We recently watched the Deep Space Nine episode “Shadowplay”

In the episode, two of the main characters discover that a village is a holographic simulation created by a dying man to recapture his former life after his home was conquered.

While the holographic generator is being restarted to fix a problem the dying man airs his concerns the villagers aren’t “real” because they’re holograms. They’re computer programs created by him.

But the part I found really interesting was how the main characters point out that the holographic people are as real as they need to be. They still have memories even if those memories are computer data. They still have thoughts and feelings and desires even if it’s all computer simulation. One of the characters even says something like “why should our definition of real be more or less valid than theirs?”

It seems that what matters in figuring out whether something or someone is real is whether someone is real enough rather than the strict binary of real/not real.

I don’t know if any systems ever struggled or thought about something like this. But my answer is that what matters is being real enough. Not fitting some predetermined mold.

• Monika