This article is very information intensive, recommended reading duration: 30 minutes.
Introduction & Overview
This article begins with a discussion of the central drivers of social development prior to the advent of information technology: the discovery of new land and the invention of new technologies. The discovery of new land provided scope for value creation, and the invention of new technologies helped people to discover land further, while increasing the efficiency of value creation. In the process, people have also invented information technology, which has opened the door to the virtual world and the connection between the real world and the virtual world.
In general, the development of the real and virtual worlds is dynamic, intertwined and mutually reinforcing, but also cyclical through several distinct stages:
(1) In the real world, people use resources and technology to produce and consume in the form of tangible products;
(2) The development of technology has brought about the digitization of the real world and the accumulation of raw information about the virtual world;
(3) Technological breakthroughs on the image and logic side, creating native information in virtual worlds and further increasing the volume of digital information;
(4) The boundary between the virtual world and the real world is gradually blurring, with the two worlds permeating and influencing each other;
(5) Different industries and sectors are impacted and squeezed by different pathways at both ends of the real and virtual worlds;
(6) The birth of new ways for individuals, organizations, companies and society to connect in the real and virtual worlds.
(7) New connections generate new data, accelerating the blurring of boundaries and furthering the development of virtual worlds.
We further divide real and virtual worlds into “native real world”, “actualized virtual world”, “digitized real world” and “native virtual world” and describe each of them, and also discuss the dynamic relationship between real and virtual worlds, supplemented by industry and market developments for further extrapolation.
We are currently in the early stages of virtual world development, which is characterized by the following two features:
(1) Digitalization of the Real World: the transmission of information from the real world to the “digitized real world”. For example, using tools to digitize the real world, with specific applications in photo taking, video recording, e-commerce, community, facial recognition, the Internet of Things, and more.
(2) Nativization of the Virtual Worlds: Create native information in the virtual world. For example, the use of creative tools for digital design and development, with specific applications in games, film and television, animation, design, special effects, virtual images and more.
In the future, the native information in virtual worlds will increase dramatically, both from people realizing ideas in virtual worlds and from information that can be autonomously produced in virtual worlds. The former requires infrastructure to provide access and support, and more efficient tools are needed to actualize ideas, while the latter requires the involvement of “intelligences” that can intelligently and efficiently produce large amounts of information in the virtual world.
In addition, people in the real world also need more efficient ways to interact with native information in the virtual world, which will give birth to new entrances, new applications, new hardware, etc., thus changing the existing production processes and structures and gradually forming new fields and industries.
To understand, to feel.
I. The Limitations of Real World Value Creation
In the long history of mankind, the 15th to 17th centuries was a very special period in which the European navigators, represented by Columbus and da Gama, played the leading role in the great geographical discoveries. In the past, the lack of knowledge of astronomy and geography led to the belief that the earth was flat and that beyond it lay a bottomless abyss. Coupled with the lack of precise positioning systems and robust and reliable navigational equipment, ocean-going was undoubtedly a very risky business.
As the trade in spices and gold and silver expanded, the desire for wealth continued to fuel European explorers. For Europe, however, not only was Asia a long way to reach by land, but caravans had to traverse multiple regions to reach it; At the meantime, in most eras, the various trade routes to Asia were also controlled by Muslims and other powers, and Europe was in desperate need of opening up a new trade route. Europeans then discovered the New World of America through ocean voyages, and thus began the next era.
The continuation and development of civilization requires a continuous and stable physical environment as a foundation. Although the oceans and skies would be more vast than land, due to the limitations of both the human body and technological development, land is, for the time being, the most suitable way to support the continuation of civilization.
In fact, if limited to “real” objects of value, there is only so much value that can be leveraged from land and resources as the ultimate lever for much of the value born of human society as population increases. In the real world, the area of land we can use for survival and normal living is also very limited, and people have yet to find a stable, sustainable, large-scale way of life in the oceans, skies, or even space.
Broadly speaking, the land, the sea and the sky are all part of space, so we can draw the first conclusion:
- The limited nature of space limits the area in which humans can live and develop.
Moreover, with room to live, we need to consume resources to produce energy, which we then use in various ways to meet the necessary survival and diversification needs of life. In fact, we can also understand “life” as a movement against the increase of entropy, based on the second law of thermodynamics, as Schrödinger has also expressed, life exists against the law of entropy, it lives with negative entropy.
In thermodynamic terms, human civilization, in consuming resources to maintain order, transfers entropy to the consumed resources, increasing them. At the same time, the abundance of resources directly determines the upper limit of the entropy that can be transferred, which gives rise to the second conclusion:
- The finite nature of resources limits the amount of energy available to people for their survival and development.
