A Moral Question

The internet has already developed an etiquette for dealing with such situations.


Person A: ASL?

Person B: Ima grrl.

Person A: omg pics plz

Person B: kk

...

Person A: Thats not you. too hawt

Person B: U r just saying that *blush*

Person A: No, I really don't believe its you


That's about as much proof as you can get, right there. After that, it's all trust.

- Desmond 'the man' Shang

I prefer being honest both in first and second life because I am too lazy to make up lies.

I really don't care what other people do. That is their business and not mine.

The truth IS who we are inside. And that truth comes out, even if the truth is that the person is kind of a liar, lol.

Because the truth is who we are inside, so many relationships are possible online that would never happen offline, where age, sex, looks, all kinds of things, effectively cull out who we even talk to much, much less be in a relationship with. And that's wonderfully liberating when it comes to friendships, and learning more about a vast variety of other people you wouldn't necessarily come in contact with normally.

But being discerning when it comes to intimate relationships is not equivalent to being close-minded in any way. If you want only heterosexual or only gay relationships, then that is every bit your right, because your intimate relationship is only for you and your partner, not to satisfy some societal expectation at large.

If you want only relationships with people your age, or of a certain personality, intelligence, culture - or anything - that is also your right, and no need to feel apologetic about it, as it is for you, and not to make the world at large happy.

In the matter of age, for instance - anybody over 18 is legally fair game to anybody else over 18, and that is a huge range of anybodies. Nonetheless, we all have a sort of built-in limit beyond which we start to feel like either dirty old men/women or, if young, we start to cross a line into the "ew" factor.

There's nothing narrow-minded about that, and the parameters differ with each individual. In each relationship, if one partner is actually something else that the other partner doesn't know - such as male/female, old/young, married, etc. - and they know it might bother the other person, they should let them know. Early on. Or else they risk hurting that other person, and more, the longer it goes on.

I've seen some people literally psychologically damaged by deceit of this nature in an online game.

coco

I'm the same as one of the previous posters, I find it quite easy to tell. I'm under no illusions thinking my instincts are full proof, but they're pretty good. Sometimes it's dead obvious give aways, and sometimes it's something more subtle - something that you can't quite put your finger on.

But yes, at the end of the day it's down to trust, as you never really know 100% unless you meet in the flesh

Yes it matters, and the 'why' is easy to answer as well. It is because once you've introduced an element of real-life into the fantasy, the fantasy melts away and it's no longer an online/virtual relationship - it's a real-life relationship.

When people fall in love with an avatar, or someone in a text chat room, they fall for a mental image that they themselves have created in their heads. It is the image of the perfect most ideal companion for that person. Once the barrier to reality is broken, there's no way to go back. Photos may be completely different from fantasy images. A phone call may introduce not the sexy, silky-smooth voice imagined, but a wretched voice complete with hacking cough every 10 seconds. And I needn't describe the damage a gender-bending revelation could do to that perfect fantasy.

Now you may still wonder; why can't people forget about or overlook those real-life facts, because, after all, they did fall in love. Well, that'd be like overlooking the fact the Mellow-Yellow you're drinking is really someone's piss - despite gulping it down moments ago.

This is interesting to think about. I see a problem when VR and RL somehow slop together.

As this is all new in the human experience, and as humans just somehow expect things to hold the possibility of "more," I think as humans we, without thinking about it, have difficulty keeping our relationships in VR from seeming like they could slop over into RL. What's wrong with having a VR relationship that has no RL aspect? And if that's all right and I have a nice VR relationship with someone, why should RL be forced into the mix? I don't know... this is interesting for cogitation purposes, anyway.

Hi, RisingShadow - I caught a ride with you in your pineapple the other day.

*sips his orange juice and considers*

So basically what you're saying is that no matter how people claim that they seperate RL from VR, most of us assoiciate the two on some deeper level? Well it's either that or you just really don't like mello-yellow.



*waves* hah, hey there Osprey, how's life treating you?




Agreed, Coco, I agree with what you say, but where I was classifying things as narrow minded is when an individual reads somewhere that this kind of thing is going on and instantly posts a very tactless and hateful comment towards the inital poster on the subject questioning their mental state and sexual preference.

I myself ended up living together with someone I met via IRC and it's still all very peachy.

but over the years of IRC ICQ and various muck's i have learned to always be suspicious about the player's real identity as there is no way to tell if the person is lying about anything, untill you meet RL.

i think it's a beginner's mistake to fall in love in real life with someone you meet online as they can easily be anything buT what they say. If you realize you start to fall for the other person, pull on the mental handbrake for a moment and try to find out if the person really is who they're posing to be, either trough a RL meeting webcam chat or the phone.
But don't get swept away by that gorgeous girl or handsome guy you see on your screen before you know the truth behind it...
And if it turns out they're not lying nothing's lost at all.

