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From: jmunkki@hila.hut.fi (Juri Munkki)
Newsgroups: sci.virtual-worlds
Subject: Re: More on Classifying VR
Message-ID: <1991Feb25.114611.29204@santra.uucp>
Date: 25 Feb 91 11:46:11 GMT
References: <16816@milton.u.washington.edu> <7679@crash.cts.com> <17101@milton.u
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In article <17101@milton.u.washington.edu> quasar@neuromancer.leis.bellcore.com 
(Laurence R. Brothers) writes:
>There are no display devices that I am aware of for which the user 
>cannot distinguish between reality and the display,...

Currently one of the easiest methods to distinguish between real images and
computer generated (or otherwise displayed) is to check if you can focus on
different depths. A stereo display will force your eyes to focus to a single
depth while the stereo effect makes the brain think that distance is variable.

One way to solve this problem is to monitor the focus of the eye and
change the focus of the picture accordingly. Since this is far from
easy, I would guess that most systems will ignore the whole thing and
hope that a partial illusion is sufficient.

IMHO, the human mind is flexible enough to compensate for the defects in
virtual reality. All we need is something that will feel real enough, if
the user wants to think that it is real. Just think of how well we adapt
to the totally unrealistic worlds of video games and think how well a 14
year old kid controls the spaceship (or whatever) with a 9 position joystick.

Our minds are the most powerful part of the virtual reality interface and
will probably remain so for the next 10-30 years.

So, a "virtual reality Turing test" is not necessary for virtual reality
to be useful. Full realism has its uses, but the advantages over a slightly
unrealistic are really quite minimal.

   ____________________________________________________________________________
  / Juri Munkki     /  Helsinki University of Technology   /  Wind  / Project /
 / jmunkki@hut.fi  /  Computing Center Macintosh Support  /  Surf  /  STORM  /
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