There’s something in your eye: ethical implications of augmented visual field devices
| Date | 08 August 2016 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JICES-10-2015-0035 |
| Published date | 08 August 2016 |
| Pages | 214-230 |
| Author | Marty J. Wolf,Frances S. Grodzinsky,Keith W. Miller |
There’s something in your eye:
ethical implications of
augmented visual eld devices
Marty J. Wolf
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science,
Bemidji State University, Bemidji, Minnesota, USA
Frances S. Grodzinsky
Department of Computer Science and Information Technology,
Sacred Heart University, Faireld, Connecticut, USA, and
Keith W. Miller
College of Education, University of Missouri, St. Louis, Missouri, USA
Abstract
Purpose – This paper aims to explore the ethical and social impact of augmented visual eld devices
(AVFDs), identifying issues that AVFDs share with existing devices and suggesting new ethical and
social issues that arise with the adoption of AVFDs.
Design/methodology/approach –This essay incorporates both a philosophical and an ethical
analysis approach. It is based on Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, philosophical notions of transparency and
presence and human values including psychological well-being, physical well-being, privacy,
deception, informed consent, ownership and property and trust.
Findings – The paper concludes that the interactions among developers, users and non-users via
AVFDs have implications for autonomy. It also identies issues of ownership that arise because of the
blending of physical and virtual space and important ways that these devices impact, identity and trust.
Practical implications – Developers ought to take time to design and implement an easy-to-use
informed consent system with these devices. There is a strong need for consent protocols among
developers, users and non-users of AVFDs.
Social implications – There is a social benet to users sharing what is visible on their devices with
those who are in close physical proximity, but this introduces tension between notions of personal
privacy and the establishment and maintenance of social norms.
Originality/value –There is new analysis of how AVFDs impact individual identity and the
attendant ties to notions of ownership of the space between an object and someone’s eyes and control
over perception.
Keywords Augmented reality, Autonomy, Transparency, Human values,
Augmented visual eld devices, Informed consent
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Visual augmented reality (AR) involves projecting light in such a way that both natural
light and articial light enter the eye simultaneously, so some objects seen in the visual
eld can be traced back to physical objects, and other objects seen are virtual objects, for
which no physical object is the source of reected light. As high-tech innovations go, AR
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/1477-996X.htm
JICES
14,3
214
Received 20 October 2015
Revised 22 December 2015
Accepted 17 January 2016
Journalof Information,
Communicationand Ethics in
Society
Vol.14 No. 3, 2016
pp.214-230
©Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1477-996X
DOI 10.1108/JICES-10-2015-0035
is not a particularly recent invention. As early as 1968, Ivan Sutherland (1968) wrote
about a “head-mounted three dimensional display”. Nearly 30 years later, Mann (1997)
wrote about a much smaller system with a similar function; his system included
“eyeglasses, a handheld control, and a computer worn in back under the shirt”. More
recently, Google Glass generated a tremendous amount of publicity, despite its rather
modest AR goals compared to those earlier devices. Houghton (2013) describes Google
Glass as:
[…] a wearable Android-powered computer built into spectacle frames so that you can perch a
display in your eld of vision, lm, take pictures, search and translate on the go as well as run
specially-designed apps.
About that same time, Meta (2013) announced more ambitious goals for Space Glasses,
a device they described as “augmented reality 3D glasses”. Unlike Google Glass (which
is designed to stay out of the way of most of the visual eld), Space Glasses use two “see
through TFT LCD displays” with the intent that the user will see “three-dimensional
display output on top of the real world”. In the demonstration movie on their homepage,
they show people playing chess, designing a vase, using facial recognition and playing
laser tag using virtual images projected as if in space. Space Glasses also include a high
resolution, forward-looking camera. As of this writing, Space Glasses are not yet
available for purchase and have not captured the public’s imagination as much as
Google Glass.
Recently, Microsoft (2015) announced the pending release of HoloLens, “the world’s
most advanced holographic computing platform”. HoloLens seemingly will project
holographic images into the physical space that are visible to, at least, the wearer of the
HoloLens. Other advances in this arena include research to embed AR capabilities into
smaller devices, including contact lenses (Stauth and Parviz, 2006;De Smet et al., 2013),
and Magic Leap’s recently led patent application for technology that, rather than
having the user viewing articial light emanating from a screen, will project light
directly onto the wearer’s retina (Abovitz et al., 2015). The holy grail of all of these
technologies is to create an environment where the user interacts with virtual and
physical objects in a natural, seamless way. It appears that the goal of many of these
technologies is to make the virtual objects as similar as possible to the physical objects
in the immediate environment to the point that the user is unable to distinguish between
the virtual and the real in his/her interactions. We will call devices that are attempting to
achieve these goals as augmented visual eld devices (AVFDs).
Some of the ethical concerns raised about AVFDs are not new; however, the nature of
these concerns changes when these technologies are combined into a single device with
proposed components of AVFDs. Promoters speak of the advantages for the individual
user of the device; however, there seems to be little analysis of the potential
disadvantages for the individual user and almost no analysis of the impact these devices
might have in larger groups and on social structures. Brinkman (2014) warns against a
simplistic view of AR as “a mixture of reality and virtuality, like a mixture of salt and
pepper; it’s a compound in which the combined elements have new and powerful
properties”. The AVFD’s cameras are an obvious point of concern. Denning et al. (2014)
conducted an experiment in which they documented the reactions of bystanders to
cameras and recording devices. Their work revealed that the newness and unfamiliarity
of these devices caused bystanders to view them differently from other recording
215
There’s
something in
your eye
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