celled organisms will emerge simulating all essential information flows in such organisms in the real world. When these are planted in a suitable environment, we may observe, but never determine in advance, their growth and movements. We may develop virtual species which=20have an accelerated evolution by increasing their frequency of mutations and replication. <2> There are yet no examples of this type of information objects. The information objects above are part of a structure which may be listed like this: 1. Controllers (Causes effects in their environment which could be determined in advance / not interactive.) 2. Compounds (Causes effects in its environment which are undeterminable in advance / interacts with human being and/or machines.) 2.1. Static compounds 2.2. Dynamic compounds 2.3. Organic compounds (Able to "learn") 2.3.1. Virtual environments 2.3.2. Robots These categories may be ordered in accordance to inclusiveness: - Static compounds includes controllers. - Dynamic compounds includes static compounds. - Virtual environments and robots includes dynamic compounds. - A "fully equipped" organic compound will amount to a VIRTUAL WORLD (VW). And listed in the same fashion: Controllers Static compounds Dynamic compounds Robots and Virtual environments V I R T U A L W O R L D S The first network application which qualifies as a VW will most likely never be celebrated as a technological breakthrough. - The first VW will be the outcome of gradual development of more and more sophisticated network environments. Present technology already reveals the potential for VWs. <3> We are in the middle of the transition towards the second stage of the development of global computer networks, the stage where not only computers are interconnected, but where also all software is distributed through the same network. In a couple of decades, a few VWs will most certainly emerge as leading VW- standards. Compounds (or some equivalent entities) will consist of classes of controllers which will be standardised. It may be forbidden by law to submit non-authorised controllers in a leading VW standard. This would "pollute" VWs and endanger the "life" of robots and virtual environments. We will learn to accept that "life" is merely a matter of complexity in "machines" which stores and communicates coded information in a way which in our view qualifies them as "living" objects. <4> 2. CONVERGENCE BETWEEN THE VIRTUAL AND THE REAL As we enter into the world of distributed multimedia software, the term "information" will be redefined completely. VR is eventually developing into an operational technology with applications available to a wide audience after decades of talk and promise. VR-products will be able to transmit coded information in many forms - in fact - in ALL forms we know of: The standard user interface will utilise all our senses. There exists little more than what we see, smell, feel, taste or listen to. Quite literary, the "reality" we know is a product of the input channelled through our five senses. Clearly, microscopes, microphones, radars and a wide range of other tools, let us observe a lot which is out of reach to our senses, but such tools, one should never forget, are no more than extensions of our senses. By definition our real world is what our senses pick up. We may not have understood how the mind is processing the incoming information, but we are pretty sure that our five senses capture the main parts of what input there is. - In other words; what we sense, is what we get. Our senses defines the interface to the real world we know. 2.1. PREDICTABILITY AND ORIGIN AS DISTINGUISHING CRITERIA If future user-interfaces to VWs utilises and "fools" all our senses, what principle differences will then remain between the virtual and the real worlds? One may choose to investigate their differences when it comes to degree of predictability: In the real world fate rules; we are never in full control of events like weather or crying babies, and we will never be. However, this also applies to virtual worlds since they will, no doubt, include feedback functions, both in their environments and as elements in the robots which will inhabit them. Events in the VW would be just as unpredictable as similar events in the real world. People make VWs while God, or somebody/something quit different than people, created the real world. Does this distinguish the real world from the virtual worlds? Hardly. The truth is that we don=B4t have a clue who - o= r what - created our real world. But even if we knew for a fact that people like our selves did NOT create the real world, this would not be a significant difference between virtual and real worlds: The reason is that the VWs includes feedback functions which means that it is undergoing continuous recreation: As times go by the initial state of a VW created by human beings would be erased, but most importantly from a philosophical point of view; also all traces of the initial state would be lost. They would be altered by events which are products of the complex feedback functions which rules the VW. We may conclude; Neither the degree of predictability nor their difference in origin distinguish the real world from the virtual worlds. The more general implication is staggering: The fundamental properties of a virtual world may not be distinguishable from the properties of the real world. 