Abstract
Google has recently announced Project Glass, a plan to embed computers into eyeglasses. Their vision is that technology should “be there when you need it and get out of your way when you don’t.” The main idea behind this technology is called augmented reality. In this chapter I will introduce the main ideas behind augmented reality, and the most interesting examples (so far) of how it is used. I’m most interested, however, in the ethical challenges this technology will present as it becomes pervasive. I describe and explain two examples; augmented reality as an extension of the home (which has privacy implications), and augmented reality advertising (which has implications for property rights and local government). Along the way I will introduce several techniques and concepts that are useful in analyzing the ethics of new technologies, including pervasive information and computing technology (PICT).
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Notes
- 1.
From this point on I use the term “virtuality” as a synonym for “virtual reality.” I do this, as do many other authors, because I wish to emphasize that “virtual reality” is not really reality at all, but something different, which exists in its own right.
- 2.
Virtuality is place-bound due to the technologies that make it possible, such as desktop computers and Computerized Automatic Virtual Environments (CAVEs). In CAVEs, free movement is often constrained due to safety concerns, because the user cannot see the real world (Waller et al. 2007).
- 3.
See, for example, (Mack 2009), a book about John Locke in the “Major Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers” series.
- 4.
One important and fascinating work on the role of metaphor in society is Susan Sontag’s “Illness as Metaphor.” She points out the difference between the romantic metaphors that surround tuberculosis and the military metaphors surrounding cancer, and how these metaphors affect the treatment of patients (Sontag 1977).
- 5.
Of course, some digital artifacts might also be illegal, such as child pornography.
- 6.
The augmented reality research community seems very open to these efforts. I recently presented a poster about another of McLuhan’s ideas, autoamputation, at the International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality. The poster, which presented a McLuhan-inspired explanation for some unforeseen experimental results, won a best poster award (Brinkman 2012).
- 7.
Unlike in real life, augmented reality objects that are very close to the eye do not get “fuzzy.” In real life, depth of field effects provide important distance cues to our brains – fuzzy objects are either very close or very far away. In a computer graphics system, making close items look blurry is actually much harder then making them look crisp and clear.
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Acknowledgments
My thanks to Julie Rogers and Brian Breitsch for their helpful feedback on early drafts of this chapter.
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Brinkman, B. (2014). Ethics and Pervasive Augmented Reality: Some Challenges and Approaches. In: Pimple, K. (eds) Emerging Pervasive Information and Communication Technologies (PICT). Law, Governance and Technology Series, vol 11. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6833-8_8
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