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Message no. 1
From: Jerry Hill <agh60070@*******.CC.UCF.EDU>
Subject: Sim and education
Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 21:01:33 +0000
> seems to be what Holly Brighton's _Free Fall_ was). How permanent
> are these outside symbols? If you have memory of the sim, it would
> seem to be relatively permanent. That means that your thinking
> process has been changed, thus changing your personality. So how

And, if these are immersive experiences (which I assume) these would
seem to make some ideal training / education tools. Want to learn a
new language? No problem, just grab this new sim and you're immersed
in japanesse, with either translation overlays, or simply
comprehension (does the recording gear pick up thoughts? Emotions?
"just" sensory things? What about a mage watching a sim? What about
a mage _recording_ the sim. What if he astrally percieves? Projects?
Arg. Too many questions, no answers.)


------------------------------------------------
Jerry Hill agh60070@*******.cc.ucf.edu
Message no. 2
From: The Spaceman <spaced@*.WASHINGTON.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 18:51:37 -0700
>>>>> Jerry Hill didst say unto the aether thusly:

# comprehension (does the recording gear pick up thoughts? Emotions?
# "just" sensory things? What about a mage watching a sim? What about
# a mage _recording_ the sim. What if he astrally percieves? Projects?
# Arg. Too many questions, no answers.)

The symbol idea is shamelessly stolen from Douglas Hofstadter's
_Godel, Escher, Bach_, a book I highly recommend. A symbol represents
not just an image, but the circumstances that trigger that symbol as well as
triggers for other symbols. For example, take the symbol for the physical
act of a shadowrun. That symbol could be triggered by references in the paper,
the act of shooting, whatever. It could also trigger the symbol for Hellblast,
etc. So if simsense inputs someone else's symbols, you'd have to take this
trigger effect into account. Is there software to eliminate some trigger
transfers? If so, sim becomes the grail of training, because the images/
symbols/procedures come pre-sorted, almost like you were permanently slotting
a skillwire, but with the possibility of improvement.
However, sim as written seems to be "just" emotional/physical feeling,
no intellectualization. This implies a different method of transfer, perhaps
dealing with chemical levels in the body manipulated by the datajack.
This seems a little lacking, as the mind seems free to respond and
intellectualize in "free-form" sim aka the Grid/Matrix. Perhaps in addition to
chemical, the interface stimulates nerve endings and other functions all over
the body. In essence, everything has the potential for blackness.

The Spaceman |The best lack all conviction, while
spaced@*.washington.edu |the worse are full of passionate
Check out the Bill Page! |intensity - W.B. Yeats
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Message no. 3
From: Jerry Hill <agh60070@*******.CC.UCF.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 22:40:45 +0000
> However, sim as written seems to be "just" emotional/physical
> feeling, no intellectualization. This implies a different method of
> transfer, perhaps dealing with chemical levels in the body
> manipulated by the datajack.


Digging out the old copy of ShadowBeat (starting on p. 74):

Simsense is a variation on the theme of ASIST (Artificial Sensory
Induction System Technology) used in simsense, cyberdecks, rigging,
skillsofts, med-wares (whatever that is) and other stuff.

The experience appears to be totally immersive to the user, as if
they were "...really there, going through the same changes as the
actor/artist who recorded it."

Simsence consists of two tracks, the sensory and the emotive.
The sensory tracks are split into Proprioceptive (PC) and
Extroceptive (EC). PC consists of the sensory stimulii generated by
posture, muscle tension, balance, blood pressure, etc. The EC are the
stimulii generated from outside the body. Apparantly most experience
involve both of these responses.
The emotive track is measured in terms of the neurobiological
systems that activate or suppress an emotional response. The major
emotive tracks are: "sympathetic, parasympathetic, adrenal,
thalamic, and hypo-thalamic, limbic, and so on." An emotive track
mixes these to produce (recreate?) a single responce.

It goes on about some of these things some more, but I'll skip ahead
and answer one of my own questions: Magic.
Magic is sometimes used for "special effects" via illusions or
"stimulation" type spells. Hmm. They then go on to say that the
actor's REACATION to the illusion is what is recorded, while the
illusion cannot be recorded. This begs the question of physical
illusions, and spells with elemental effects... Also, apparanty, you
can record the sense of a mage casting, but not the effects, thus
there are no "Learn to be a Mage" simsences out there.

Well. This may clear some things up, though it's left me with even
more questions about just how this all works anyway.