For a civilization, the history of energy change is one of the epitome of human social history. Of course, we can use real-world resources with increasing efficiency through technological breakthroughs, such as controlled nuclear fusion. If that were possible, we would have an almost inexhaustible supply of energy. So we have a third conclusion:
- The efficiency with which resources are used determines the scale of energy available to humanity.
Prior to the advent of information technology, social development in the olden days essentially stemmed from two factors:
- The discovery of new land: bringing about an increase in living space and available resources
- Invention of new technologies: improved efficiency in the use of resources and the discovery of space
In fact, scientific theories are free inventions of the human mind, and the word “discovery” does not even exist in the fundamental approach of theoretical physics. Thus, the invention of new technologies helps us to perceive the world in a new way and, in the process, to discover new available resources and to gain new efficiencies in their use.
The exciting point about information technology is that the invention of binary rules has opened the door to a digital virtual world for humans. It allowed us to see an almost unlimited virtual living space and almost unlimited virtual resources. Although information technology in the virtual world is still dependent on real world resources, in terms of efficiency of use, if a particular goal is achieved in the virtual world, it will consume less real resources than it would take to achieve a similar goal in the real world.
For example, to get from Beijing to Los Angeles in the real world, you need to choose transportation, which consumes resources with limited energy efficiency; but in the virtual world, you only need to “teleport”, which consumes only a few seconds of electricity; if you want to experience the journey in real traffic, the virtual world consumes only a small fraction of the energy consumed in the real world.
Of course we also know that there are many angles and factors that come into play when discussing the legitimacy of something happening, such as the fact that the Internet was originally born from a military purpose; but when the first code was transmitted to the other side of the planet, it officially began the exploration and construction of virtual worlds for all of humanity.
II. Construction and Performance of Virtual World
The definition and description of virtual worlds has been well described and imagined by various people. Ralph Schroeder of the Oxford Internet Institute (OII) has put it this way:
In his description, a virtual world is a continuous virtual environment in which people can interact with other people or things as if they were in the real world. This virtual environment, or virtual reality, is computer-generated and allows people to interact with “people” in the virtual environment; it also allows people to interact with the virtual environment itself.
In fact, such a definition would place more emphasis on “sensory experience”. Can the experience of text, books, MUD (Multiple User Domain), dreaming, or other phenomena be called a virtual world if it simply describes a sense of “interacting with others or the environment”? Technically, we don’t think that’s the case.
Thus, before discussing the construction and concrete manifestations of virtual worlds, we need to distinguish between “virtual environments” and “virtual worlds.” They actually represent two different types of concepts and domains, and although they may be often confused by people, they essentially describe objects of very strong relevance.
- A virtual environment is a relatively static concept. Most often, we use the term “virtual environment” to express a property of space, such as the environment that the brain imagines when it sees words, pictures, and other objects, or the environment of images constructed by digital technology. Everything that does not exist in the real world can in fact be called a virtual environment. While everything is absolutely dynamic, a virtual environment refers to a relatively static framework and structure.
- A virtual world is a relatively dynamic concept. In fact, virtual worlds can be social in the sense that they allow people to constantly socialize with others, thus emphasizing dynamism. On the spatial level, it also emphasizes persistency. In addition, virtual worlds in a more comprehensive sense should also include an online dimension, as modern information technologies have created virtual worlds that are based on code-rules, and an offline virtual world does not allow the participants to engage in social activities in real time.
Based on this distinction and description, virtual worlds actually encompass the concept of virtual environments. And what we often refer to as video games are, in fact, only part of the virtual world, or a subset of the virtual world, and there is no problem logically with the idea that “the world in the game is a virtual world.” In other words, online games are a subset of the virtual world.
We can think of virtual worlds as the “third space” that is distinguished from online games, that is, the social place online (Steinkuehler and Williams, 2006). Such a “third space” is one of the driving forces behind what is currently blurring the edges between the real and virtual worlds; the driving force behind it is the technological advances brought about by breakthroughs in basic science.
III. Dynamic Development Logic of Virtual World
From the first personal computers to the mobile phones and other terminal devices that almost everyone has, from a few lines of code in a display to selfies and realistic virtual identities, what lies behind this series of changes and innovations is that the process of technology-driven digital civilization is becoming faster and faster, and is occurring in a circular fashion:
(1) In the real world, people use resources and technology to produce and consume in the form of tangible products.
(2) The development of technology has brought about the digitization of the real world and the accumulation of raw information about the virtual world.
(3) Technological breakthroughs on the image and logic side, creating native information in virtual worlds and further increasing the volume of digital information
(4) The boundary between the virtual world and the real world is gradually blurring, with the two worlds permeating and influencing each other.
