Alright – the last post about visceral incentives for a bit, but I have incredibly strong bipolar feelings about this Playstation advertisement. 

 On the one hand it engages me and makes me really excited! Who doesn’t want to be a classy, fireball-throwing, raging badass.

 On the other hand, it directs that human visceral desire for greatness and awesome towards playing video games.  Video games aren’t necessarily bad – I just wonder: what could be accomplished on the margin if that energy and desire for greatness were targeted towards the physical world *cough cough * space *cough cough * instead?

I feel like we’re progressing towards one of three  four far futures:

1)   We are all wiped out, either by nature or ourselves.

2)   We become a spacefaring species and spread to the stars

3)   We turn inwards, our brains experiencing amazing “realities” of our own creation

4)   A future that is two blocks over and down the street from where my imagination can see

The visceral appeal of that advertisement makes me feel like (3) is the most likely. Is this bad? Not particularly, but it isn't the option that I will strive to make into a reality.