2.2. MATTER AND ENERGY AS DISTINGUISHING CRITERIA Not so fast, perhaps you say: What about matter and energy - the most fundamental elements in the real world - where do we find them in the VWs? In the real world, the source of all energy is the big bang which all astronomers believe was the starting point of our universe. Some astronomers believes entering a black hole amounts to entering new universes, "baby-universes", as some call them. <5> The initial source of energy may in other words quite possible be another universe. A VW running on solar power is therefore no less "real" than the earth, or our universe, which depends on the same source of energy. We conclude that energy running a VW is a necessary requisite originating from the world "outside" - which however also may be the case for the real universe we live in. But what about matter - there is no matter in VW=B4s? Yes there is; there are a lot of electrons and photons , and a lot of hardware to serve all software which defines the VW. This gives matter a very limited role compared to the role matter plays in the real world, but this difference is not in any way fundamental. We all know that matter and energy are interchangeable ever since Einstein revealed the simple equation; E=3Dmc2. The limited role of matter in the VW=B4s are in other words no good criteria for distinguishing between real and virtual worlds. 2.3. VIRTUAL AND REAL WORLDS VWs are here thought of as consisting of globally distributed hardware, and cables linking the hardware together. All software (or information objects) in the VW are "running on" electrons and photons. Clearly, the VW must be a subclass - or part - of the real world? Yes, that may be true from our point of view, but try asking a robot in a VW! My point is that this is without relevance to inhabitants of the VW. Imagine that the real world we know is a VW invented by inhabitants in another universe. The laws of nature and the species inhabiting our world would be real for us, but "virtual" for our inventors. The relationship between the real and the virtual worlds is in other words dependent on which world the observer is living in. Ryan (1994) describes the "actuality" of worlds in a similar fashion: ".. the actual world is the world from which I speak and in which I am immersed, while the non-actual possible worlds are those that I look at from the outside. These worlds are actual from the point of view of their inhabitants." <6> This suggests there are an infinite number of worlds and that there is no "objective" way of describing their interrelationship. No world is more "real" than the other. This is far from a new idea: Leibniz philosophy allows for an "infinite number of possible universes". <7> According to Leibniz "the present world is necessary physically or hypothetically, but not absolutely or metaphysically". <8> 2.4. ROBOTS AND REAL COMMUNITIES If we accept, albeit reluctantly, that it is impossible to distinguish between VWs and the real world on the basis of their fundamental properties, the possible new territory to "defend" may be our community - the collective consisting of civic men and women. No-one would ever suggest that our civic community is threatened by an emerging virtual community, or that the VW=B4s would in the foreseeable future be able to simulate such an entity? No, we are nowhere near creating intelligent human-like conscious robots. <9> The truth however, may be that human intelligence and human capabilities never will be seen as a standard by entrepreneurs of the VWs. The most advanced information objects in demand in a VW will have little in common with human beings. The inventors of robots may choose from all possible capabilities defined in the VW, and need not worry about the material "clothing" of these capabilities. Many of the unique qualities of human beings in the real world would therefore probably not even be among the desired traits of the inhabitants in the VWs since the qualities of human beings are products of an evolution working under conditions completely different from the ones present in VWs. Robots in VWs will most probably have capabilities which are radically different compared to human beings. The virtual individuals would for example define "intelligence" quit differently than we do. When the constraints of the real world are broken, our capabilities will no longer be seen as the standard which virtual individuals will be compared. 