(5) Different industries and sectors are impacted and squeezed by different pathways at the real and virtual ends of the world.
(6) The birth of new ways to connect in the real and virtual worlds for individuals, organizations, companies and society.
(7) New connectivity generates new data, accelerates the blurring of boundaries, and further advances the development of virtual worlds.
From the perspective of completeness, there was only the native real world in the beginning; the advent of computers and code in turn marked the birth of the virtual world; the digitized real world emerged as people used digital means to transmit information from the real world, such as words and images, into the virtual world; at the same time, people began to create and produce directly in computers, which became the native virtual world.
Built on the premise of mutual influence, there are a total of four most central world forms: native real world, actualized virtual world, digitized real world, and native virtual world. They each represent different scenarios and correspond to different needs, thus giving birth to different industries. In other words, technological breakthroughs can not only optimize existing needs, but also create new ones.
Simultaneously, the relationship between these worlds leads to a “migration effect” that allows scenarios from one of them to be migrated into the other and combined with scenarios from it. The essence of this structural effect is also the migration of demand, and the result is that the industry gains new ideas for development.
Based on this perspective, and in order to better understand the relationship between the concepts mentioned above and what is involved, we use a “spectrogram” to visualize their content:
1. Native Real World
The definition here refers to the period before the advent of information technology when people in the real world used real resources and produced and consumed real goods. During this phase, all of our interactions were based in the real world.
In terms of the direction of information flow, our information comes from the real world and our final output is also from the real world. For example, we consume ores to smelt metals, and then use those metals to labor, mine, battle, transport, and so on. The final object of its action is the object in the real world.
The process from Homo erectus to Homo sapiens and then from Homo sapiens to humans before the advent of information technology has always involved animals and humans interacting with objects in the real world, meaning that information is extracted and transmitted from, terminates in, and deposits in the real world.
For example, whereas in the past people used to take raw materials from nature and use them to make tools for cooking, producing clothes, creating currencies for trade, etc., in the pre-information technology era we still interact with the real world in this way. The difference is that, as a result of past technological accumulation and organizational changes, we can consume, organize and produce information more efficiently, which translates into outputs that are more detailed and differentiated objects and products.
The result, however, is that we are able to access information in new ways and to combine information in new ways. The efficiency of the use of information originating in the real world has been improved, resulting in what is known as an “upgrade” of our needs. Essentially, it is our need for information that has increased.
As our need for more and more information, originating from the real world, increases, there is a question of the efficiency of information acquisition. For the act of “acquiring”, it has two stages: transmission and reception.
Broadly speaking, the existence of information itself does not depend on the means, paths, and objects of information transmission; information itself is only related to the information carrier. In other words, when we acquire information from the real world, we simply acquire the information that was already there in some rational way. The efficiency of information acquisition, therefore, is essentially these two efficiencies.
- Efficiency of dissemination of information
- Efficiency of receipt of information
Information production in the real world refers to the fact that we obtain native or processed information from real-world objects. We see the sun, throw a rock, raise a fire, harvest food, etc., all of which are native information obtained in the course of interactions with real-world objects. On the other hand, processed real-world information includes the conversations, words, paintings, vocalizations, and other communications that occur between people.
At the same time, different objects have different information. For instance, stones and ores are objects made of different chemical elements but also possess other characteristics such as shape, hardness, color, etc., which are information. However, not all of this information is directly available to us from the beginning and requires certain tools and methods, which also involves disseminating information.
Besides the real world’s inherent ways of spreading information, such as wind, rain, and the change of day and night, it’s more often the case that humans have built some tools or discovered some way to make information already there accessible.
In fact, in the real world, there are two ways of communication. One way people come into direct contact with objects to spread information and the other involves communication-based on interaction with other people. The first way is relatively simple and can be reached with the right approach, while the second requires an interaction process.
Nonetheless, it’s not that when we discover information, we can “understand” it and use it for our purposes. There is a problem of information acceptance. For example, we know about different minerals, but if we want to use them, we need something like a “translator” to let us know what decisions we should make to interact with them based on such information. Examples of decisions include using, discarding, and so on.
Based on consensus and accumulated knowledge, people can effectively get their message accepted through the first type of communication. In contrast, the second type of communication encounters Wittgenstein’s “context problem”, meaning when confronted with the same expression, people will generate various levels of reception of the information depending on the context of the information and the scenario in which they interact with the message. This also affects the efficiency with which the information is received.
Only when certain limitations are obtained does the efficiency of information acceptance improve significantly. Thus, after the information is accepted, people may acquire certain theories or knowledge that can be called “consensus,” helping them advance the efficiency of information acceptance under the first mode of communication and understand the world more efficiently.
