THE H.I.T. LABORATORY  

Seven years ago I wrote a column for the Vancouver Province about Project Telepresence. This was the first indication of a totally new concept that man had never contemplated outside the realm of science fiction. To have a doctor on earth direct an android or robot in space to operate on a human. The goal of Project Telepresence was to complete such an operation.

Several decades before that I had an opportunity to "fly" the Moon Lander at the Boeing plant in Seattle. This was the flight simulator that provided the training for the astronauts who would eventually land on the moon.

During those years young U.S. Air Force officer Thomas A. Furness III, was travelling full time in similar fields -- at the WrightPatterson Air Force Research Base in Dayton, Ohio. Today Dr. Furness, is Director of the new Human Interface Technology Laboratory at the University of Washington in Seattle.

His work there is an extension of Telepresence and the "Smart Cockpit" project he developed for the U.S.A.F.

Of all the opportunities available upon retirement from the U.S. Air Force, two years ago, the most appealing came from the State of Washington, with the offer to run the first State Resource Institute, apparently in the world. The resources of not just the University of Washington but apparently anything in the state are available to Dr. Furness!

Something is working here. Students from around the world, via both mystic and electronic communications have heard about what is going on and have been drawn here somehow, to learn, study and work in that excavation which will, when eventually developed, be the exciting world of Virtual Reality. A field where, at least at present almost everything that happens is new. The effects of VR on many fields will be tremendous. These students are virtually assured of success by being in the right place at the right time. Something like walking by the recently completed but empty Apple Computer plant in Silicon Valley when they put up the first "Help Wanted" sign.

Dr. Furness sees what might be ... "Eventually a personal Virtual Phone/TV for everyone. You would wear it constantly. You could contact anyone, enter any promising world, sample any emotional, visual or physical experience one might contemplate, alone or shared with another anywhere on the planet it would be a constant, challenging learning experience". I agree. It will eventually affect the world to a greater extent than the automobile.

In VR people can share worlds and collect knowledge in unlimted and never-ending form, quality and quantity. Anything ever created, imagined or dreamed can be produced. History can be relived, characters from the past resurrected and options for the future created. It will be the ultimate classroom. Versions of heaven or hell could be tested on command. One of the staff I spoke to at the H.I.T. Lab was Natalie Stenger, from France, who was working on creating emotion for a lab project she is directing. Her creation shows a unique rose. When you enter the rose's reality you become a rose with all the emotion that one wishes to program into such a symbol. Have you ever experienced entwining with a rose? Would you like to talk to a heart? Become an angel? Most people are startled by the fact that everything and anything may be possible.

Not that long ago it used to be sheer science fiction to think that man might land on the moon. The jump into virtual reality will startle man more than that physical "impossibility" of men on the moon.

Dr. Furness is gathering a team to explore these new worlds of VR that people will notice with excitement and awe very soon. During the 1960s President John Kennedy asked America to put a man on the moon. Soon a mere moon will fade into insignificance as whole new VR galaxies open to us far beyond our current horizons.

More information: Dr. Thomas A. Furness III, Director, H.I.T. Laboratory, 2nd Fl, Fluke Hall, University of Washington Technical Center, FJ-15, Seattle, WA 98195. Phone: 206/543-5075. Fax: 206/543-5380.

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