2.5. ROBOTS, TIME AND SPACE Some robots may be the human beings interface to the VW, that is, our "representative" in the VW. These kind of robots will "observe" a lot which is out of reach for human beings today. They will have far more advanced "senses" compared to human beings: - Their "eyes" will see wave images ranging from molecules to distant galaxies. The "virtual horizon" will be the available image on the networks which they are part. - Their "nose" will be able to detect what-ever any machine are able to detect, and will also be able to accurately determine what it smells. <10> - They will "hear" all wave-lengths that we know of and be able to detect the most minuscule fragment and analyse and convert it to any type of information object. - Their "taste" will be censors testing for viruses and other anomalies in incoming flows of information. - "Touch" will be extremely sensitive, (but lack sensuality...) <11> These robots will also have the capacity of "observing" the future - that is - the ability of foresight: Linear dynamics would in many cases be easy to analyse and extrapolate, but also nonlinear dynamics would be analysed by use of scaling technics and other methods which determine their nature. "Foresight" will not be anything mystical as today where it is associated with witch-craft and the like, but a regular kind of "observation" which would be linked to premises (input information) and probabilities. We could make a transition from the near past to the near future without changing our sense of "reality". The degree of certainty would be the common criteria for "truth", which both past and future observations would be compared to. Hence, when computer technology is developed further, not only the distinction between the real and the virtual world would be blurred, but eventually also the distinction between the past and the future. When comparing observations of similar events, observations of recent events would with few exception be more reliable than future observations. - But this will not always be the case: The observation of the future conditions of oil reservoir may for example be more reliable than observations of recent economic trends. (This is even true now.) The perhaps most dramatic feature of the VW is however not yet touched upon: The fundamentally changing concepts of time which will confront human beings in VW=B4s: 2.6. SUPPLEMENTING UNIVERSAL LINEAR TIME Time, as we know it, will never be obsolete for the simple=20reason that human beings, with our limited "in-house" data-processing recourses, always will need it. How else would we be able to meet someone at the airport, compete in athletics or set milestones in business and politics? What we don=B4t need however - and surely are going to loose - is the notion of a unique time scale as a common parameter in empiric science, engineering and manufacturing. We will sooner or later look back on our "obsession with the universal linear time scale". We will need one common time schedule to coordinate interaction between our selves, but not in the boundaries of the VW=B4s and probably not either in the fully automated production of real goods and services. Arranging a "meeting" (or initiating a communication session) between two robots in a VW, will happen by reference to algorithms which compute the optimal instant available, subject to previously agreed criteria, including unpredictable processes/events in the environment. These criteria will be fixed by an exchange of information in advance of the meeting. (This exchange demands very little use of resources, compared to ordinary communication sessions and requires no common time schedule.) The actual moment when two robots start communicating, (or "meet"), could be determined only a few milliseconds before the meeting actually takes place, even if the original time frame was set several weeks in advance. To subordinate all communication to a moment in which refers to a single time schedule would be suboptimal for robots which have the capacities of fast computers. "Moments in time" will in this part of cyberspace be moments in the "criteria-space" which is defined by the communicating parties and which will substitute "a single time schedule". ("Cyberspace" is here understood as "the space defined by the total flow of coded information inside and between computers".) It is amazing how many of the present ideas concerning VR, and its implications for our concepts "time" and "space", which are echoed by the German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, born in 1646: Space and time, Leibniz insists, are relative: "As for my own opinion, I have said more than once that I hold space to be something merely relative, as time is. I hold it to be an order of co-existences, as time is an order of successions..." Leibniz maintained a relational theory of space and time: "If two events, A and B are not simultaneous but successive, there is a certain relation between them which we express by saying that A is before B and B after A. And if we conceive the order of possible relations of this kind, we have the abstract idea of time. Abstract time is no more something real than is abstract space. There is no real abstract space in which things are situated, and there is not real abstract and