At the same time, we know that real-world information itself exists in a certain way, so rather than “we discover information,” it is more like “information discovers us”. Except that for information to discover us, people use various tools and ways to construct specific pathways.
Based on the Big Bang theory, the universe had infinite mass and matter, as well as infinite information, before the singularity occurred. In fact, matter and information correspond to each other. Information about the real world exists in itself, and the deeper we discover about the real world, and thus the more information we get. As the more information we get, the information itself will not change because of the combinations of information.
When we have not discovered it correctly, the “deeper” information will neither reach us. Even if it does get us, we need to understand it in the right way.
Because of its broad relevance, this information is being combined every moment, every day. In this process, we create new ways of understanding these combinations of information, such as logical systems. The information itself is only relevant to its carrier, and the way it is combined is the pathway by which we understand it.
Humans have been using language and words for a long time to understand, express, and convey information. The carrier of a particular phrase, which appears to be words, is indeed the way the chemicals in people’s brains are combined at that specific moment. Words are how we understand information. It is because we have found “words” as the means to understand the information represented by this combination of substances. Because it has been verified over time with a degree of validity, we believe that words can be used as a “proximate carrier” to convey information. For example, the arrangement of the three letters ABC is the message which they are transmitting.
Another example is numbers. If you consider numbers as an “approximate carrier”, it allows us to better understand the information in the process of receiving information, and it can also facilitate the dissemination, so it has been passed down. Regardless of whether it is binary, decimal or other methods, when facing the same object, people have different expressions, but they want to express the same information.
For example, when we put 5 apples in another 5 apples, the Arabs who use the decimal system think there will be 10 in total, and the binary code thinks it is 1010.
Suppose we confirm that string theory is correct, and we want to add information to the real world, we only need to add matter. The way is to add string or other forms of matter, let it combine with the existing matter and information in the real world, and the information will increase.
Apart from that, information in the real world will not increase.
2. Digitized Real World
After the advent of information technology, the starting point and the end point of our information acquisition have changed. We can obtain information from the real world or the virtual world. The premise is that we have entered information into the virtual world, or generated information in the virtual world. In fact, these two methods serve as the meaning of “existence” and provide the source of information for the virtual world.
Let’s discuss this question first: Why did people first come into contact with the digitized real world after the development of the native real world? The reason is that the digitized real world is actually humans who use information technology to transplant part or all of the information in the real world into the digitized space, and then obtain digitized information through different media.
There is actually an implicit process here, that is, humans have invented the information communication method between the real world and the virtual world, that is, binary coding, and it is also the translation rules and methods of information between the two worlds. Real-world information is decomposed into information such as ones and zeros that can be quickly understood by computers under the repeatable and stable consumption of resources such as machinery and electricity.
In fact, this coding rule establishes the way of information transmission between the two worlds, so all kinds of information in the real world can be converted into codes and input into the computer for presentation. Of course, just having this underlying rule is far from enough. There are two other reasons:
- In the real world, there are too many volumes and types of information that need to be transmitted to the virtual world in different ways.
- In the virtual world, information needs to be adjusted again into different forms that people can accept.
The main types of information we receive in the real world come from our five senses: sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. Among them, visual information accounts for more than 80% of all the information the brain obtains. If the internal information processing logic of the brain is not considered, digital visual information is the most intuitive and efficient way for us to “perceive” the virtual world.
Therefore, when we “create” the information exchange method between the real world and the virtual world, in order to better understand the virtual world, we will put the visual presentation on the first breakthrough position from the beginning. At the same time, in order to achieve such visual effects, we will also make breakthroughs in the underlying hardware and related software facilities, so as to input real-world information as much as possible.
According to the logic of displaying real-world information in the virtual world, we first need to extract the real-world information, and then let the computer transfer this information to the virtual world through a “conversion mechanism”. Finally, through other means, the information in the virtual world can be accepted by us in the real world.
For the visual image information we see, this process is actually the combined application of “computer vision” and “computer image” technology. As for text, although it contains much less information than images at the level of information transmission or storage, in fact text contains very large information, and it is one of the carriers for humans to carry out effective language communication.
From the perspective of information transmission, both images and text can represent people’s expressions of the real and virtual worlds. Only due to technical limitations, in the virtual world, the earliest visual information is presented in the form of codes and texts, and then images and vision technologies emerge, so that we can gradually restore the real world information in the virtual world.
From the Internet to the mobile Internet to the Internet of Things, we are accelerating the mapping of the real world to the virtual world in many fields such as social media, e-commerce, logistics, and collaborative offices.
