One of my favorite books is “Ready Player One” by Ernest Cline. And while it is more about virtual reality than augmented reality, it’s a good place to start and to end.
We live in the physical world, of course. Yet, we’re slowly making the digital world our habitat. As this progresses, there is a substituting of the physical reality with that of the digital.
I’m sure you have noticed that people tend to have an “Internet” persona along with their physical persona. Sure, there are those whom it is indistinguishable. Yet, there are surely others who present something other than their true (i.e., physical) self; hence the “Instagram vs. Reality” posts.
At what point does the digital persona completely replace the physical one? And, when that happens, will there be any self-conscious instances as in the strip above? As Cline points out in his book, each person can be whatever they want to be online (in his book, “The Oasis”).
With that in mind, augmented reality may be simply a stepping stone to a substitute digital “reality” which, if we’re honest with ourselves, cannot truly be called “reality.” Only reality has the sole privilege of that moniker. Everything else is a distant wannabe.
Jason Salas, Creative 