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The virtual doesn't kill the real

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The screen or the window?

It may seem that acknowledging the virtual perverts the notion of place because the technology of the virtual cuts us off from our environment and our deeper selves, and from uncontrolled multi-dimensional interactions in face-to-face encounter with one another and with raw nature.

It is true that in dealing with people and nature physically present there are far more modes and channels of contact than any virtuality is likely to contain. Still, the objection overestimates the immediacy of normal encounters. Even if the virtuality cannot provide the fullness of our most awake encounters, it will provide as much as our humdrum awareness often gives us.