Browsing by Subject "http://www.yso.fi/onto/yso/p23547"
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(2023)Philosophers and scientists often strive to investigate the 'objective' properties of a mind-independent reality. But how have their personal models of reality – that could include a belief in Yeti – been constituted in the first place? In this master's thesis in theoretical philosophy, I will ask whether we could produce a subjective approach to ontology, where our sense of what exists and the specific manner it exists could be comprehensively explained by the phenomenal properties of our prior experiences. In an answer, I will argue both Husserlian phenomenology and Integrated information theory feature a viable subjective approach to ontology, explaining how our prior experiences could make up and specify our own subjective models of reality that do not necessarily correspond with the supposed mind-independent structures of the world. In chapter 2, I will make a survey on the Husserlian phenomenological approach to ontology. In this, I will provide a bottom-up account of Husserlian terminology concerning e.g., consciousness, intentional matter, form, embodiment, experienced objects, and universals, and how it acquires an ontological function in describing how experienced things are constituted in the mind in passive and active synthesis in the specific form the subject thinks of them as existing. The final product of these constitutive processes is the subject's manifold of the world i.e., its subjective model of reality. In chapter 3, I will argue IIT's principled neuroscientific account of experience must also feature a subjective approach to ontology, where two of its central components, the axiom of existence, and the central identity, entail a subject's sense of what exists – and in what specific manner it exists – can only have an explanation on the cause-effect structures of the subject's physical substrate of consciousness. I will also make the case the experiential counterpart of the subject’s substrate's cause-effect structure itself (as measured by Φ) could be interpreted to be its subjective model of reality based on its prior experiences. In the work, I will argue a subjective approach to ontology could offer a wider theoretic scope for ontology, explaining such irreducibly subjective things as Yeti, beliefs, hypotheses, dreams, illusions, and music; be less problematic theoretically, avoiding problematics related to Cartesian imp i.e., brain-in-a-vat -scenarios and some metaphysical paradoxes; and have tangible real-world impact in more realist policies, in the area of societal resilience, and in the development of artificial intelligence.
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(2021)This master’s thesis examines comments for and against virtual reality (VR) as a gaming technology in the context of the VR-only game Half-Life: Alyx. Comments were collected from its online community in the Steam discussion forum, and understood as speech acts. The game is the first in its series to not be playable with a keyboard and mouse. The purpose is to examine the virtual community’s speech acts in connection to social movement mechanisms for taking collective action: social networks, collective identities, conflict action against identified others. This mixed-methods case study’s primary method is qualitative grounded theory. For comparison, additional data was also collected on whether the commenters purchased the game or not. The research material consists of comments before and after it was released. Commenters are grouped based on their comment sentiment toward VR as positive, negative, neutral (mixed), or unclear. These sentiment groups are visualized as social networks. In results, Half-Life is modernistically constructed as a technology-advancing gaming series. The advancement in its latest release Half-Life: Alyx is contributed to its use of VR technology. The game being playable VR-only divides the virtual community’s reception of the game, and the technology. Disagreements concern the technology’s economic expenses, gaming experiences, and distinctiveness as a gaming medium. The shared collective identity of “the Half-Life community” is a PC gaming community, which consists of “Half-Life fans” who consider themselves to be keyboard-mouse gamers, and gamers who are part of a “VR community.” They use different conflict strategies against the identified other. In time, the commenters became less polarized. Furthermore, they entertained which of the mediums or what future technology will be used in Half-Life 3. In essence, the main phenomenon of the gamer divisions around Half-Life games’ hardware requirements but later uniting as a community is named “The Half-Life cycle,” although not all commenters agree that VR belongs in the same technology-advancing narrative as the previous technologies. The hardware and software developer Valve is discussed in regards to the company benefiting from the divided Half-Life community, whether or not a “divide and conquer” strategy was intended. Furthermore, the main phenomenon Half-Life cycle is discussed from multiple perspectives. Further research suggestions relate to the distinctions between virtual communities and social movements, what a technological movement would look like, and the understanding that different communities can be divided similarly to social movements.
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