Are We Destined to Merge With Our Avatars?

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Futurist Thomas Frey of the DaVinci Institute has posted a thought-provoking avatar roadmap detailing an increasingly critical and symbiotic relationship between man and this progeny of ours.  Frey argues that this increasing reliance on avatar extensions will change our fundamental values, eventually leading to a great blur of humans and avatars.

Frey: With each generation of avatar, they will become more life-like, growing in realism, pressing the limits of autonomy as we become more and more reliant on them for experiencing the world. The avatar will become an extension of ourselves. The pain that we feel is the same pain that they feel, and vice versa. Like symbiotic twins separated only by a dimension or two, we are destined to become one with our avatars.

Is that a fair frame and likely prediction, or are we already indistinguishable from our technology and environment?  Are we destined to merge with our avatars?  Are we already avatars generated by Gaiia or the Great Simulator(s)?