[-empyre-] definition of virtual

[roger malina]

johannes john
sorry to jump in asynchronously

but i checked out john's definition of virtual which follows  a
summary of the development of glass

http://tech-no-mad.net/blog/archives/75283

A singular conclusion of this short look at glass (through a pair of
glasses on a glass screen!) brings me to define the “virtual” as being
the situation where one is experiencing an attenuation of energy flows
(via some ‘blocking’ or ‘diverting’ technology) that otherwise would
be impinging directly on the body-system. This suggests that any
discussion of the virtual not be limited to material ‘delivery’
mechanisms or mediatory (digital!) devices. Rather, a broad
consideration of the character of flows between the Self and the
Other, the Self and the cosmos, is needed: especially the relation
between those flows and embodied sensory presence. The dialectic of
reality/virtuality is fundamentally about the ‘allowance’ or
attenuation of potential energy flows as they effect change in the
energized body.

i must admit i find the emphasis on 'attenuation of energy flows"
problematically restrictive- so many of the technologies of virtual
presence involved
amplification of energies that do not reach the body ( telephone) or
conversion of an energy that the body is incapable of detecting and
converting
it to a form of energy that the body can perceive ( infra red vision)

in  my writings on 'intimate science' i emphasised that the whole
panoply of instruments give access to human perception all kinds of
forms of energy
that the body was not evolved to detect- so one form of virtuality
embodiment is being able to be present in spaces that are present but
that the
body is unable to perceive without amplification or translation devices

roger malina