11/03/2003
In an opening scene of The Matrix, Neo picks up a hollowed-out book entitled, Simulacra and Simulation.
Simulacra and Simulation is a book written in 1981 by Jean Baudrillard. The essence of the book is that the constant flow of images and information that bombards our modern society alters our perception of reality. We are unaware that our perception of reality has been altered. The altered or false reality is accepted as true and thus becomes our new reality, our matrix.
Simulacra and Simulation is a book written in 1981 by Jean Baudrillard. The essence of the book is that the constant flow of images and information that bombards our modern society alters our perception of reality. We are unaware that our perception of reality has been altered. The altered or false reality is accepted as true and thus becomes our new reality, our matrix.
10/21/2003
Observations about The Matrix: Simulacra and Simulations
"Simulacra and Simulations, by Jean Baudrillard, is the book in which Neo hid his diskette. I started reading it and was amazed by the relevance of the concept of the 'simulacrum' to The Matrix.
A simulacrum -the copy without an original- is what the virtual world of the Matrix is symbolizing. Baudrillard states that most simulations today have been converted into a simulacrum, which no longer represents a real entity, but instead forms and defines a reality of its own, a 'hyperreality'. What we see in it is no longer an image, but something more real than its original, something that doesn't bear any relevance anymore to its real counterpart, which it once simulated." More...
Byron Hawk - Simulacra and Simulation
"In Simulacra and Simulation, French social theorist Jean Baudrillard argues that our "postmodern" culture is a world of signs that have made a fundamental break from referring to "reality."
Baudrillard's concept of simulation is the creation of the real through conceptual or "mythological" models which have no connection or origin in reality. The model becomes the determinant of our perception of reality-- the real. Homes, relationships, fashion, art, music, all become dictated by their ideal models presented through the media. Thus the boundary between the image, or simulation, and reality implodes (breaks down). This creates a world of hyperreality where the distinctions between real and unreal are blurred. Robert Tilton becomes a simulation of religion; Ronald Reagan a simulation of politics; and Kurt Kobain a simulation of marginality. The culture industry blurs the lines between facts and information, between information and entertainment, between entertainment and politics. The masses get bombarded by these images (simulations) and signs (simulacra) which encourage them to buy, vote, work, play,... but eventually they become apathetic (i.e. cynical). Because simulations and simulacra ultimately have no referents, the social begins to implode. This process of social entropy leads to the collapse of all boundaries between meaning, the media, and the social- no distinction between classes, political parties, cultural forms, the media, and the real. Simulation and simulacra become the real so there are no stable structures on which to ground theory or politics. Culture and society become a flux of undifferentiated images and signs.
This process is analogous to Herbert Marcuse's notion of one-dimensionality. The multi-perspectival negating potential of art becomes collapsed into one-dimensional thinking promoted by dominant ideology. The potential for resistance is itself negated through a world of hyperreality, leaving the one-dimensional models to replace polyvalent "reality." Popular music provides a good example. The categories and forms of music are forced onto the musicians by music corporation's categorical conventions. They do change their categories to follow the times but the ultimate end is still restriction/conventionality. What begins as projecting a liberating function at the level of individual expression, gets turned into a repressive category." More...
Josh Conterio - Simulation and Mirrors
"Real, hyperreal. Simulation, simulacrum. Mirrors, duplications, reflections/refractions –a warped sense of time and space, of history, of culture and society. We have been mapped onto a cryptic surface, were nothing is substantial, all is a mind’s eye dreamland, mass conspiracy, self-defining truth. We have been notified of the construction, the idealization of truth --life is a hoax. What once imitated us, we imitate now; imitations on imitations, resulting in fantasy, hallucination. Baudrillard’s apocalyptic perspective seems extreme, demeaning and bleak, but one can to see a certain facet of truth in his texts, regardless of the pain involved. His vision can be used to our advantage if only we can get past his difficult terminology and dig up the crux of the text. We can utilize this abstract confusion to better navigate Gibsonian space if nothing else, hopefully without having to resort to too many assumptions or vague jumps in logic. In such a way might we be able to tie Baudrillard to some sort of comprhensible example, and so grasp at least a vague understanding, and maybe even uncover or explain some of Gibson’s own twisted present/future.
Two vital terms stand in our way, simulacra and simulation. I have come to understand them as meaning the following: simulations are reflections of the real, while simulacrum are based not on fact but on fantasy –no basis in reality. What then can we call the real? It is a good question, without an easy answer. And the hyperreal? An augmented real, an idealized simulation, a fuzzy area between simulacra and simulation, the midpoint perhaps. But what does one have to do to track down this mysterious real that is escaping us? My impression is that Baudrillard thinks we have lost hold of it. And so we must evolve (devolve?) to a state of pure simulacra." More...
Postmodern Theories and Texts - Simulacra and Simulation
"In the first case, the image is a good appearance--representation is of the sacramental order. In the second, it is an evil appearance--it is of the order of maleficence. In the third, it plays at being an appearance--it is of the order of sorcery. In the fourth, it is no longer of the order of appearances, but of simulation."
