Whenever I hear this I'm always reminded of Ian M. Banks' infamous Mind (AI/Ship), the Gray Area, showing off his collection of torture devices to a passenger. Many of the Minds collect weird things as a hobby.

The centre piece being the neural lace, a VR device embedded in the mind of virtually every culture citizen which they use to communicate, dream fantastic dreams and experience amazing things in total safety.

Which it remarks on being the most effective torture device ever invented.