Minutes

(Thank you to NP)

Would you plug into the experience machine?

Not Sure, It Depends:

·        If you had no relationships on earth whatsoever, then plugging in would be ok. It would just make your individual life better. It depends on your situation – if it’s bad enough, it may be rational to plug in.

·        If you’re mentally or physically handicapped, plug in and live out the remainder of your life. If Jean-Dominique Bauby had felt the need, he could have plugged in. (Interestingly, he practically created his own experience machine, i.e. when he went out to dinner and chose things to eat.)

·        An absence of real attachment to other people also makes it okay to plug in

·        Experiencing something without the risk: skydiving. You can experience it without the fear. But that is only plugging in temporarily.

o       these temporary periods can compare to drug use

o       it needs to be a great chunk of your life

·        There need to be rules and regulations so people don’t get addicted to the machine

·        If you’re a reasoning human being, is there a rational reason to check out?

·        Some people are suicidal and if they went on the machine for a certain number of years, it might cure them – like rehab

Would Not Plug In

·        This machine is an indulgence. A life full of indulgence is a meaningless life without substance

·        There’s no depth to any of your experiences. You are not actually doing anything. There is no real action.

·        A loneliness to it – it’s all about you

·        Affects your family/friends – even if you are plugged in your family is still aware that you did that. You can check out but they haven’t

·        You need bad with the good. In a world with just good, you wouldn’t have any appreciate for the good things because you haven’t experienced the bad things.  [But couldn’t highs and lows be programmed into your experience by the computer, if you preferred?]

·        Any argument that we come up with to not plug in, we have to assume the machine’s perfect.

·        Selfish – it does not allow you to impact others. There are moral judgments against plugging in

Would Plug In

·        Assuming that everyone has the choice to plug in: a lot of us have had a good, vivid dream that we didn’t want to wake up from. It’s like prolonging a good dream

·        Happiness is something physiological

·        In testing out this theory, why do it this way with creating this virtual reality?

·        We’re experiencing this machine right now through illicit drugs or pharmaceutical drugs. We have the ability now to increase “happiness” in the brain

·        You can also make yourself happier by having false beliefs as well (does religion offer people false beliefs?)