Here's a moral dilema. Today we see hundreds of video games where killing people is the order of the day, and although it can be frowned upon if the context is deemed unappropriate, we generally accept it.

Pretty strange then, that if someone made a "virtual reality" experience or video game that allowed us to do something such as, say, rape a child, it would be frowned upon pretty heavily.

One could argue that we shouldn't allow vile paedophiles the chance to experience their sick desires. But we let people kill in a fantasy world, so how is that any different? Even if the person playing the game has no desire to kill in real life, the game is still out there, pleasing those who want to kill.

I've long believed that if someone thinks something, no matter how horrible it is, then they aren't being immoral unless they act up that thought. That being the case, shouldn't we allow paedophiles the chance to fulfil their fantasies in a virtual world? If the experience was real enough, would it not remove their need to fulfil their desires on an innocent child? Would that not be a good thing?

The reason I thought of asking this is because there will always be peadophiles, and maybe this is a better way to stop them harming children than just banning them from doing it...

The same principal could apply to any act that we deem immoral. There are a lot of sadistic people out there. If we make it possible for people to act out these deeds in VR/AR, then maybe we can stop them doing it in real life.

I don't think there is anything immoral about fulfilling such desires in virtual reality, but I don't know if I would want such people around me.

I think it would be better if people spent most or all of their time in virtual realities. That would allow everyone to have their own personal heaven.

In reality, a person can have liberty up to the point where it starts to infringe upon the liberty of others. In VR one can do anything without infringing upon anyone else. By anything, I also mean things that are impossible in real life.

Fully Immersive VR will be one of the most amazing inventions ever. I can't wait.

Ah, yes. I agree with that. That's what I was getting at.

I believe that it would be okay to design a computer program that would allow pedophiles to experience their fantasies, but there should certain rules and limitations. First, the program would have to be so realistic that a person would not be able to distinguish the real world from the virtual one. If the virtual world that the pedophiles are in is not realistic, they will eventually want the real thing.

I believe that two versions of these programs should be available to the public. One version should be available to the general population and the other to prisoners. The version that is available to the public should be a program that is designed to take away a person’s desire to rape children. The program could be designed in a way that would allow pedophiles to have sex with children, but with consequences. For example they could get raped themselves if they harm a person in the virtual world. The program could also include some kind of therapy that a pedophile would get from a psychiatrist. The ultimate goal of the program would be to activate a person’s orbitofrontal cortex. (The part of the brain that inhibits inappropriate actions) The second version could be a program that allows prisoners with life sentences to experience whatever they want as long as they behave properly in prison.

Good suggestions fish. I am a big fan of behavioral psychology and behavior modification.

If such a virtual-reality system would prevent actual children from being harmed, it does seem that having it available would be more moral than not having it. 

However, I'd have serious qualms about whatever "research" might be required to make these simulations realistic.  Could this be accomplished without harming children?  Would there be a way to prevent the (presumably non-paedophile) software engineers who worked on these simulations from being traumatized by the imagery they created?  Would only paedophile software engineers be hired to create these "games"?  Would they be paid for it?

Not to mention the problem of beta-testing, unless all the beta testers happened to be convicted criminals already.

This is an extremely interesting topic -- as someone who regularly kills people made of pixels in video games without thinking twice about it, your question did give me pause.  One thing about most modern video games involving killing, however, is the fact that normally the scenarios are set up so that your character's actions can easily be considered self-defense.  That is, the person / monster you are trying to kill would almost definitely kill you if you didn't.  This paradigm of self-defense does not translate well to the "ultimate fantasy" you describe.

I agree with what one of the previous posters said about possibly using these simulations as a means to rehabilitation -- it might even encourage more people with these urges to come forward and get treated before they actually act on their desires.  I find the sexualization of children to be such an utterly vile and reprehensible thing that anything that could potentially curb it is worth at least thinking about. 

I must admit I am bothered and surpirised by the posts on this topic. The  thing about video game violence is usually about saving your own ass or saving the day or something. There is skill and tasks and goals in defeating a game, it's not about simulating killing (usually). And hopefully the people who do buy the few games that really are about just killing able to handle it  (channel out unpleasant thought they shouldn't have had in the first place) and not transfer it back to reality. But if they're simulating killing and cruelty for amusement they would seem to me a straight up hazard to society, probably needing psychological help whether they get it or not. But shoot 'em up games are often still very outside of reality. Grand Theft Auto type violence falls into a different category. It's a humorous type of game and few take it seriously. You don't go cutting heads off to watch them die, you just run over very animated characters and watch them fly in the air or whatever. Some people still have taken it seriously however, and emulated it in real life.

Let me remind you all that violence in video games doesn't necessarily channel aggressive emotions into something harmless. Many studies have shown that violence in video games really do lead to violent thoughts.

http://www.physorg.com/news7168.html

So how can you think that f'd up pedophiles will get their fix virtually? Simulated violence appears to increase violent thoughts, especially in developing minds. I would have to think then that these predispositioned people would only became more into this behavior as the virtual fantasy created would moreso fuel a real life desire. People should NOT have twisted thoughts like this to begin with. To be able to imagine a scenario is one thing, but if you're fantasizing about a situation, even if you don't plan on acting on it is NOT okay- because it simply means you subconsciously want to.

