How close are we to having a ‘Holodeck’ experience?
The cutting edge technologies of both artificial intelligence and mixed reality have been developing rapidly over the last 10 years or so.
With new technologies such as ChatGPT 4o and Apple’s Vision Pro hitting the market. We’re getting close to these technologies hitting a certain level of maturity and useability in day to day lives.
Open AI recently demonstrated their new voice model for ChatGPT, which allows the user to have realistic and engaging conversations with an AI agent.
Apple’s new headset now delivers a level of visual fidelity to the general public in mixed reality that now makes it a viable replacement for a traditional computer monitor.
But now these two technologies are starting to come together in ways that really does have the potential to change the way we entertain ourselves, educate ourselves and interact with the real world.
In this article, I’ll break down five exciting ways that these technologies are being used together to show where the sharp end of the spear is in consumer technology.
The Evolution of AI and VR
Before we get into the specific use cases of the intersection between artificial intelligence and virtual reality. We should probably have a quick look back at the trajectories of these two technologies to better understand how these paths have collided.
For decades (until what feels like yesterday), AI has been the backbone of science fiction.
There have been plenty of pseudo examples of it being used where many wouldn’t have even noticed.
For example, in my computer game development days, we would say that the NPC’s (non-playable characters) and enemies had AI. When in reality, they were just following a pre-determined path or set of instructions.
There was nothing intelligent about them.
Voice recognition systems such as Siri were the first noticeable experience that many of us had with AI, and our first appreciation of the benefits it could bring.
Starting as an AI initiative project funded by DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) in 2003. The initial concept was to help military personnel with making decisions in the office, which developed into a system called CALO (Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Organizes).
It would arrange meetings for staff, provide documents to attendees, and even cancel and reschedule if someone couldn’t make it.
Clever, but still fairly straightforward.
Along the way over the last few years, one of the biggest use cases for AI that we’ve heard about is autonomous cars. Robbing us of one of our last joys.
That’s not quite with us yet in the mainstream, although Tesla might disagree. But it’s certainly just around the corner, and we’ve been watching it develop over the last 10 years.
ChatGPT was released on the 30th of November, 2022.
Can you believe it’s only been that long?
Since then, AI has evolved at a meteoric rate. With multiple updates, improvements and clones, and we’re already worried it’s going to take all of our jobs.
The capabilities have blown our mind, and given us a real taste of what the future holds.
For me, one of the scariest examples was when the Alignment Research Centre was given access to an early version of ChatGPT-4 to test for ‘risky behaviours’. And then immediately found one, when they challenged the AI to overcome the Captcha test and it did so by hiring a human from TaskRabbit to do it.
Nope.
Virtual Reality Has Had A Slower Rise In Popularity
With virtual and mixed reality, the evolution has been a lot longer and steadier.
Starting way back in 1838 with the invention of the stereoscope by Sir Charles Wheatstone. We’ve long been fascinated by the concept of a more immersive visual experience using 3D.
The first ‘VR machine’ was created by cinematographer, Morton Heilig in 1956, and it was called ‘Sensorama’. It was more akin to Cineworld’s 4DX, with full color 3D video, sound, vibration and even smell-o-vision.
In more recent memory, a lot of us recall our first VR experience with Virtuality in the early 90’s. Featuring those enormous headsets and dalek-like seats.
With the exception of the Virtual Boy from Nintendo. Things were fairly quiet on the VR front until 2012, when Palmer Lucky knocked it out of the park with his Kickstarter campaign for the Oculus Rift.
Two years later, things got serious when Oculus was acquired by Facebook for $2 billion. For context, that’s a similar figure to what George Lucas was paid by Disney for the Star Wars brand.
Since then, VR has been a passion project for Mark Zuckerberg. And he sees VR/XR as the ‘new platform’. And by ‘platform’, the one before was the internet.
Now that Apple has launched a headset of its own, we all know that’s an indicator this new technology is here to stay, and it’s about to become a mainstream part of all of our lives.
Despite what the nay-sayers might think.
Three Interesting Intersections Of AI And XR
AI controlled NPC’s in VR games.
For a long time, non-playable characters in computer games have been dumb and annoying. Their appearance didn’t justify the same resources as the main character. So they looked basic and pixelated. And their vocabulary was usually restricted to a few choice phrases along the lines of “Excuse me. Sorry. I’m too busy to talk to you.”
But now? Now, thanks to technologies such as Unreal Engine 5, and ChatGPT’s voice model. In the virtual realm, NPC’s look incredible, with life-like features and animations. AND you can have a full blown conversation with them about anything you like.
No-longer will the background characters be little more than window dressing. Going forward, they will an integral part of the vast immersion on offer.
AI Assisted Shopping Using Mixed Reality
E-commerce is about to get a lot more interesting, and in the same breath, could this actually be the end of the high-street?
If you have no shame, you can now walk around a department store with your Quest 3 or Apple Vision Pro on looking at products.
The AI can recognise objects in front of you and go and search for them in online stores. Or it can go and find products that are very similar, based on it’s shape that it can recognise thanks to machine learning.
And then the real killer, you can order that product there and then and have it delivered to without having to carry it home.
Rather than buying it from the shop you actually saw it in.
AI Teaching Our Children In VR
Anyone with an 8 year old (or older) will attest that the children of today are almost cybernetic in their aptitude with technology.
With low pay, high stress, and long hours marking homework, it’s little surprise that we are already facing a significant shortage of qualified teachers across educational institutions.
Classroom sizes are growing year on year, and with it, the level of quality education is at risk.
Combine that with the population collapse crisis we’re now facing and a general lack of able workers post-Brexit. And it’s not hard to see how this use case could become a vital part of our future lives.
Rather than it being seen as a poor replacement for a real teacher. VR learning experiences powered by an AI teacher working one to one with every child would likely become a far better solution for tailored education than any real teacher trying to coach a class of 30+.
Not to mention how much more fun and interesting the learning experience could be in VR. With fun interaction, beautiful locations and constantly tailored challenges based on the child’s progress.
Over the next few years, one thing is for sure. As these technologies become an integral part of our daily lives, these use cases will explode in ways we can’t yet imagine.
They certainly have the potential to alleviate some of the shortages of people we’re already starting to see. And will enrich our lives with entertaining and engaging experiences.
But what of the downsides? Will people fall in love with virtual girlfriends instead of finding someone real? Will the personnel shortage flip the other way leaving many without a job?
Who knows. But as Arthur C. Clarke once said, the only thing we can be sure of about the future, is that it will be absolutely fantastic.
Alex Smale
About The Author:
Alex Smale is a digital business and technology expert. He is a virtual reality software developer, having developed an award-winning VR application to help people living with dementia.