I made the mistake of falling in love with my current RL partner as well when we only talked online but I was lucky enough that most of what he told me was true.
(that he wasn't a real dragon RL was obvious of course )

My advice: think before you fall in love or decide (together!) that it can't be anything more then a virtual relationship and just forget RL.

Asking whether a particular choice is moral is in effect asking whether it is expected to lead to increasing good.

Choices are considered "good" to the extent that they are perceived to promote subjective goals, measured objectively. [Subjectivity and objectivity are each context-sensitive, but this is not a reference to moral relativism.]

Choices which are perceived, (over an increasing scope of subjective agents) to increasingly deliver desired results (over increasing scope of time, number of agents, types of interactions) will tend to be seen as increasingly moral.

So, away from the abstract and back to the situation at hand:

Within the limited context of a single agent choosing to limit objective awareness of his/her self, with the goodness of this choice measured within the limits of game interaction, there is nothing inherently immoral about this choice.

However, as described above, actions are considered increasingly moral to the extent that they work over increasing context. Thus, in the bigger picture, increasing awareness of both subjective values and objective (instrumental) knowledge leads to increasingly effective decision-making, promoting what is increasingly seen as good, or "moral."

Short version: Growth (in terms of our values) is good. Limited context of interaction leads to limited growth.

- Jef

good grief, you're a scripter aren't you?

Good Call RisingShadow...and I live with the man.

He's really smart, but difficult to understand at times.

Good god, I just read it twice and still don't get it.

Sorry Love.

Yes, I'm a scripter at times, an engineer at heart, and a technical manager by profession. I am also notorious for taking what may seem to be a simple subject and illuminating it in 4-dimensional, laser resolution, animated holographic technicolor.

Moral philosophy is a subject of great interest to me and of great importance to the world as we are rapidly gaining the technology to destroy ourselves while not so rapidly gaining the wisdom to effectively employ it.

I believe the solution to this dilemma requires expanding the sphere of our awareness of ourselves and our environment in order to make more effective decisions that promote our shared human values. We are already expanding this awareness via web-based connectivity and collaborative technology but it's a race we're not certain to win.

More directly to the point of this thread, if a very close friend in-game disclosed that their persona was misleading, I would take that as a sign that they want to "increase the scope of interaction" with me--an opportunity for increased growth in the relationship--which I would welcome as a good thing. If the revelation conflicted with my previous hopes and desires, I would see it as requiring some adjustment on my part, but still an opportunity for growth.

Lizbeth loves it when I talk techy.

- Jef

Lol I enjoy it too. My best friend is an amazing programmer, and the tends to break things down like they're a program. 90% of the time that works, but I have to say that as you get on trying to analyze human behavior like a program, it tends to get a bit mucky because of many unknown factors. Still, I don't disagree with your analysis (yeah I understood it the first time I read through it, lol was laughing too hard to think up a proper response though).

Mainly my thought is that with growth of interaction and intimacy level of online agents does create to a degree an associated physical bond between the two individuals in the realworld. Whether or not one would admit it, that bond is there though it may vary in strength between the two agents depending on how they interpret the information (one may see it as just a game while the other could consider it their life) in which case there becomes a conflicted state between the two when disclosure of personal information is given.

Really what bothers me though is that this extension of trust from one individual to the other could actually be viewed by many as an act of betrayal. As Alain pointed out, such discloser might have been better given earlier on, but should be at this time met with the understanding that the one disclosing is looking to heighten the trust between the two and remove any barriers that they would see as being harmful to the continued growth of the online relationship.

Upon further thought, you know you could really write out a script for a pet, where positive actions cause the creature to like you more and negative reactions would cause harmful results....*ponders* ohh you could even leave the pet out after you log in your area, and the longer it's left alone the more it misses you though once it reaches a certain point it starts to lose trust points with you...*ponders* it'd basically be a virtual virtual pet. LOL....though you could do it with a prim avatar too....hmmmmmmm...A second life Alice? That would be interesting!


**thinks more* I wonder if we could make an Alice interface for second life.....

When I see a "female" I assume there's a 50/50 chance that there is actually a guy sitting behind the keyboard. When I see a "male" I assume there is a chance, less than 50/50 but still present, that it is a female who thinks "boys have cuter clothes" or whatever. (Some of you old folks will recognize who I'm talking about.)

So far, I have never been disappointed by these assumptions

That's got it in one for me...you create an image in your mind and there are only so many leaps I can make from the fantasy to the reality of the other person. The gender leap is too big for me to make.

Been done. At least three seperate times, to my knowledge.

Amen.

Hi I'm Jack.
And I'm really a bobble head.
No really.
I am.