Back to my  argument that a pedophile video game is not okay- Here's a simple thought experiment to show just that: If you had a 7 year old daughter, would you rather her come into contact with someone who played a twisted virtual pedophile game every so often and did whatever they did with it, or someone who had thought about it once or twice but never acted on it and nor played the pedophile video game to get their 'fix'?

::shudder:: Of course thoy're both very bad, but the former sounds worse to me, and statistically probably would be. Why can't people have better thoughts? Shit, way down the road, perhaps a brain chip could just be installed to make people not have bad, disturbing thoughts. There are actually good things to think about!

What happens if the pedophile knows it's fake and wants the real thing? Part of the pathology of a power trip is to impose your will on real people by force, otherwise it just isn't satisfying.

Not saying it will happen in all cases but it is something to think about.

I didn't know this was part of the perversion. That might make it a bit more difficult to provide the fulfilment required to make the whole exercise worthwhile.

I disagree with altering people's thoughts very strongly, because where do you stop and who's to say what thoughts are good and bad?

But now we're getting in the whole liberal versus authoritarian arguement..

I personally wouldn't want anyone who played such games anywhere near me or my family, but it's no different to if they were a real life pervert/killer who hadn't actually done anything yet (to my knowledge). That may be happening already, but what can we do about that?

I'm sure there'll always be people who have bad thoughts, if an AR system was realistic enough they might just settle for it.

Quote>I'd have serious qualms about whatever "research" might be required to make these simulations realistic.  Could this be accomplished without harming children?  Would there be a way to prevent the (presumably non-paedophile) software engineers who worked on these simulations from being traumatized by the imagery they created?  Would only paedophile software engineers be hired to create these "games"?  Would they be paid for it?

I don’t think programmers that are not pedophiles would be willing to design a virtual world where people can have sex with children. The program would have to be designed by an AI, and it would have to be much more advanced than anything that is available today. I can imagine a program that perfectly simulates all of the things in this reality. (Human biology, human psychology, the laws of physics, ect.) A powerful supercomputer that contains an AI would take your request. It would build your virtual world for you.

A fantasy isn't immoral, though enacting it may be.

It might be beneficial to allow the virtual enactment of child rape or such. At least if the perv has abilities and skills useful to society he can develop them and perhaps never tell anyone about his disorder.

Our society -- the modern one that does cover much of the world, at least the Western world -- is probably unique in attempting to protect everyone. When slavery was legal, especially no doubt in Roman times, and where it's legal today as in some Moslem countries, the perv could simply buy a child to use or a woman to forcefully rape. The victims of course are destroyed though the perps probably are outwardly sane and personally whole. The use of robots and virtual reality would substitute for this and alleviate the suffering and loss that either arrangement, slavery or emotional repression, cause. (Slavery being the worse, of course.)

Would it be wise to eradicate such from our behavioral possibilties once we are able to do so? Maybe not. The underlying tendencies may somhow be useful or they would long ago have vanished. Only their perversion is generally dangerous...

People here are making some good points but, I think I fall into the camp that wants to cure them instead of just functionally ostracizing them in VR devices and throwing away the key.

I don't think the cure itself would really change the person's memories but it would probably have a profound effect on their personality. And after the cure, the person might find the memories so horrible they'd want them edited.

And I suppose the victims of the criminal in question couldn't abide seeing the criminal's face or knowing the criminal exists somewhere. So probably after being cured, the former pedophile might have to have a new past and identity constructed and probably have even more memory editing.

By that point, the cure becomes nearly the same as death for the old personality.

I have no idea but, my feeling is that VR ostracizing might carry a slight risk of escape and further damage to society. Curing might entail a form of death for the offender's personality but, at least it would be slightly less risky,

Farlops, I agree, but I am not so sure about the morality of memory editing. I'd be fearful of my freedom. I guess it's okay as long as in appropriate circumstances- the cured offender would choose to be edited and since he is no longer a threat, and the victim + family would be edited to not harm him. But not have the memory erased. But all this memory editing stuff is unrealistic and certainly one of the most difficult things to achieve (unless we were to switch brain sections to mechanical parts like holographic storage using quantum bytes [could that be done?] instead of the memory storage brain sections) so I don't even think it's worth discussung as an option at this point!

Would it be wise to eradicate such from our behavioral possibilties once we are able to do so? Maybe not. The underlying tendencies may somhow be useful or they would long ago have vanished. Only their perversion is generally dangerous...

Why would they have vanished?

Evolution doesn't have moral or ethical qualms. All it cares about is propagating genes whether or not the gene vectors want to be a part of it or not. The "tendencies" you speak of are only useful in the context of evolution, but so is genocide.

We have reached the point where we have consciousness to override our inbuilt programming.