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In this era, going back and forth on all roads from East to West, we encounter a new image. Anywhere, anytime, especially in trains, buses, subways... People look intently at the tiny screen of the smartphone. In the past, people also read books and newspapers in the car to take advantage of the time, but the books and newspapers of the day were only temporary means, not comparable to the screens of today's smartphones. What has happened in this twenty-first century?

We are at the beginning of an important transformation in the human psyche, which is the concept of "society" or "reality" that is taking on completely new content, based on the huge amount of information brought by the internet. The most prominent characteristic of these realities is their "virtual" nature, They exist only in the human mind. However, they are gradually becoming real and have many scholars alarmed. This reminds us of the Buddhist concept of ordinary reality, in which this reality is already considered "virtual". Now, in the new era, virtual reality is occupying human life. This situation can be called "virtual overlap" and actually does not bother Buddhist scholars. But let's start again.

Individuals and Society

Every human being is born with a society around him and increasingly expands his social space. When the child is in the family, his society is his parents, siblings and other members. When he reaches school age, The social space is expanded to teachers, friends and all people living around the school. Similarly, in the working age, the period of family establishment, human society is constantly expanded by the number of people contacted. When communication activities are expanded, through tourism, socializing, careers... The human social space is multiplied many times, is more subtle and complex, contains more different nuances. A person's entire society is sometimes referred to in Buddhist terms as the "medicine" of that individual. In certain definitions, that space is also called the person's "reality".

From ancient times to the present, society (as defined above) has been built by direct contact between people. Those contacts are mainly through three natures: seeing, hearing, and touching. Through these three important senses, people receive external information, and then rely on theoretical reflection to create their own internal world. That particularity creates the characteristic personality of each person, and the sum of which can be called the I. That ego has the opposite effect on society with its own personality and its own energy. Thereby, society and the self are a reciprocal interaction, constantly changing, largely in the unconscious plane. "Medicine" and "newspaper" are therefore a reciprocal effect that never stops. "Self-grasping" occurs in this case, when the individual believes that there is an eternal self, independent of all the changes of the external society. The "self-grasping" mind does not know that what we call I is nothing more than a sum of the five aggregates: Form, Feeling, Perceiving, Action, and Consciousness, which are formed according to external influences according to the law of Dependent arising.

The Ego and Tools

Unlike animals, humans are species that know how to make and use tools. Except for a few monkeys that use tree branches to pick fruit, almost no animals know how to use tools. On the contrary, humans know how to use tools very early in their development history. Here we understand that "tools" are objects outside the body but are used to strengthen and expand the range of activity of the body. In ancient times, we could see fishing rods, cages for traps for wild animals, spears and bows and arrows... is a means of increasing the ability of the body to function. Because the abilities of the human body are extremely limited, far inferior to living beings, in the past, people dreamed of flying like birds, diving as deep as fish, and still being able to hear and see thousands of miles away, things that the myths of the twentieth century still record.

Today, everyone knows that thanks to the tool, humans can "see" objects that are extremely distant, millions of light-years away, and extremely small as atoms. Ordinary consumers can use a miraculous device to move and dive everywhere, hearing and seeing thousands of miles away. It can be said that the focus of human science and technology is the process of making and using tools, raising the level and expanding the capabilities of the human body in three natures: hearing, seeing, and tactile. Once these three possibilities are miraculously expanded, the intellect of human reasoning is also raised to a new level, that is, knowledge is expanded in all directions.

Because the tool is his "extended arm", people love it as an inseparable object. From the child's bicycle, the farmer's plow, the doctor's stethoscope... to the exquisite devices in the laboratories of scientists, all of which enhance the capabilities of the human body, adding to the capacity of the mind. Such an essential tool for the human body and mind is therefore part of the Ego when it appears in society.

From virtual reality to virtual society

Virtual reality (simulation) was formed around the middle of the twentieth century. The purpose of a virtual reality designer is to rehearse how to react to a dangerous situation with dynamic models. Around the 70s, virtual reality became a subject, designed more and more sophisticated. Pseudo-reality is best known for training pilots in fighter or civilian aircraft, or in scenario models to deal with hazards in complex factories.