The webpages we are using browsers to view are people’s sorting and combination of real-world information (of course, there are also information about native virtual worlds such as games); various apps we use will contain account information, which is not It will definitely contain all the information of each of us in the real world, but there will be some representative information, such as avatar, nickname, gender, profile, etc.; the streaming media we use (also, with the development of the virtual world, movies Creative information such as games, games, etc. will also appear everywhere), it is also that people send information in the real world to the virtual world in the form of pictures, long and short videos; the e-commerce platform we use is a combination of real-world products Information digitization; the corresponding logistics system also transfers information such as the parameters, geographic location, and distribution status of items in the real world to the virtual world…
At the same time, an important difference between “mobile Internet” and “Internet” is that the form of “mobile” improves the efficiency of our input of real-world information into the virtual world. If each networked node is regarded as an information portal, in the era of mobile Internet, not only the data of the portal has increased greatly, but the portal itself has been “moved”, so that real-world information can be covered with higher efficiency and transmitted to the virtual world.
3. Native Virtual World
Based on the completeness of logic, we know that the virtual world can actually be divided into two parts, one is the mapping of the real world, and the other is the more virtual and native virtual world. In this world, all objects are native to the virtual world and always exist in the virtual world.
From the perspective of information, we know that: the existence of information itself does not depend on the way, path, and object of the information, and the information itself is only related to the information carrier. At the same time, there are two sources of information in the virtual world:
- One is this part of information derived from the real world mapping, which is not only restricted by people’s acquisition of their own information in the real world, but also restricted by the transmission method. For example, no one knows some corners of the earth, and it is difficult to have the opportunity to be transmitted into the virtual world through various terminals; at the same time, even for some well-known items, people cannot strictly digitize the internal structure that composes it. Therefore, some of this information will be lost in the process of digitization.
- The other is this part of the information that is native to the virtual world. They were originally born in the virtual world and will not receive any restrictions on transmission. In other words, this part of the information is presented in the form of data. Any corner and object in the virtual world can be positioned and represented by code. Therefore, this kind of original information is absolutely digital, and at the same time, it can be completely obtained through codes and various kinds.
After discussing the information sources of the virtual world as a whole, we will also find that there are two different sources of information in the “native virtual world”:
- One is input from the real world: people display the “images, pictures or scenes in their minds” digitally in the virtual world;
- The other is the output from the virtual world: information generated by the objects in the virtual world;
Therefore, if a more clear definition is needed to describe the native virtual world, it may be like this: all information in this virtual world is virtual and native, and this information either does not exist in the real world or is composed of other virtual information. “Creative.
For “native virtual world”, the first virtual refers more to “digitalization”, and the second virtual refers more to “fiction that does not exist in the real world.”
For example, when creative designers use various digital tools to create, the various images, scenes, and special effects constructed in the virtual world are in fact fictitious; most video games actually belong to the native virtual world. Their production and consumption are completed in the virtual world, and almost every video game world is different from the real world.
Compared with more general and common life scenarios, games are often the application and landing scenarios of many artificial intelligence and big data related technologies due to the massive and structured data. At the same time, the combination of gamification and other fields has also burst out new vitality and possibilities. It will be more accurate to define gamification development methods combined in different industries as “virtualization development paths”.
At the same time, in the context of the development of virtualization, people are aware of the huge volume and development prospects of virtual content, and have corresponding technical support in different virtual content generation fields. Since vision is the most important proportion of people’s access to information, with the first development of image and vision technology, we can generate image information in the virtual world with unimaginable efficiency in the past, and let them be directly observed and experienced by us .
For example, animation, modeling, shader, rendering, special effects, cameras, etc. in the field of 2D/3D design, in conjunction with the image performance of GPU, allows us to “watch ourselves interacting in a native virtual world.” If we can also cooperate with VR, AR and other equipment, this kind of extremely immersive experience can impact our main senses more strongly, making us “think” that we are really in the virtual world.
Returning to the logic of information acquisition, continuing to analyze from the three levels of information existence, transmission and acceptance, we will find that in the virtual world, everything is composed of code, whether it is a spatial address or a specific color, shape or action And other content can be accurately expressed in binary expression. Therefore, although not all information in the real world may be available, the availability of information in the virtual world is almost 100%.
As we mentioned above, the material and information in the real world are limited and determine the information itself that we can obtain in the real world. Since we cannot understand the underlying rules in the real world for the time being, we cannot add substances and information to the real world. But the virtual world is different. The compilation method we created defines the underlying rules of the virtual world, and digital content is based on 1 and 0. If we want to add material or information to the virtual world, we only need to increase the digital content, that is, increase the number of 1 and 0 and their permutation and combination.
Of course, another issue must be discussed here: if real-world matter and information are limited, then a human being composed of real-world matter uses a computer composed of real-world matter to create a logical code Rules, digital information is created in computers, do they still belong to real-world matter and information?
