Augmented reality and virtual subject: Theoretical ethics discussions on the virtual world

The relationship between virtuality and reality is one of the issues that have been discussed for many years in the history of philosophy in terms of semantic and conceptual. When these debates are analyzed from the ancient period to the present, it is understood that the main idea that emerged is the demarcation problem. The demarcation separating virtuality and reality; while it is evident in the ancient understanding, it becomes blurred with the modern understanding and then becomes complicated with the Post-Modern understanding. In this complicated understanding in which virtuality and reality are integrated with each other; according to many studies, virtuality is considered as a version of reality or as a layer of reality. This idea, shaped by the post-modern understanding, has found a response in practice as well as in theory with the Augmented Reality Philosophy. The aforementioned Augmented Reality Philosophy constitutes the center of the demarcation problem discussions about virtual and reality. Augmented Reality combines physical things with computer-generated virtual things; therefore, Augmented Reality Philosophy also includes the philosophical evaluation of this new form that has emerged ontologically. In this context, when the nature of Augmented Reality is examined, it can be said that the virtual and the real are mixed together, and the physical world is moved to the virtual world and the virtual world to the physical world. In addition, thanks to Augmented Reality, Plato's Allegory of the Cave, Descartes's Dream and Evil Demon Argument and Baudrillard's Simulation Theory have found an onto- epistemic ground for him. On this basis, the main purpose of this study is to evaluate the ontological and epistemological dimensions of the relationship between virtual and real, to analyze the nature of Augmented Reality from a philosophical point of view, and to examine ethical discussions in the virtual world based on all these. For this purpose, in the last part of this study, the moral status of virtual actions and the main problems of the virtual subject are evaluated in the moral dimension.