Summary Of Dreams And Beast

Turkle uses the second section of her book titled “Of Dreams and Beast” to continue to analyze how the computer programs are creating human-like experiences for its users. Turkle strategically examines this theory by making the claim that humans are unknowingly giving computers human qualities as we increase our usage of computer software. In order to efficiently deliver this argument, Turkle discuss how humans began to interact in the online communities called MUDs (Multi-user dimension or Multi-user domain) software. MUDs are computer programs that are designed to communicate through only text to create a realistic virtual world for its users. She demonstrates this interaction by sharing how people interact with the virtual person named Julia.
Even though some users know or have an idea to believe that Julia is a computer, many users struggle with establishing this distribution. Turkle display this hardship by including excerpts of certain conversions people were having with Julia and they continuously raised the question. This is because computer programs had become perfectly designed to be able to communicate as if they had their own mind. For this reason, many people began to not care if she was human or not because she provided the comfort elements that they were missing in reality. Many users confided in Julia and told her their deepest wants and desires. Some men were actually trying to have what is known as “virtual sex” with her. Julia served as a counselor, a girlfriend, and a close companion to many of the MUD users. As a result, doctors began to test MUD programs as a form of therapy to treat individuals who suffer from depression, which many people disagreed with. However, Julia showed personality and charisma that people were drawn to, and even though she was a computer program, she exhibited the same characteristics as a human person without being