What is it like to be a Bat?

I ask the reader to imagine what it is like to be a Bat. To redirect their five human (presumably) senses into the experiences of a Bat. I ask the individual to imagine the sensation of the night air brushing past your leathery wings, the sense of echolocation as you emit a hyper sonic screech and understand your environment through the mode of sound. Whilst I imagine you are all able to do this, your imagined experiences of a Bat’s sensations are probably far from the truth of how a real Bat experiences the world. Here, I am paraphrasing an essay from philosopher, Thomas Nagel (Nagel 1974: np). According to

Nagel, we can know exactly how a bat “works”, even down to rigorous academic study whereby we can measure the frequency of the screech and the beats of their wings to a measurable statistic. We cannot, however, know what it feels like to be a Bat. There exists a gap between knowledge and experience. This distinction doesn’t just exist between humans and flying marsupials as well. In philosophy there exists a concept called “Qualia”. This concept argues that thoughts, perceptions, and emotions all have a subjective quality to them and thus are unique to an individual. This notion proceeds to bring up other questions regarding experience; do we all see the same shade of blue as one another? Do we all feel sadness the same way? Is everyone else equally as frustrated when they stub their toe? (the last one is probably true). Nonetheless, this distinction of experience between individuals is important as it brings up one of the most exciting and unique things regarding VR, we can breach (kind of) the experience gap. VR experiences literally allow you to inhabit the mind and experiences of someone completely different, suggesting that you leave your “self” behind and instead take up the identity of the character you find yourself inhabiting (a process in the VR industry called “onboarding”). By presenting the player with the potential to be immersed in the senses of a new individual’s perspective, they can shift their own sense of identity and learn from the experiences of their new virtual persona. For example, a study found a significant reduction of racist thinking after placing white people in a virtual black avatar and subjecting them with some of the day-to-day prejudice these people must experience. It is exactly because of this medium’s almost unique ability to shift someone’s self that makes VR perfect for new therapeutic techniques. It is widely used as an alternative to exposure therapy, presenting patients with a digitally created environment in which they can confront their phobia without risk of becoming too overwhelmed.

Nagel, T (1975) What Is It Like to Be a Bat? Duke University Press

Available at: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fac/iatl/study/ugmodules/humananimalstudies/lectures/32/nagel_bat.pdf