What does it take to move a manufactured system across the "as if" threshold into the realm of "is?

when the boy could earn the love of a mother.

Metaphors become real when we act as if they are real – whether or not we intellectually "believe" they are real. 

But is simulated sex real? Is the metaphoric rape of one artificial avatar by another avatar in a virtual world, virtual or real? Is it a real assault, a real crime? This was the famous question posed by a real legal case about an online game.

"If you respond as if it were real, then it is Presence."

eliciting real behavior from the metaphor.

We are heading into a domain where we create things "as if" they are something else, in imitation of them. Then we improve and deepen the fake with layers of more "as if" until it actually become something else.  Our creations go from "as if" to "is."

adding more layers of meaning and realism, until metaphor slowly passes whatever invisible barrier lies between the real and fake

see human society as the dominant superorganism on the planet, consuming resources and growing.

the world looks "as if" it has a global brain.

We currently view it as "our" brain, our collective brain, and that is how we act towards it

One of the ways we will know when a thing has passed from "as-if to is" is when it earns unalloyed love from humans.