------------------------------------------------
Jerry Hill agh60070@*******.cc.ucf.edu
Message no. 4
From: The Spaceman <spaced@*.WASHINGTON.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 20:11:45 -0700
>>>>> Jerry Hill didst say unto the aether thusly:

# The experience appears to be totally immersive to the user, as if
# they were "...really there, going through the same changes as the
# actor/artist who recorded it."
# Simsence consists of two tracks, the sensory and the emotive.
# The sensory tracks are split into Proprioceptive (PC) and
# Extroceptive (EC). PC consists of the sensory stimulii generated by
# posture, muscle tension, balance, blood pressure, etc. The EC are the
# stimulii generated from outside the body. Apparantly most experience
# involve both of these responses.
# The emotive track is measured in terms of the neurobiological
# systems that activate or suppress an emotional response. The major
# emotive tracks are: "sympathetic, parasympathetic, adrenal,
# thalamic, and hypo-thalamic, limbic, and so on." An emotive track
# mixes these to produce (recreate?) a single responce.

Damn. Looks like I'll actually have to find a copy of Shadowbeat now.
However, just one question as to the above: How does language get translated?
I'm assuming that's covered in the ASIST description. However, in the
description of how simsense works, there's no mention of "rational" workings.
If all you get is the emotion, then when (for example) Jackie Chan screams
at Maggie Chueng, you don't actually "hear" what Jackie says, just Maggie's
emotional understanding of what Jackie is saying. This could lead to some
weird interpretations of "plot" in sims, as words have different emotional
responses for certain people (For a _really_ silly example, see Mike
Stackpole's short story _Let Me Call You Sweetheart_[1], in which sweetheart
can be the traditional endearment or a foul obscenity.

[1]Included in the anthology _Newer York_ ed. Lawrence Watt-Evans

The Spaceman |Some days even my lucky rocketship
spaced@*.washington.edu |underpants don't help
Check out the Bill Page! | - Calvin
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~spaced/bill.html
New maintainer of the Shadowrun Player Directory:
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Message no. 5
From: Jerry Hill <agh60070@*******.CC.UCF.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 00:11:34 +0000
> However, just one question as to the above: How does language get
> translated? I'm assuming that's covered in the ASIST description.

No, it's not covered at all, unfortunately. I THINK what you would
get is the external sensory input (sound) of the language (which you
may or may not understand on your own) and an emotional responce to
that sound. i.e., no translation. Which means you still have to
deal with overdubbing and/or subtitles. (How in the world would
subtitles work anyway? Oh well).


------------------------------------------------
Jerry Hill agh60070@*******.cc.ucf.edu
Message no. 6
From: The Spaceman <spaced@*.WASHINGTON.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 21:41:12 -0700
>>>>> Jerry Hill didst say unto the aether thusly:

# No, it's not covered at all, unfortunately. I THINK what you would
# get is the external sensory input (sound) of the language (which you
# may or may not understand on your own) and an emotional responce to
# that sound. i.e., no translation. Which means you still have to
# deal with overdubbing and/or subtitles. (How in the world would
# subtitles work anyway? Oh well).

That sounds about right, given the sim description you forwarded.
This brings up another point (Will we ever run out of questions?? :). What
happens to external stimuli that would damage the body? A great attraction
of simsense would be its ability to safely sim really dangerous behavior.
I'm assuming that bone-breaking, etc. would fall under illegal signal limits,
but how about noise damage to eardrums? In _Night's Pawn_, Cara has a sim
addiction, and at least one of the chips (Buzz) is a rock video of sorts. Does
the volume of sound have a lasting effect on Cara's hearing?

The Spaceman |Some days even my lucky rocketship
spaced@*.washington.edu |underpants don't help
Check out the Bill Page! | - Calvin
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~spaced/bill.html
New maintainer of the Shadowrun Player Directory:
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~spaced/srdir/
Message no. 7
From: Jerry Hill <agh60070@*******.CC.UCF.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 00:43:45 +0000
> :). What happens to external stimuli that would damage the body? A
> great attraction of simsense would be its ability to safely sim
> really dangerous behavior. I'm assuming that bone-breaking, etc.
> would fall under illegal signal limits, but how about noise damage
> to eardrums? In _Night's Pawn_, Cara has a sim addiction, and at

Well, a large part I didn't go into is the post production effort,
which is just as involved as that today, including sensory and
emotive "touch ups" and overlays to improve saleablity, as well as to
tone down those things that would boost the chip into the BTL arena.
This is also where many things are edited out (the sim-star's
hangover from the cast party, the fact that she's about as sexually
exited as a neutered cat, etc.) and replaced with more favorable
things (or sometimes a scene is simply re-shot and spliced in).


------------------------------------------------
Jerry Hill agh60070@*******.cc.ucf.edu
Message no. 8
From: Gurth <gurth@******.NL>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 11:50:28 +0100
Jerry Hill said on 21:01/21 Jun 97...

> (does the recording gear pick up thoughts? Emotions? "just" sensory
> things?

AFAIK emotions and sensory data (depending on how you see it, those might
be the same anyway). Remember that normal sims are filtered, else they'd
be BTLs which cause brain damage because their signals are too intense, so
you get the basic emotions from the actors, as well as a toned-down
version of what their senses picked up on the set. IMHO especially pain
would be filtered out so far that the viewer knows he or she should feel
pain, but doesn't actually.

