VIRTUAL REALITY SHOWS YOU WHAT IT’S LIKE TO DIE

Do you wonder what it might be like to die? Go to Australia, the country where everything tries to kill you. There’s now a Virtual Reality experience that claims to replicate what it’s like to die. The exhibit is part of Melbourne Now, a culture festival running from now until August. Artist Shaun Gladwell has created an exhibit called ‘Passing Electrical Storms’ which, it claims, “guides participants through a simulated de-escalation of life, from cardiac arrest to brain death.” According to one person who has tried out the simulation, you’re asked to lie down on a fake hospital bed and hooked up to a heart rate monitor. You put on the VR goggles. The bed vibrates, you flatline. The doctors gather over the top of you. You can see yourself in the goggles as they try to revive you—it doesn’t work. Then you float up out past them into space and it keeps going.”
* Eventually, you come to a room where the movie “Tár” is playing on a loop. You’re in Hell. (Or “Magic Mike’s Last Dance” or “A Man Called Otto”)
* A hospital bed? No horrific car crashes? Horrific accidents? Hungry, hungry hippos?
* Is there anyone born after 1997 who hasn’t already died dozens of times in Grand Theft Auto?
* This is a good opportunity to try death out, to see if it’s worth your time.
* So when Death comes knocking, you can say, “No thanks, already did it!”