homogeneous time in which successions occur. Both, then, are ideal. At the same time co-existence and pre- and post-existence are real. Time is neither more or less a being of reason than space. To co-exist and to pre- or post-exist are something real..." <12> 3. OUR COMMUNITY 3.1. EXPANDING PUBLIC SPACE Articles on the relationship between technology and community have traditionally emphasised how the emerging technologies makes the world seem smaller. Headlines like "Convergence of Mass Culture" and "Globalisation of Business" have the past decade dominated international news magazines. At the same time, however, the introduction of new software and network applications are slowly opening up new worlds in cyberspace. The boundaries of physical presence and locality are slowly being erased by an increasing number of networks and software products which eventually will interconnect and form the first VWs. We are on the verge of a new era, but will people take advantage? Before computer technology will provide us with alternative living spaces, it will pass many stages where the flow of information in cyberspace will increase enormously. But people communicate through "public space" - the space carrying human to human communication. What willthe advancing cyberspace mean for the future of public space? Public space have been expanding for many hundreds of years, according to J=FCrgen Habermas. In 1962 Habermas describes how the universalisation of public space (Habermas uses here the phrase; "the repoliticized social sphere") is historically linked to the elimination of illiteracy, democratic reforms and the introduction of the printing press and mass media. <13> This universalisation created however a dilemma because the less informed masses are incapable of making rational political decisions. According to Habermas the ruling elites response is partly to produce the kind of publicity needed in order to manipulate the masses, and partly, the gradual withdrawal of issues from public space which are judged to important for the masses to deal with. Jean Baudrillard believes we have reached a stage where the masses, and the symbols appearing in mass media, is living a life of its own - disconnected from its former counterpart, the ruling elite. Public communication is disconnected from the dialectics of meaning. Words, and other symbols appearing in public spaces, are however still pretending to interact with some counterpart, according to Baudrillard. We are witnessing a process of simulation on a grand scale. The community is no longer achieved through a symbolic medium, (like the charismatic leaders during the second world war, using newsreels and radio), but through technical means: Baudrillard points to the circular inquiries and tautological messages occupying public space: "There is no question of genuine symbolic or didactic processes coming into play, since it would only compromise the meaning of this ceremony, which is collective participation - a participation that can only occur in the form of a liturgy, or as a formalised code of signs meticulously emptied of every drop of meaning." <14> Pretty pessimistic this - but one should bear in mind that Baudrillard is commenting on a society where the domination of one-way mass media perhaps have culminated. In 1982 Baudrillard also sees the computer as a one-way medium. <15> At that time however, very few anticipated the impact of interactive computer technology, the global networks, and particularly; how Internet would capture the world without any central controlling unit. Cyberspace may rescue public space from the collapse which Baudrillard describes, by opening up new dimensions for communication and dialog. <16> If it became true, it would be good news, because the survival of public space is all important for at least three reasons: 1. For the creation of "community spirit"; the collective notion of being bound together by common language, music, religion and other cultural manifestations which in turn allows for collective compromise and good government. <17> 2. For learning, in the broadest sense: Without free exchange of ideas and critics, both the pace of innovation, and the quality of political decisions, will suffer. 3. For freedom of speech: The right to free speech, and the practising of free speech, are mutually dependent. History tells us that civil rights never are won once and for all, they have to be continuously fought for. Cyberspace - as a medium - promises to; - open more communication channels than ever before (measured both by numbers and by categories), - stimulate more people more intensely than any other medium and - offer more means of participation in public space than ever before. The threat by the present one-way mass media to public space, may in other words be reduced by the emergence of computer technology and computer networks offering interactive communication. The option to participate will be easy to utilise by producers of mass media programmes and it will create a more engaged audience