Having spent a fair amount of time in a virtual world (Second Life), I would like to support Jim's comment.  It is amazing how adjustable the human mind is, although it should come as no surprise.  After a while working with virtual friends, it is surprising how close you can become to them.  And it interests me how I begin to depend on other cues when there are no facial expressions to tell me what is happening. 
 
In some ways, Second Life is a far more complex world than real life, and the risk level is far different.  You can stand in the middle of a volcano in SL or care for a critically ill patient, and, if the sim is well designed, see what is happening without any of the risk that would be present in real life.  Despite this, the emotional response can be very strong.  
 
Several semesters ago, Janet Nepkie, Jim, and I had students organize concerts at my concert hall in Second Life.  Aside from the fact that it is highly unlikely that I would own a concert hall in real life, this resulted in some fascinating experiences, which were sometimes as emotion-loaded as anything I have encountered in real life.  I told the students that if they were going to manage in my hall, they had to dress the part, virtually.  One of my SL friends suggested that my female characters needed better formal dresses and agreed to design clothes for them.  I was sitting next to a young female student in real life when she put on her gown for the first time in SL.  The gown was incredibly beautiful, and the expression on the young woman's face as she watched herself on screen was a level of ecstasy that could only be comparable with certain experiences that are not appropriate to discuss on a PG-rated discussion list.
 
Virtual worlds are not a substitute for real life, but they do provide a much more complex and engaging experience than one might expect.  You may not be able to smell the donkey urine, but it does draw you in and engage you in other ways.  As Jim says, we are still at the early stages of this process.  When you control your avatar with your real life gestures, which is already being done in some places, you move to a whole new level of engagement, and that is only one step in a continuing process. 
 
Cordially,
Harry
 
 
Harry E. Pence
SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus
SUNY Oneonta
From: Teaching Breakfast List [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Greenberg, James ([log in to unmask])
Sent: Monday, April 04, 2011 7:04 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Next Teaching Breakfast Meeting and a Good Read

Steve and Jay,

  I believe virtual spaces and augmented reality will dramatically change education over the next 10-15 years.  How quickly we can develop virtual spaces that mimic real spaces is anyone's guess.  To glimpse into this future, I should show off a project I am part of that is building a Hospital in a virtual space to be used by Nursing and Pre-med students throughout SUNY.  It is remarkable, even to me!

If you want to know more do a quick read on Ray Kurzweil's idea of Singularity and/or Moore's Law.  I believe these concepts are more than just academic curiosities.  I believe they are very real.  Something to think about: Today's computers are as different from the first computers ever made as tomorrow's computers will be from today's.

The frightening thing about the movie The Matrix was just how possible it is..... Someday

Jim G.
[log in to unmask]

On Apr 3, 2011, at 5:06 PM, "Gilbert, Steven ([log in to unmask])" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

The Starship Enterprise featured the Holydeck, a virtual reality room programmed to mimic real (or mythic) places, times, and events so precisely and completely that no "tell" to their virtual reality remained.  Except the knowledge that it was a virtual reality.  And this left everyone experiencing it longing for the real thing!

 

Many of the benefits derived when teachers and students are together in a real place in real time can be derived from high quality SKYPE-like experiences.  And as technology enables these experiences to better mimic being together in a room, more and more of the benefits of being together in a room will be realized by virtual encounters.  In light of the efficiencies and possibilities the technology affords, this is a good thing.

 

The writers of Star Trek assumed that technologically perfect virtual encounters will never satisfy the human need to experience actual encounters -- that teachers and students always will crave to be together in a room, talking to each other.  But they might have been wrong.  Or they are right, and the final step in the perfect virtual reality encounter is the activation of the mechanism that disarms the recognition that the encounter one is having isn't actually real!*

 

Steve.  
*This is not so far-fetched.  A good deal of research shows that people often can be induced to recall having actual experiences they never had.

 

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Steven J. Gilbert, Ph.D.
   Professor of Psychology
      State University of New York, College at Oneonta
      [log in to unmask]
      Phone: 607-436-2557     Office: FITZ 416
      Home Page: http://employees.oneonta.edu/gilbersj/stevepage.htm
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________________________________________
From: Teaching Breakfast List [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Fleisher, P. Jay   ([log in to unmask])
Sent: Friday, April 01, 2011 9:14 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Next Teaching Breakfast Meeting and a Good Read

Jimmy,
Being one who is still firmly grounded in the value of personal interaction (people speaking to people while in the same place, at the same time), I accept the potential for electronic learning, but regret the loss of communication that comes with eye contact.  Is there such a thing as an electronic mentor?  Geo-scientists are now developing the technology to conduct virtual field trips.  I say great, as long as it doesn't reduce the frequency of "actual" field trips.  Think back - can you still smell the dust and mule urine on the Bright Angel Trail.  The Grand Canyon is grand only to those who have experienced it first hand.  Anything else may be good (even very good), but not grand.

We are the sum total of our experiences.  Diminish those and you limit the person.  My daughter Sarah once said to me (1992), "just because you can, Dad, doesn't mean you should".  I suppose that today she could have sent that message by email, but it was the eye contact that drove it home.  There is a world of difference between information and communication.
Jay

________________________________________
From: Teaching Breakfast List [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Greenberg, James ([log in to unmask])
Sent: Thursday, March 31, 2011 7:44 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Next Teaching Breakfast Meeting and a Good Read

TBers,

This is a reminder that our next Teaching Breakfast meeting will be April 6th outside the Starbucks in the Hunt Union at 8 am.  I'd like to have a discussion about electronic learning spaces and what faculty would ideally want.  What is good and bad with ANGEL?  What privacy issues do you have?  What "cloud" applications do you use?  What would you like that you don't have?  What do you cherish now that you wouldn't want to lose?  If this topic interests you, please join us.

Looking for a good read with this morning's coffee?  The article linked to below is a shameless plug for a group I am honored to be part of – the Higher Education Teaching and Learning Portal. I found it inspiring and refocusing.  See http://hetl.org/.


Mr. James B. Greenberg
Director Teaching, Learning and Technology Center
Milne Library
 SUNYCollege at Oneonta
Oneonta, New York 13820

email: [log in to unmask]
phone: 607-436-2701
fax:   607-436-3677
Twitter: greenbjb

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