Empty shells
I have been playing video games recently and are struck on how good games has progressed since the days I played Lemmings and Doom.What struck me was mainly how good the graphics look like, how life-like it has become; especially when the game protagonists are humans. Their faces are pretty and handsome, their bodies are perfectly proportional and toned, their movements are graceful.
No doubt, this is due to the talented artists that created meticulously them, from draft drawings, 3D modelling, skinning and texturing, and motion capture; it is also the attestation of the immense computing power of modern GPUs. When combined with talented voice actors, the imagery is complete - we are, definitely, in the uncanny valley.
However, no matter how real these characters look like, I cannot drown a tiny voice in my head that keeps saying that what I see is all there is. There is no depth. There is no substance. All I see is literally skin-deep. Underneath the skin of that pretty girl or handsome man, there is nothing. They are hollow. Literally. They are just million of triangles covered by textures; voiced by someone else with stories which aren't their own. They are just empty shells.
But sadly, there are people - real-life people - who are real-life versions of these empty shells. They do have flesh and bone, and will bleed if hurt; but otherwise, what you see of them, is all there is. There is no depth. There is no soul. They speak with with other people's voices and their life are other people's stories. There is nothing else beyond what the eyes can see or the ears can hear or the hands can touch.
Beware that you don't fall for these empty shells. For beneath their skin, there is only nothingness that awaits you.
Even more important, is to beware that you don't become empty shells yourself. Focusing on the outside, but forgetting the most important part of yourself - what's inside.
For when that happens, you become nothing.
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