and therefore also bring commercial opportunities. The threat outlined by Neustadt that computer technology will "fragment our politics, narrowing peoples perspectives, shifting more power into special interest groups and weakening the glue that holds our system together" is therefore highly unlikely. <18> The potential of this technology to control information is not underestimated, but it is many times forgotten that this control will be in the hands of the large majority of the population, not only the ruling elite. It will be impossible to hinder the masses access to cryptography, photo manipulation, gigantic databases, E-mail and other products which will make censorship and central control more difficult than ever before in modern history. The result may then be that cyberspace will expand, and possibly revitalise public space. 3.2. DEMOCRACY: THE NEED FOR GLOBAL AND ISSUE-SPECIFIC CONSTITUENCIES Academic literature concerning the development of liberal democratic systems, emphasises broad participation. <19> In paragraph 3.1., it was concluded that cyberspace, as mass medium, have the potential of expanding and even revitalising public space. Democracies will no doubt benefit from this since VR technologies will offer a range of new means of participation and activate the masses. Mass media could be turned in to a truly interactive tool not only to the benefit of governments but to the benefit of all with access to computer networks. But the development of computer-networks will also reduce the strength of; - geographically identification and - hierarchical control structures which both are essential to democratic systems today. Democracies will have to adopt to cyberspace. Today democratic constitutions rely on a predefined territory and a predefined group of citizens. The development of cyberspace will gradually undermine this pyramidal structure of authority and participation. <20> The undermining of geographical identification results from the increasing travelling and communication among people around the world. Local identification is needed if we are to sustain local constituencies and representation. When local identification withers, so also will our system of local constituencies and representation. Without the adaptation of our democratic systems to these challenges, democracy will be replaced by less orderly and more authoritarian systems. Constituencies should in the future be defined according to the issues at stake. A political issue concerning only a geographical territory would require a geographical defined constituency, while other issues would require issue-specific constituencies. Because of new technology transcending national borders, and the increasing integration of world economy, political issues with no geographical limitations are getting more common. Today national structures are carrying the burden of delivering political results in an age where national political bodies are becoming so weak that the publics distrust in politics and politicians are unavoidable - even with the use of massive image-control by the political elite. Gu=E9henno and Reich describes how this may happen. Both emphasises the mismatch between transnational economic structures and national political structures. (Gu=E9henno 1993, Reich 1993.) There is, on this background, a need for the development of both global and issue-specific constituencies which may gradually develop to become a political system with powers to influence its economic environment: 1. Global constituencies Issues which concern all people on earth, like communication standards, control of emissions to air and international trade restrictions, will need a global representative forum. <21> The UN, WTO and other global and regional bodies like IMF, IBRD, EU, ASEAN, NAFTA, MERCOSUR and OAU should form a superstructure. The General Assembly of this organisation will be the supreme authority in world economy and politics. 2. Issue-specific constituencies Issues which transcends national borders, and are considered to be relevant only to a group of people, should be decided by representatives of constituencies where the "citizens" qualify according to criteria such as education, occupation and competence. The criteria should be decided by the general assembly of a global parliament.