A philosophical question about virtual reality

Great Debates
1

(I wasn’t sure if this should go in IMHO or this forum. If someone thinks it should be moved, go ahead and move it.)

Say that you were going to be trapped for the rest of eternity in a virtual reality matrix. This is a terribly unpleasant world you are stuck in. Every time you back your car out of the driveway, you run over a box of puppies. Whenever you try to make human contact with one of the simulacra in the matrix, that person will be subjected to a terrible, gruesome death. And, in what is probably the worst aspect of the world, you are constantly treated to visions of your parents, children, and other loved ones dying, over and over again, in tragic ways that are usually your fault. There is no reprieve from this world, not even the physical death of your body; assume that time has been crunched in such a way as to make the torture essentially eternal. However, before you’re put into this world you have a choice:

A) You can choose to be ignorant of the fact that it’s a completely false reality. You will see the deaths of your family members as being real, and repetition will not give away the falsity. It will hurt just as bad as the first time, every time. However, you will not be aware that the world will go on forever. Every day you wake up thinking that today might just be the day everything goes right.

B) You can be entirely cognizant of the fact that it’s a completely false reality. Since you know the world is false, you know your family is safe and sound, no matter how many times you watch them being slaughtered. You will know you haven’t killed anyone. There is no hope for the future, though; you know the world will go on forever. You are also aware that every person but you is fake.

What do you choose and why?

2

That’s one fucked up game show.

The second sounds like “going mad”. Would I not simply end up that way anyhow, regardless of my initial “choice”? (As in all other dubious moral conundra like this, the blame for this mental torture lies squarely with the one who forces such a choice.)

3

Damn. Day late, dollar short. Sentient nailed it.

4

I’d choose B and just get laid a lot. Like in Groundhog Day.

5

I’d have to choose “B”, I couldn’t bear thinking that I was responsible for the deaths of my family and loved ones. Besides, I’d keep my memory in tact and I’d at least have the hope that I could escape. Hope springs eternal and all that.

6

Nope, there’s no hope for the future in scenario B. You know about the machines you’re hooked up to, know about the time-crunch, know it’ll subjectively last forever.