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It isn't really any different from the level of control you can get with a conventional VR headset. My guess is that Yuri either isn't very aware of his equilibrium sense or is simply too inclined to think of things in terms of how they can be used to "control" humans.
Possibly both, but I lean towards the latter notion.
There is also the possiblity that the technology is too crude at this point to avoid inducing at least some vertigo (I know, technically, that's exactly what it's supposed to do, but I'm refering to the feeling of having vertigo).
quote:It sent a very low voltage electric current from the back of my ears through my head _ either from left to right or right to left, depending on which way the joystick on a remote-control was moved.
Is this how a VR headset works? By running electric current through your head?
Posts: 1810 | Registered: Jun 2002
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posted
Sounds like a skit from "Kenny Everett Video Casette" "Totally undetectable, your friends won't even know your wearing one.'
Posts: 1683 | Registered: Aug 2004
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I didn't say the mechanism was similar, only that you can "force" a person to change directions with visual cues just as easily as you can by using equilibrial cues.
Posts: 8322 | Registered: Aug 1999
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A few weeks ago I went to a haunted house at a Six Flags amusement park. On the whole I was frightened, screamed like a little girl and all that.
The last room of the house was what caught my interest, though. The room consisted only of a narrow bridge from one end to the other. The room was cylindrical and rotated around the bridge, so that as I walked down the bridge I felt as though the bridge itself were rotating. I kept on leaning to the side.
As advanced as an electric pulse in the ear? No, but a friend told me that he had been to several Haunted houses years ago that had the same premise.
So while it's not as modern, the same type of control has been possible for a long time.
I think the story idea in this helmet-thing is that you could have a circuit installed along the base of the skull, from ear to ear. It would--of course--be controlled remotely.
The story idea arises when you think of the kind of society that would allow this to be installed. Perhaps an intensely hedonistic society would allow such hardware implanted in their brains if it allowed for a more realistic entertainment venue to arise.
Sound familiar?
But it's really only a neat story idea if you take it a step further. After all, the concept of government mind-control has been an SF staple for years.
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