=20The global parliament should also decide which powers the bodies elected by the issue-specific constituencies should have and the election procedures, but it should normally not influence the decisions made by the bodies elected by issue-specific constituencies. The future of democracy depends - no doubt - also on the strict interpretation of the subsidiarity principle. The subsidiarity principle is covered extensively both in academic literature and by documents issued by intergovernmental organisations, and will not be discussed further here. <22> 3.3. REDISTRIBUTION AND SOLIDARITY Personal incomes are distributed unequally among people in all countries - also in the mixed economies of the egalitarian Scandinavian countries. To avoid large inequalities in living standards, all liberal democracies practices some sort of redistribution by means of progressive income taxes, subsidies to non-competitive sectors, or by other means. The bases for this policy is the belief that all human beings have the same value, and that the market mechanism must be counterbalanced by collective measures to avoid unacceptable human misery. Will cyberspace (its implications for public space and democracy) reduce our efforts to redistribute welfare? - Reduce solidarity? The will to share with those less fortunate depends on the culture and the values in our community, which in turn are influenced by the material basis which our community depends on: Our income and our productive labour relies on a transnational - often global - structure, with increasing vertical specialisation of production, and horizontal specialisation of competence. Economically, we no longer depend on our community, but on the global structures of trade and corporations. Our communities (local, regional and national), are loosing their material basis. <23> But in the mean time we see virtual communities emerging, communities which are both global and local at the same time. If we are to implement policies which redistributes welfare in the future, we must be able to identify with those less fortunate. Will the trends which undermines the material basis of our communities also undermine this ability and thereby mean less redistribution and greater inequalities among people? I believe not: Greater transparency, caused by the global information networks, will contribute positively to egalitarian culture and values. - This requires however that acts of solidarity "survives" the transition from geographical communities to cyberspace-communities. NOTES: <1> This should be a reasonable expectation - see for example =46erguson/Morris 1994 where they predict that "The power and price/performance of microprocessors will continue to improve at roughly the current pace for the foreseeable future." (Chapter 13; "The Next Decade: Market Opportunity", page 191-192.) <2> The Tierra Model of Thomas Ray have simulated evolution of pre-cambrium species: "Thousands of generations were compressed into hours and the ancestors diversified as they competed for the computer=B4s energy (processing time)." (Source: Slack:1994.) <3> Professor Thomas Ray at the University of Delaware, is leading a multinational project where they use computers to probe evolutionary processes. In 1990 his first version of a virtual (pre-cambrium) environment, called Tierra, was greeted as "the first logical demonstration of the validity of the Darwinian theory of evolution". (Professor Grahem Bell in the New York Times.) "While Ray intended to start with the simplest set-up and then add more complicated features such as parasites and sex, these features emerged spontaneously when the programme was run." (Boston Globe Book Review, January 1995.) Ray is currently working on a more complex model which is to be a globally distributed system for simulation of evolutionary processes where all interested around the world, with free disk space and process power, may participate. (Source: Slack 1994.) <4> Rothschild shows that the analogy between technology/innovation and organic matter/life is strong=20in a hole range of fields, in his brilliant book; "Bionomics". <5> Stephen Hawking describes the role of "Baby Universes" in several articles. See Ferguson 1991. Gribbin 1993 argues that we may be part of a family of universes (baby- and parent universes): The collapse of a black hole can create a new universe. Gribbins hypothesis is that there may be a competition between universes in a Darwinian sense. <6> The citation originates from Ryan 1994, paragraph 10. <7> Leibniz; "The Monadology", paragraph 53. <8> Source: Copleson 1963, page 329, quoted from Leibniz "On the Ultimate Origin of Things". See also Woolley 1993, chapter 11, "Reality", for a description of the relation between quantum mechanics and virtual reality. <9> There are several Virtual Reality applications where communities are simulated, but they are nowhere near an environment which may allow "free life". One example of such an application is "Virtual Polis", developed by a group at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA. <10> The virtual "noses" developed today are based on neural networks. Leading suppliers are Neotronics and Aromascan. The most common uses of virtual noses are as quality controllers in food, drink and perfume producing companies, in medicine to determine causes of infection and in fire detection. (See The Wall Street Journal 2.3. 1995 and The Economist 15.4. 