Cypher's Choices

The Variety and Reality of Virtual Experiences

Peter Ludlow

In Anarchy, State, and Utopia, Robert Nozick offered a thought experiment involving an "experience machine" — a machine that can constantly simulate experiences that are pleasurable. Given the opportunity, would we permanently plug ourselves into such a machine? And if not, why would we refrain from doing so?

In some respects, the opportunity to plug into the experience machine presents a choice like that offered to the character Cypher in the movie The Matrix (1999). For those who never saw The Matrix (or who have forgotten the plot), the movie involves a group of hackers who have come to know that most of humanity is plugged into a vast simulation, known as The Matrix. Cypher is one of the hackers who has become aware of this fact and has been unplugged from The Matrix, but he later betrays his comrades. As his reward for selling out the others, he chooses to be reenvatted. He has seen enough of the real world; he prefers the simulation.

Nozick, however, predicts that most of us would not choose the path taken by the evil traitor Cypher — we would reject the simulation in favor of a life embedded in so-called real life (hereafter RL). Based on this presumed choice, Nozick draws several conclusions. One is that the reason we would reject the simulation is because we cannot genuinely act when we are in the simulation. A second conclusion Nozick draws is that we would reject the simulation because it does not afford us contact with a deeper reality. It only affords us a kind of superficial reality. Finally, Nozick claims that the thought experiment shows us that there is something wrong with the doctrine of hedonism, as ordinarily construed. Even if being embedded in a simulation could afford us a life of pleasure we would reject it — presumably because we value the ability to act in the world and be in contact with basic reality more than we value pleasure itself.

Since Nozick's publication, the idea of an experience machine has become less of a thought experiment and more of an ongoing empirical research program, with virtual worlds like Second Life (hereafter SL)and other synthetic worlds providing laboratories in which these questions can be explored. Even though such synthetic worlds do not exhaust the conceptual space of possible experience machines, including Nozick's core example, they have been around long enough that we can extract some important insights into Nozick's questions. The study of virtual worlds can help unglue us from unexamined assumptions about the nature of Nozick's experience machine.

Using what we know about existing virtual worlds I argue that it would be wrong to think that actions in virtual worlds are not genuine actions, and wrong to think that virtual experiences do not afford contact with deeper reality. On the other hand, when people choose to participate in virtual worlds, they typically choose those activities that are fraught with risk — including the risk of causing themselves pain in interpersonal relationships, and engaging in activities, plans, and goals that often yield genuine disappointment. I then argue that this holds true even for the solipsistic experience machine envisioned by Nozick. We would insist on experiences that afford us at least the illusion of agency, action, and risk. Virtual worlds show that given the choice of any virtual experience, we do not choose the hedonistic experience path, but we rather chose virtual lives that have importance and nobility. In effect, Nozick is right, but for the wrong reasons.

1.0 HEDONISM

Because part of Nozick's claim is that the experience machine thought experiment refutes hedonism, we need to get clear on what hedonism is. A standard definition goes something like this: Hedonism is the doctrine that we should act so as to maximize pleasure and minimize pain to the greatest extent possible.

There are several further choice points here. First, we have to decide whether we ought to maximize pleasure for everyone or just for ourselves. For purposes of discussion I'm going to assume the latter, since if Nozick's experience machine thought experiment doesn't refute individual-level hedonism it won't refute the group-level hedonism either.

There are other decisions to be made. There is a kind of hedonist who would say that we should always opt for the best possible experience in the moment — we should live in the moment and opt for the greatest pleasure (and least pain) in that moment. This version is too easy a target, I think. Hedonists since Jeremy Bentham have stressed that future pleasure and pain are important considerations as well.

I'm going to assume a less in-the-moment version of hedonism — one like Bentham's hedonistic calculus in which we are concerned with matters like the future effects of our actions (indigestion and hangovers, for example), the duration of the pleasures received, and so forth.

We might be tempted toward a Millian version of hedonism — one that incorporates the quality of a pleasure. I'm going to avoid that version for purposes of this argument, since it is unclear to me how that doctrine could ever be refuted given a broad enough understanding of "quality" of pleasure. For example, you might stipulate that a pleasure is qualitatively better if it involves a real object. That would undermine Nozick's argument against hedonism pretty quickly, but not in a very interesting way.

Ultimately then, the target doctrine is this version of hedonism: One ought to act to maximize the greatest quantity of pleasure (and/or least pain) over the rest of your...