Here again I have to quote Einstein’s point of view: scientific theory is a free invention of the human mind, and there is no word “discovery” in the fundamental methods of theoretical physics. Combining the perspective of information, since matter and information are certain in the real world, our understanding of the real world depends on whether we can find a correct and reasonable path to get in touch with different combinations of information.
For scientific theory, discovering the combination of information is an invention, and the content of the invention is: the cognitive path of different information combinations. In other words, as human beings, we have invented scientific theories and obtained the cognitive path of information combination so that we can discover the information itself. For example, a “logical system” is an invention, and the use of reasoning to find a logical relationship is a discovery, and the object of discovery is information in the real world.
According to this analysis method, the “binary coding system” is first an invention. For the same real-world object, we can use another logical system to describe it in addition to the daily description. In other words, we invented a logical method based on binary coding to understand the combination of real-world information. From this perspective, we are still discovering information in the real world.
On the other hand, the “binary coding system” also brings additional information when interpreting existing real-world information. For example, if 110101010101 represents an apple, in fact we translate the word “apple” into a binary expression, and use a priori logic to reach a consensus on real-world information; but what information does 110101010101 represent?
In the real world, it represents the information of the “apple” object, but because the code itself has specific directions in the virtual world, this code points to the material and information in the virtual world, but we accidentally created a “logical system” and discovered the virtual world. In other words, the virtual world itself exists.
This also explains what we said above, the original information in the virtual world either does not exist in the real world, or is “created” by other virtual information.
At the same time, it’s very interesting that the real world cannot create new materials and information because we don’t know what the bottom-level rules are; but in the virtual world, the bottom-level rules are created by us, so logically, we can create any material and information we want in the virtual world. The implementation is also very straightforward. We only need to increase the number of 1s and 0s, and it will naturally increase a lot of information combinations.
It is also very interesting to note that the real world cannot create new matter and information because we don’t know what the bottom rules are; but in the virtual world the bottom rules are created by us, so logically we can create any matter and information we want in the virtual world. The implementation is also very straightforward, we just need to increase the number of 1 and 0 and it will naturally add very many combinations of information.
Since the repetitive computation of numbers can generate new virtual matter and information, if we can teach computers to learn to create matter and information, then the virtual world is then a highly creative and infinite world. Thus, in order to separate such information that can be “autonomously produced” from information that is “digitally derived from the real world,” we make the distinction above between the entire virtual world.
4. Actualized Virtual World
According to what we discussed above, the “actualized virtual world” is still essentially the real world, but in this category the objects in the actualized virtual world materialize the images in the virtual world.
For example, traditional books contain very rich fictional worlds and stories that end up in text and paper. E-books have objects in a virtual world, and if they are about something in the real world, then the e-book belongs to the digitized real world; if it has a purely fictional or overhead world, then it belongs to the native virtual world. Board games also have examples, such as Mafias, Dungeons & Dragons, etc., they are all virtual stories that we can experience in the real world. There are also numerous models, posters, cosplay, etc., all of which present the virtual images or contents in the real world, completing the process of “actualization”.
The information logic of this part is simpler, with an additional source of information: digital information in the virtual world. However, since the expression of information in the real world is limited by real matter, this part of matter and information still has no impact on the overall volume of matter and information in the real world.
Now that we have described and discussed these four worlds, we then start to describe the dynamic relationship between the real and virtual worlds from a more macro perspective, supplemented by industry and market developments for further discussion.
5. Dynamic relationship between the real and virtual worlds
1) Structure of the Real World
The world in which we currently exist and live is a complex structure that is always changing dynamically. Behind the appearances of the objects we touch and feel, there are some basic laws that drive our world’s continuous movement. Whether it’s the theory of relativity, quantum mechanics, or string theory, they are all moving toward that “ultimate rule”. There are some scientists who believe that someday in the future we will be able to unify our cognitive logic at the macro and micro levels to understand the original rules of the world.
Such a path of discovery actually assumes the existence of an “ultimate rule”, if we follow the logical system we invented to do the reasoning process, then it gives birth to all matters. With existing technology, we have continued to break through our knowledge of the composition of matter, and smaller amounts of matter are being discovered all the time.
What we focus here is not on how small that matter can be separated in order to approach that “ultimate rule”, but on the process that various objects are combined by matter. In the process of development over millions of years, a variety of objects have appeared in the world: some are alive, some are not (at least temporarily we think so). Among these objects, we also consider that the basic characteristic of living things is that they are capable of metabolism and heredity.
