Digital Arts and Culture 2009

This paper examines questions of digital autonomy from a humanist perspective. Drawing from the humanist tenet that transcendental ethical systems serve to defer personal ethics, this paper examines the ways in which game mediation undermines player autonomy, and the extent to which “destructibility” affects game spaces. Presenting a brief history of “destructibility” in games, and comparing the ramifications of “destructible” and “non-destructible” spaces, this paper argues that digital humanism requires a reassessment of virtual behavior, and a conscious move towards unmediated and unmoderated spaces, in order to draw considerations of ethics back to the individual.