This type of false reality is designed on three natures, including the nature of seeing, hearing, and touching of humans. The operator is placed in a closed scene with the lights, images, and sounds of the real situation. Through seats, limb manipulation tools, and the vibration of equipment, people are placed in an artificial scene, made up of seeing, hearing and touching of the operating program. The pilot will find himself flying a real plane and using a combat weapon against the enemy. This false reality becomes more and more subtle and leads people to truly forget who they are and live in a different situation. Today, this type of virtual reality is widely used in many entertainment games, meeting those who want to find new sensations in games such as driving, horse racing, spaceships, submersibles, etc.

The kind of reality mentioned above is attractive to young people who want to find strange feelings, but it does not make people very fascinated. After about ten minutes, everyone who attended the game felt a boring repetition because the control program equipment, no matter how large, was limited. We temporarily call this false reality a "mechanical" reality, because although they have a response to humans, they are all within the prediction of the programmer.

For about 20 years, another type of fake reality has been formed in the world, which is "social networks". In this article, let's call these social networks also a false reality, or call it "electronic reality". The characteristic of this type of reality is that they are just a virtual space frame, consisting of millions and billions of participants, their content is not predicted by anyone, they consist of millions of communication back and forth, there are no regulations at all.

On the basis of the internet with huge volumes of information, transmitted in an extremely short time, social networks were established and showed that something very new is happening in human society. If in a conventional society, people communicate with each other by direct contact, in a virtual society they form a community in an imaginary space. If in a conventional society, people use the three natures, seeing, hearing, and touching as the basis for becoming friends and partners, then on social networks, people use "information" to build relationships. Information crosses the threshold of seeing, hearing, and touching to go straight into Italy. In social networks, people use their "ideas" quickly, simply and simultaneously with thousands and thousands of other people.

That's why today many people, especially young people, are irresistibly attracted to social media. With just one statement on the Internet, in the blink of an eye, there were dozens of responses, how could the young man not help but glue his eyes to the screen and wait for someone to say something about him. Information on the Internet is self-expressed about oneself and one's own conception, and it is full of the nature of the self. Therefore, online correspondence is even more attractive, in addition to being broad and sensitive, they also have the ability to caress and strengthen the Ego, which is a weakness of ordinary people.

Smartphones and Me

For the same reason, let's take a look at the nature of smartphones. It's not just something to put on the table to brag about as many people talk about. Its importance in this day and age is that it is a "tool" to enter social networks, to talk about the Ego and the My. It was the bridge that led me from a world full of sorrow and loneliness into a magical space in which thousands of people were ready to listen to me and talk about myself. Whether those people are really "ready" is unknown, because this is just a virtual space, they are on the other side of the ocean. Or they are men who pretend to be women, or they are old and boast of being young, or they are poor and boast of being millionaires. It's all information, and no one verifies it.

Smartphones are the second self of today's generation. Many social workers and education experts have voiced alarm about the situation that many people are addicted to this small device. Many researchers on the future of humanity and many philosophers wonder about the possibility that humans will fall into false realities, virtual societies and no longer know what is "real". They are worried that once humans are allowed to "play" in a world like the world of butterflies, for example, will it still be normal to return? At that time, people will wonder whether they have turned into a butterfly or a butterfly, as Zhang Zhou thought deeply in the past.

But why are Buddhists not embarrassed? The things that go into the mind, whether through hearing or touch, whether through information to the "mind", all play out in the human mind and each individual has a relationship with them. That relationship makes the world, whether it's the eye, the auditory, or the conscious. All of them are illusory, that is, they are all projected outward by our minds and become the world. The real world is already an illusion, and cyberspace is also an illusion, a realm of "illusion of illusion". But "illusion" does not mean that there is no impact; They make life, there are joys and sorrows, there are successes and failures, there are afflictions, there are peace.

Social networks are a huge change in human life, it will continue to change endlessly and unexpectedly. In the future, perhaps we will be able to live in many different realities, and still assume "real". If you understand the word "illusion" of the Buddha, people hope to live more freely.

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