In fact, there are many ways to classify objects in the world, and here we’ve chosen a not-so-common classification: objects that can subjectively make decisions and other objects that they cannot do so. Constrained by the “ultimate rules”, objects that can make subjective decisions are able to actively participate in changing information throughout space based on their own judgments and decisions.
Currently, it seems that humans, animals and other objects we have yet to discover (perhaps it would be more appropriate to treat them as living things here, but we cannot rule out that inanimate objects are incapable of subjective decision making) are capable of making subjective decisions, and the focus of our attention is on ourselves, so in this diagram, we will only discuss humans.
Research and experience have shown that people as individuals will show the decision-making characteristic of the “rational man” in economics; but people as groups and societies will show both individual decision-making characteristics and group effects. Here, we are concerned with the ability of people to make subjective decisions, which can be affected by group effects. As for questions about how many people exactly count as groups, and how many groups can be considered as a society, are not what we focus here.
On the other hand, objects that cannot make subjective decisions form space. Within a given space, the collection of people and objects generates scenarios of interaction. At the same time, people as individuals, groups and societies have different types of needs. For example, demands such as vanity and recognition appear only when the individual can connect to the group or society.
In general, different types and numbers of objects and people create different types of interaction scenarios and corresponding demands, which give birth to various markets and industries.
In the real world before the emergence of information technology, people discovered or combined objects to obtain “new” information, and in different scenarios, transmitted this type of information to them, thus generating the value of information discovery and the value of information transmission. In this process, the promotion of technology improves the efficiency of people’s discovery, transmission and reception of information, and thus they gain the value, respectively.
Based on the logic of information acquisition above: discovery, transmission and reception, one acquires these three corresponding values and then converts them into technological breakthroughs that further advance the real world and gradually reach the edges of the virtual world.
2) Structure of the Virtual World
In the virtual world, the basic rule is made up of 1 and 0, which then form the code and various technical frameworks that people could use to create a series of digital objects. The various video games, music, images, browsers, etc. that we see are all digital objects in the virtual world.
Similarly, we refer to the way that objects are classified in the real world and distinguish between them by determining whether digital objects are capable of “subjective” decision making. In fact, the significance of such a classification is not only for the sake of consistency with the way things are done in the real world, but also in line with the exploration and expectations of digital intelligences.
In the paper “Computing machinery and intelligence” from 1950, mathematician Alan Turing discussed in detail about the question of “whether machines can have intelligence”. In fact, Turing succeeded in defining what a machine is, but he could not define what intelligence is.
At the same time, he himself said that humans themselves cannot in turn successfully disguise themselves as machines and asked another question, “can’t a machine that is thought to possess intelligence behave differently than a human?” .
At the same time, most AI-related research is concerned with: how to simulate purely intelligent activities of humans, rather than all mental activities. Or we can say what we expect from intelligences: to be able to create as humans do. But looking at ourselves in reverse, the premise that humans can create is that they can make decisions of their own will, i.e. subjective decisions.
Thus, we distinguish intelligibility by dividing objects in virtual worlds into “objects that can make subjective decisions” and “objects that cannot make subjective decisions”.
Ideally, intelligences that can make “subjective” decisions are capable of autonomously creating information and matter in the virtual world, while other non-intelligences can be derived either from human design or from the active generation of intelligences. Thus, the combination of these non-intelligences also constitutes the “space” of the virtual world. Space here refers more to: the physical space that we can feel in the virtual world rather than the digital space.
The reality is that our current AI technology does not yet allow for the “subjective” decision making of the intelligences mentioned above, so there will be some early versions. The weakest version of an intelligent body is a “mirror image”, which is a mapping of people’s images in a virtual world.
As previously mentioned in the digitized real world, our various accounts on the Internet are “mirror images”, those virtual images are mostly presented as data, such as name, age and other more intuitive descriptions. And their information is provided by the user themselves into the virtual world. The descriptions of preferences are done by tagging the user, such as what type of products they have browsed, what is their path after exiting, and so on.
In fact, this is the effect of big data and recommendation algorithms, and at the same time these information can be understood as logical information. In the real world, the various dimensions of human information can be processed into a series of logical structures that can be uploaded into the virtual world after data processing. Thus, the information of the “mirror image” is gradually refined.
On the other hand, in addition to information on the logical side, a complete “mirror image” also requires information on the graphic side, just as one needs to know not only what a person says and does, but also, more directly, his size, appearance, and so on. When people first enter virtual worlds, the level of technology limits the extent to which “mirror image” can be presented. Even games, which require a very strong immersive experience, can only use very simple images to represent the virtual image and content at the beginning.
But with the breakthroughs and advancements in technology, we can now achieve better and more sophisticated images in the virtual world, which means we are creating new information in the virtual world. Based on the above we know that new information will meet new needs and thus bring new value, which is one of the key factors driving the industry.