> What about a mage watching a sim?

What about it?

> What about a mage _recording_ the sim. What if he astrally percieves?
> Projects? Arg. Too many questions, no answers.)

That's actually very simple: astral space is the realm of living things. A
simsense recording device isn't alive, so whatever a magician perceives on
the astral plane won't be recorded at all. As far as the simsense recorder
is concerned, the magician is doing nothing at all, except maybe being
comatose. Interesting sim, don't you think? :)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
I used to change this line every day. Now, I'm kinda lacking inspiration.
-> NERPS Project Leader & Unofficial Shadowrun Guru <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/plastic.html <-

-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version 3.1:
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Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X++ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------
Message no. 9
From: Jerry Hill <agh60070@*******.CC.UCF.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 08:13:09 +0000
> That's actually very simple: astral space is the realm of living
> things. A simsense recording device isn't alive, so whatever a
> magician perceives on the astral plane won't be recorded at all. As
> far as the simsense recorder is concerned, the magician is doing
> nothing at all, except maybe being comatose. Interesting sim, don't
> you think? :)

Well, the thought was that somehow this information is channeled
through the optic nerves of the mage (though upon consideration this
isn't true), but I was just kind of rambling there as things jumped
through my head. The sun was gettign ready to come up and addled my
thoughts to no end.


------------------------------------------------
Jerry Hill agh60070@*******.cc.ucf.edu
Message no. 10
From: Barbie <barbie@**********.COM>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 08:44:38 -0500
At 21-Jun-97 wrote Jerry Hill:



>And, if these are immersive experiences (which I assume) these would
>seem to make some ideal training / education tools. Want to learn a
>new language? No problem, just grab this new sim and you're immersed
>in japanesse, with either translation overlays, or simply
>comprehension (does the recording gear pick up thoughts? Emotions?
>"just" sensory things? What about a mage watching a sim? What about
>a mage _recording_ the sim. What if he astrally percieves? Projects?
> Arg. Too many questions, no answers.)

The answers are all in the Shadowbeat sourcebook.
Sometimes this book is very usefull too.

--
Barbie


==================================================
You can see the earth we`re high here we`re
climbing over sumertowm you can kiss the air we`re
gliding follow me for sumerland no sound no life
no essence we lay enstranged in our curious ways
memories lay beside us but i`m seeing through an
age who i`m through sumerland.

(Fields of the Nephilim-Eilzium-Weil of Sumer)

Message no. 11
From: John E Pederson <lobo1@****.COM>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 14:41:30 EDT
On Sat, 21 Jun 1997 21:41:12 -0700 The Spaceman <spaced@*.WASHINGTON.EDU>
writes:

<snip>

<<Cara has a sim addiction, and at least one of the chips (Buzz) is a
rock video of sorts. Does the volume of sound have a lasting effect on
Cara's hearing?>>

It shouldn't if the sensory information is being pumped directly to the
brain. I don't know if that is the case (don't own Shadowbeat), but if
they are putting sensory and emotive iformation into the viewer's skull,
then I doubt they'd need to bother with anything aside from the simsense
itself. IOW, there wouldn't be any permanent damage to her hearing unless
she were to suffer from some sort of neurological breakdown in that
section of her cerebral cortex, and even then it's quite likely that
another part of her brain would pick up and take over that sensory
function. If the sensory organs themselves aren't perceiving anything
damaging, they won't be damaged.

--
-Canthros
And ye shall know the truth, and lobo1@****.com
the truth shall set you free. canthros1@***.com
--John 8:32, KJV
http://members.aol.com/canthros1/
Message no. 12
From: The Spaceman <spaced@*.WASHINGTON.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sim and education
Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 17:04:32 -0700
>>>>> Gurth didst say unto the aether thusly:


# AFAIK emotions and sensory data (depending on how you see it, those might
# be the same anyway). Remember that normal sims are filtered, else they'd

# That's actually very simple: astral space is the realm of living things. A
# simsense recording device isn't alive, so whatever a magician perceives on
# the astral plane won't be recorded at all. As far as the simsense recorder
# is concerned, the magician is doing nothing at all, except maybe being
# comatose. Interesting sim, don't you think? :)

Even if the images can't be copied, the mage's emotional response could
be. After all, you're still in your body when only perceiving. Say they
stationed you near Crater Lake, or at Stonehenge during a solstice ritual. That
could be an intense event, esp. if the mage was participating in the ritual.
Then an "artists rendition" of the mage's description could be filtered in to
the sim.
In Dunky's Will, it mentions a reward for whoever duplicates a magical
effect through tech. Suppose a corp figures out a way record the "astral"
sense. Suppose it's a small corp. Suppose Fuchi/ATC/Ares finds out before the
public...... <BSEG>


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Check out the Bill Page! |teenage boys - P.J. O'Rourke
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Further Reading

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