Danielle
What is the importance of studying virtual worlds? Does it help us to better understand real life?
Emily
Do you agree with the definition of reality provided in the text? "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." or do you think that SL is a simulation of RL rather than its own true world?
Candace
In Chapter 7 someone said that in virtual worlds you cannot make connections to another person in a "meaningful real-life way", but are real life connections always meaningful? How does the discrepency between real and false connections compare to "The Great Happiness Space"
Lauren
Boellstorff mentions the concept of "bleed-through," noting that not only do aspects of the actual world appear in the ways virtual worlds are created, but that some residents of virtual worlds admit mistaking real life experiences for virtual ones. As more people spend increasing amounts of time in online worlds, how might what residents observe and learn from participating in virtual cultures begin to affect the ways they think and interact in the actual world/how they view real life culture?
Michelle
Some residents say that Second Life is a means of escape from reality, from trivialities, from life - but the way Boellstorff explains SL leads me to believe it is hindered by some of the same social problems in the actual world. For example, the groups: Boellstorff equates them to nationalities in the actual world, but they could also relate to stereotypes. Could Second Life be seen as a consumer trap, made to look like a perfect, fantasy world, but really it has just as many flaws as the actual world?
Drew
In SL people purchase virtual accessories with real money. It is a strange concept that these people are spending their hard earned money on intangible objects. Does creationist capitalism seem like a sneaky way to make a buck without producing anything "real"?
Martin
Why is money and the time-value of money perceived so real?
Benjamin
What is it that is missing from online communities that makes some people question their validity? I ask this question, because although there is a quite obvious benefit to being able to communicate in a non-localized manner, there is also something that makes people uneasy. Is it the missing emotional and physical sense connections of our consciousness that are impossible to duplicate in words?
Charnelle
Boellstorff makes an argument how technology enhances human life. Coming from this, he makes the point that the actual world will not be superseded by the virtual world. Should we still be concerned about the virtual world? Is that what we are really afraid of?
Candace
If there is so much cross-over from real life to Second Life and vice versa, why is it so important for Boellstorf to look at Second Life on its own terms?
Kelly
If one is capable of innovation in SL beyond the means of real life, what possesses people to limit their creative energies to principles based on real life, such as sinks in kitchens and laundromats? Why are we trapped in the conception of real life even in virtual worlds?
Jason
Overall, does spending time in a virtual world lead to a more "human" human being?
Zach
Would you consider Second Life a freedom-filled utopia, a Big Brother-like dictatorship, or something else? Most of the world practices some form of democracy, yet most online communities are totalitarian in nature. Why do you think so many people pay to participate in a world such as Second Life when they have very little say over their governance yet denounce any country that exercises similar powers over their subjects?
Yen Joe
With the blurring of work and play with creationist capitalism forged in SL, is this the ideal form of capitalism, or even life, since it would mean that people enjoy and not see what they do for a living as work?
Kelly
A young soldier operating a drone from a remote location finishes his day at work and returns home. There, he and a couple comrades spend a few hours playing a combat game. What if anything has changed?
Candace
Are sci-fi novels predictive or more of a self-fulflling prophecy?
Will
If many science fiction writers have backgrounds in science to begin with, are their fictional stories "fantasy"? If they are, is it some kind of proof that fantasy must be grounded in some form of reality from perceived events and/or elements by the creator?
Emily
If people can fight in wars from Utah and robots are designed based on video games, can we differentiate between fighting in a video games and fighting in a war?
Margaret
Does technology feed fantasy?
Chelsea
"if you can imagine it, we think it can happen" (163). Is this always true? Does this mean that all fantasies are only temporarily fantasies?
Yen Joe
Is war a fantasy (or something that stemmed out of our fantasies)? At least both war and fantasy stimulate the economy and drive development.
Melissa
When Bush proclaimed the war "would be, 'a revolution in the technology of war,' which would allow the United States to 'redefine war on our terms,'" did you think that was a fantasy or false technological hopes of science fiction?
Tom
What are the "fogs of war" in a college student's life? Are there fewer now that we have e-mail, texting, and Facebook, or are these forms of networking and communication "fogs of war" in themselves?
Zach
"Science fiction throws out ideas like some people scatter seeds. Most do not take root, but some do (p. 159)." Is it even worthwhile to look at science fiction as a means of predicting future technologies, or is it just hindsight which makes us believe science fiction is predicting the future?
Casey
Chapter 8 reveals how science fiction offers far-fetched ideas that can eventually be turned into reality. Is fantasy a necessary precursor to reality?
Danielle
Is it possible for any fantasy to become a reality? Are fantasies always based on reality? Is reality always based on fantasy?
Dixon
Robotics and technology have changed the very nature of modern warfare. Is this decrease in the amount of physical interaction between enemies a good or bad change in terms of the end result of peace? Why?
Alex
What does it say about our society that we prefer science fantasies rooted in war and world dominations? Is our sense of fantasy disturbed?
Charnelle
The author says early in the chapter that "admitting you like science fiction is like admitting that you masturbate two times a day. From this we take that both things are inherently bad or socially bad. Yet they go on to say that the top grossing movies have been "sci-fi" and it has a large group of followers. Can science fiction still be seen as negative while being "influential" and "popular" ?
Meagan
Page 180: "Seeing a parallel with the U.S.'s strategic position, Cebrowski was particularly fascinated by market behemoths. He was extremely impressed with companies like Wal-Mart... Just as Wal-Mart had 'total information awareness' over the marketplace, so too could the Pentagon have a perfect picture of the battlefield."Page 188: "The first problem turned out to be the business
assumptions upon which the whole movement was based. Battlefields are not the same as corporate boardrooms..."How is this first quote fantastical? What do you think of the blurred borders between reality and fantasy, reality being that "market behemoths" are very different from the way Cebrowski viewed them as an
analogy for a battlefield?