In the process, we are constantly inputting information about ourselves in the real world into the virtual world. Unlike the real world, in the virtual world we can have many virtual images. If the information in these virtual images is identical to the information in the real world, it belongs to the digitized real world; if totally different, then it belongs to the native virtual world; and if partly identical and partly different, it belongs to the transitional stage between the two worlds.
Therefore, we also regard the part from the “mirror image” to the “intelligent agent” as the “virtual image”. However, due to the development of technology, the performance and information of the “virtual image” is limited.
In fact, the static image is the initial stage of the virtual image, and the dynamic image is the further development of the virtual image, which is based on artificially predefined dynamic interaction rules.
3) Combination of the Real and Virtual Worlds
When we discuss the structure of the real world and the virtual world using the same assumptions and reasoning logic, we find that there is currently an accelerating increase in the amount of information available in the virtual world, which is derived not only from information in the real world, but also from information native to the virtual world.
In this process, channels of information transmission and corresponding tools are needed in order to increase the efficiency of information production in virtual worlds. Also taking into account the interaction of different scenarios, any way that increases the efficiency of information transmission will produce value.
For example, Agora is the highway to the virtual world, so that information from the real world can be transferred to the virtual world more efficiently; Adobe, Autodesk and other creative tools are also the gateway between the real world and the virtual world. We can use them to create information, such as refining works through Photoshop and building virtual worlds through Unity Engine or Unreal Engine.
We are now somewhere between the “digitized real world” and the “native virtual world”. In this section of the digitized real world, we can see the emergence of not-so-complete “intelligences” in common areas, driving new demands and new value.
For example, Lil Miquela, Zepeto, MOMO-chan and Luo Tianyi in the social, community, live streaming and e-commerce sectors have received very positive responses.
Of course this is just the beginning, and in the future there will be more “intelligences” incorporated into current scenarios, thus helping us move further into the “native virtual world.”
6. Conjecture: Multiverse and Meta-universe
Human curiosity drives us to explore this world and universe and we often speculate about the current world. With the help of binary rules, we create or discover virtual worlds and then further add information to them, which in turn helps us to accelerate our exploration of the real world.
In fact, if one follows the hypothesis that “this real world in which we currently live has an ultimate rule”, then it is such a rule that constitutes all matter and objects in the real world. One of the most cutting-edge explorations is a theory called String Theory, because it will most likely become the Grand Unified Theory.
When string theory and cosmology are linked together, a parallel universe or multiverse model emerges. Our current “real” universe grows on a three-dimensional membrane, but this membrane actually exists in a higher dimensional hyperspace.
In addition, the same analytical extrapolation of the virtual world of the real universe we are currently living in also leads to the Metaverse model we discussed earlier. In the future we will have a very large number of virtual worlds that will generate a very large amount of information that will feed the real world. The different virtual worlds will become Metaverse again when they are connected.
Of course, this is only a conjecture and not based on rigorous scientific verification; but this does not make the world any less interesting, nor does it stop our curiosity and continued exploration.
In the End: about Free Will
This article also mentions a central point of this analytical framework: do objects have free will? It is because of this way of classification that a series of reasoning, analysis and conclusions follow.
We all believe that we are completely free at birth, but in later life we find ourselves not free and subject to rules as well as objects.
In the real world, we may not know: whether absolute freedom exists, or is merely a metaphysical way of thoughts. But in the virtual world, from the view of “intelligences”, when they can autonomously create the information and matter in the virtual world, they do have the ability to make subjective decisions, but do they have free will?
In our view, the subjective ability of “intelligences” in the virtual world is in fact also limited by the underlying rules of the virtual world, furthermore, is our free will also limited by the ultimate rules of the real world?
If we follow our inductive and deductive method of reasoning, we would need to at least allow the “intelligences” in the virtual world to be able to create the next layer of nested virtual worlds in order to have some basis for doing so. Technically, this may be possible. But if this is the case, does it imply that this real world we currently live in is in fact a simulated virtual world as well?
A very important point is that the human brain is cognitively flawed, and the logical systems we recognize both help us understand the current world, but also limit the other ways we can understand the world, and at the same time we cannot understand why there is such a thing as logic.
Perhaps, in exploring the virtual world, we can learn not only what “free will” is, but also where we came from and where we are going to.
“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
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About rct
rct was founded in 2018, a member of Y Combinator W19, and is comprised of talents across AI, design and business. The team is passionate about using AI to create next generation interactive entertainment experiences. Our mission is to help human beings know more about themselves. So far, rct is backed by YC, Sky Saga Capital, and Makers Fund.
See our official website：https://rct-studio.com/en-us/