1995 ) <11> Some even believe that sensuality is in reach of the VR technology. See for example Rheingold 1991, pages 345-348. <12> Copleston 1963 p. 308-309. (Citations from the third letter to Samuel Clark.) <13> J=FCrgen Habermas 1971, p. 163-164. <14> Baudrillard 1990, p. 68. <15> See for example Baudrillard 1990, p. 69. <16> C. J. Keep supports this view in an article entitled; "Knocking on Heavens Door: Leibniz, Baudrillard and Virtual Reality", published in EJournal at the University at Albany New York in September 1993: "The virtual then perhaps offers a way out of the cultural and epistemological dead-end of Baudrillard=B4s theory of hyperreality. .." <17> See Toqueville 1945, second book chapter VII. Daly 1994 is a highly recommendable anthology, bringing many of the most influential texts on "communitarianism" together. <18> Neustadt 1985, p. 561 <19> Recommended sources; Toqueville 1945, Mill 1988 and Pateman 1985. <20> Ronfeldt (1992) suggests that ".. many governments may evolve to become network organisations .. the network phenomenon may intensify interaction between state institutions and the organisations" (chapter 5). <21> Renato Ruggiero, said in his first official statement as head of WTO in Mars 1995; "Among my first tasks will be to seek to reduce the gap between the three major international institutions that play key roles in globalisation: the WTO, the World Bank (IBRD) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF)". (Source: The Wall Street Journal 22.3. 1995.) <22> The subsidiarity Principle is defined and referred to explicitly in article 3 B of the Maastricht Treaty. Former member of the Commission, Peter Schmidhuber, stated in a speech to MEPs in November 1992 that the aims of the subsidiarity principle are three-folded; 1) A sensible division of labour among the various levels at which action is taken, 2) Appropriate decisions and efficient administration and 3) Greater transparency of the decision-making structures and greater public acceptance of substantive decisions. <23> An OECD-report explains this: "It is obvious that global network or multinational firms question increasingly the meaning of most national policies .. It will be obvious from the description above, that there is an increasing need for international policy-making in this area." (OECD 1991.) Reich 1993 emphasises the unproportional weight given to national owned companies in national governments. According to Reich, the national policies should seek to maximise the value each citizen can add to the global economy. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Baudrillard Jean, "A l=B4ombre des majorit=E9s silencieuses ou la fin du social", Deno=EBl/Gonthier, Paris 1982. Baudrillard Jean, "Revenge of the Crystal Selected Writings on the Modern Object and its Destiny 1968-1983", Pluto Press, London 1990. Copleston S.J., "A History of Philosophy: Volume 4 Modern Philosophy: Descartes to Leibniz", Image books, New York 1963. Daly Markate, "Communitarianism", Wadsworth, California 1994 =46erguson Kitty, "Stephen Hawking, Quest for a Theory of Everything", Bantam Books, London 1991 =46erguson Chales H./Morris Charles R., "Computer Wars", Times Books, New York 1994. Gribbin John, "In the Beginning - The Birth of The Living Universe", Penguin, London 1993. Gu=E9henno Jean-Marie, "La Fin de la D=E9mocratie", Flammarion, 1993 Habermas J=FCrgen, "Strukturwandel der =D6ffentlichkeit. Untersuchungen zu einer Kategorie der b=FCrglichen Gesellschaft" 1962, Norwegian edition, Oslo 1971. Keep C.J., "Knocking on Heaven=B4s door: Leibniz, Baudrillard and Virtual Reality", EJournal, University at Albany, New York, September 1993. Leibniz Gottfried Wilhelm, "The Monadology", 1714, Translate by Robert Latta 1898. Mill John Stuart, "On Liberty" 1859, Penguin Classics, London 1988 Neustadt Richard N., "Electronic Politics" in Forester (ed.), MIT Press, Mass. 1985. OECD-report, "Technology in a Changing World", Paris 1991 Pateman Carol, "Participation and Democratic Theory" 1970, Cambridge University Press, London 1985. Reich Robert B., "The Work of Nations" 1991, Simon & Schuster Ltd, London 1993. Rheingold Howard, Virtual Reality, Simon & Schuster Ltd, London 1991. Ronfeldt David, "Cyberocracy is Coming", The WELL, 1992 Rothschild Michael L., "Bionomics" 1990, Futura Publications, London 1992. Ryan Marie-Laure, "Immersion vs. Interactivity: Virtual Reality and Literary", Postmodern Culture v.5 n.1, September 1994 Slack Gordy, "Virtual Evolution: A Life Goes Wild", Pacific Discovery Magazine,1994. Thucydides, "Pericles Funeral Speech" 400 BC in "Greek Political Oratory", Penguin Classics, Middlesex 1987 Tocqueville Alexis de, "Democracy in America" Volume 2 1840, Alfred A. Knopf, New York 1945. Woolley Benjamin, "Virtual Worlds" 1992, Penguin Books, London 1993. ----------------------------------------------------- ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Graduate from The University of Oslo - Norway 1989 (Master in political science and degrees in mathematics and law.) Working experience: Norwegian Ministry of Local Affairs 1989 -1991. Norwegian Ministry of Energy and Industry: 1991-1993. The European Commission, DG XV, 1993 Achilles Systems (Computer company - UK/Norway) 1994 Publications: "The political Role of Corporations" 1989, University of Oslo. (Norwegian only.) 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