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“Your Scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should.”
-Michael Crichton
Humans are great innovators, pioneers, and explorers; we have conquered Everest, the Moon, and vanquished the ancient diseases of polio and smallpox. We continue to embark on a never-ending journey of development for science, the fine arts, and technological innovation. Let it be observed, however, that the human pace for these things is remarkable. It took thousands of years for humans to develop what we now consider basic agricultural practices, and then a couple hundred years ago, the industrial revolution opened up large factories. We began to live in cities in large numbers; we developed the steam engine and mass manufacturing mechanisms; and just over 100 years ago, the automobile was created. We went from mass radio to mass television, and after the greatest loss of life in human history, we began to hold the power of armageddon itself, nuclear technology. Recently, we developed the internet, and mobile smart phones quickly outpaced flip phones. Sophisticated man-made intelligence programs have recently come into the mainstream with the introduction of programs such as Chat GPT. We have even gone beyond our own meta and created artificial worlds we can emerge in using technology such as the oculus rift, which allows people to enter the worlds of the video games that they play. I imagine that a world one hundred years from now would be unrecognizable, at least if this pace continues to play out or grows in a greater manner. Yet a question that must be asked is: at what point in time do we reach equilibrium? Not in an effort to sound like a regressive, but at what point have we achieved our goals or gone too far down a path? We could gauge certain things, such as curing all diseases (an easy task), but what about something you could say is in the eye of the beholder? The question of entertainment is: what steps are we as humans willing to take, and what are we willing to sacrifice for the sake of a greater dopamine rush?
I would like to now introduce the era of “spatial computing," which has been deemed the new name of our world through the new Apple Vision Pro. Judging by its appearance alone, you may be inclined to believe that this is some sort of gaming virtual reality (VR) set like the HTC Vive, but no, this product is actually a serious product intended beyond the gaming chair. Apple intends for this to be the next smartphone, the replacement of the flip phone, if you will. Apple sees a future where everyone walks around with a hunk of aluminum strapped to their heads. You may ask why anyone would wish to wear a VR set or “spatial computing” set while living their day-to-day lives. Well, this product acts essentially as if your smartphone were embedded inside your head, and at every moment you could simply flick your fingers, and you go from watching TV to scrolling Instagram hands-free while taking a walk through the park. I would agree this sounds greatly convenient and exciting, especially when all you see online are videos of folks drooling over the possibilities of such a device, such as 9to5Mac’s greatly original title “7 Mind Blowing ways to Use the Vision Pro” or exhilarating titles such as Ryan Trahan’s “I Survived 50 Hours in Apple Vision Pro.” Before praising the innovation and greatness of such new technology, perhaps we ought to take a moment to reflect and contemplate what this device really is and what it will do for us.
We live in a world where everything is seemingly losing its originality—what sets it apart from everything else? We all have the same mobile devices, we have the same apps, and we use the same search engine. We have lost unique dialects and languages due to a need for uniformity in an interconnected society. One of the things that humans have always held to be unique was ourselves, our appearances, and our own characteristics, yet this is too much for the bold-minded innovators of our “meta” future. In their view, the only unique characteristic of a human face is the eyes, so what do they do? The Apple Vision Pro will create a fake set of eyes based upon your own eyes; at best, you could say “at least their eyes," and at worst, I fear, you could say “what eyes?” This futile artificial attempt to recreate a human eye represents a great feat of the 21st century; you can find it simply through our architecture: simple, ugly, and a little unhuman. That's not the worst part of it; this goes far beyond that. FaceTime is an app that you can access through the Apple Vision Pro; now, when you use FaceTime, it does not show others that you’re wearing the headset. What it does instead is create an alternate version of your face in a similar manner to the atrocious eyes; a bitmoji would feel less shallow, more familial, and far less creepy than this. This is significant; we, as a people, must decide to what lengths we are willing to go for our own entertainment. Are we really going to go as far as making artificial faces of ourselves? Furthermore, take all of this and imagine this as the mainstream, the norm, if you will. Imagine instead of walking through a hallway and seeing people talk, walk, and scroll through their phones, you see zombies littering the halls, yeilding a headset with the only semblance of a human being beady, artificial eyes steaming through the glasses of the set. Or I guess if you choose to wear one as well, you will see a series of plastic faces wearing a fake smile, lacking any basic features of detail you would find in any piece of art, although it remains to be seen how this technology could be perceived as an artform.
It's humorous the lengths they go to in an attempt to impress the public with this product. In its introduction video, Apple Vision Pro brags about its ability to “immerse” you into another world. They give an example of someone transforming their view into a “stunning location,” that being a beautiful sunset, which Apple appears to believe cannot be attained through watching the real sky before dark. They even have the nerve to encourage people to capture memories through photos you take through the device. Wow, what a fun memory for a kid! “My birthday parties were great; it was hard to see dad through the piece of plastic on his head, but I sure know he was having a blast.”
This device clearly has a lot of issues and potential implications, but beyond this, as alluded to earlier, what is the point of this thing? Have we reached equilibrium here? This device performs nothing new; you can make calls, use apps, text, and take photos on existing devices. You can play virtual reality video games right now. This device is attempting to revolutionize the industry for the sake of it. The device would only tear apart our existing social structures; no one would see anyone, and no one would know anyone beyond a de facto avatar. How would you interact with someone? You could try to wave or say hi, but what if in their world they're too busy on the beach with loud waves passing by and trumping you?
It's a great thing that the Apple Vision Pro has largely flopped in the market, beyond the brief social media haze of the product. This article is a cynical one because no one is talking about the negative implications of this or any other “spatial computing” software. Progress can be a double-edged sword. We ended a world war by creating a weapon that could one day end all of us. This piece of technology doesn’t even serve a meaningful purpose. Let's not fall blind to the idea that we have to get bigger and bigger and move on to something better: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” If one day we fall for a product that seeks to dehumanize us to such a degree, would we even deserve the title of human? We must embark on a defense to ensure that, going forward into this century, we don’t lose what makes us special; otherwise, we may become a lesser piece of technology ourselves some day.
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