More...
Pathways - Simulacra
The simulacrum is never what hides the truth--
it is truth that hides the fact that there is none.
The simulacrum is true.
--Ecclesiastes
"Such would be the successive phases of the image:
it is the reflection of a profound reality;
it masks and denatures a profound reality;
it masks the *absence* of a profound reality;
it has no relation to any reality whatsoever: it is its own pure simulacrum.
In the first case, the image is a good appearance--representation is of the sacramental order. In the second, it is an evil appearance--it is of the order of maleficence. In the third, it plays at being an appearance--it is of the order of sorcery. In the fourth, it is no longer of the order of appearances, but of simulation.
RESPONSES TO THE PEOPLE VS. O. J. SIMPSON
THE SIMULACRUM IS TRUE (1):
In other words, the actual guilt or innocence of Simpson gets determined by how the trial gets acted out, specifically for the cameras. The hypervisibility of high-profile court cases makes justice ob-scene. The fact that the living room voyeur sees more than the jury serves to make him/her feel s/he sees everything. Nothing can't be seen, and so the image has no depth and therefore no meaning, except what is generated by this difference between juror/victim and TV audience/ consumer. Whatever meaning can be generated depends on that difference. More...
"Simulacra and Simulations, by Jean Baudrillard, is the book in which Neo hid his diskette. I started reading it and was amazed by the relevance of the concept of the 'simulacrum' to The Matrix.
A simulacrum -the copy without an original- is what the virtual world of the Matrix is symbolizing. Baudrillard states that most simulations today have been converted into a simulacrum, which no longer represents a real entity, but instead forms and defines a reality of its own, a 'hyperreality'. What we see in it is no longer an image, but something more real than its original, something that doesn't bear any relevance anymore to its real counterpart, which it once simulated." More...
Byron Hawk - Simulacra and Simulation
"In Simulacra and Simulation, French social theorist Jean Baudrillard argues that our "postmodern" culture is a world of signs that have made a fundamental break from referring to "reality."
Baudrillard's concept of simulation is the creation of the real through conceptual or "mythological" models which have no connection or origin in reality. The model becomes the determinant of our perception of reality-- the real. Homes, relationships, fashion, art, music, all become dictated by their ideal models presented through the media. Thus the boundary between the image, or simulation, and reality implodes (breaks down). This creates a world of hyperreality where the distinctions between real and unreal are blurred. Robert Tilton becomes a simulation of religion; Ronald Reagan a simulation of politics; and Kurt Kobain a simulation of marginality. The culture industry blurs the lines between facts and information, between information and entertainment, between entertainment and politics. The masses get bombarded by these images (simulations) and signs (simulacra) which encourage them to buy, vote, work, play,... but eventually they become apathetic (i.e. cynical). Because simulations and simulacra ultimately have no referents, the social begins to implode. This process of social entropy leads to the collapse of all boundaries between meaning, the media, and the social- no distinction between classes, political parties, cultural forms, the media, and the real. Simulation and simulacra become the real so there are no stable structures on which to ground theory or politics. Culture and society become a flux of undifferentiated images and signs.
This process is analogous to Herbert Marcuse's notion of one-dimensionality. The multi-perspectival negating potential of art becomes collapsed into one-dimensional thinking promoted by dominant ideology. The potential for resistance is itself negated through a world of hyperreality, leaving the one-dimensional models to replace polyvalent "reality." Popular music provides a good example. The categories and forms of music are forced onto the musicians by music corporation's categorical conventions. They do change their categories to follow the times but the ultimate end is still restriction/conventionality. What begins as projecting a liberating function at the level of individual expression, gets turned into a repressive category." More...
Josh Conterio - Simulation and Mirrors
"Real, hyperreal. Simulation, simulacrum. Mirrors, duplications, reflections/refractions –a warped sense of time and space, of history, of culture and society. We have been mapped onto a cryptic surface, were nothing is substantial, all is a mind’s eye dreamland, mass conspiracy, self-defining truth. We have been notified of the construction, the idealization of truth --life is a hoax. What once imitated us, we imitate now; imitations on imitations, resulting in fantasy, hallucination. Baudrillard’s apocalyptic perspective seems extreme, demeaning and bleak, but one can to see a certain facet of truth in his texts, regardless of the pain involved. His vision can be used to our advantage if only we can get past his difficult terminology and dig up the crux of the text. We can utilize this abstract confusion to better navigate Gibsonian space if nothing else, hopefully without having to resort to too many assumptions or vague jumps in logic. In such a way might we be able to tie Baudrillard to some sort of comprhensible example, and so grasp at least a vague understanding, and maybe even uncover or explain some of Gibson’s own twisted present/future.
Two vital terms stand in our way, simulacra and simulation. I have come to understand them as meaning the following: simulations are reflections of the real, while simulacrum are based not on fact but on fantasy –no basis in reality. What then can we call the real? It is a good question, without an easy answer. And the hyperreal? An augmented real, an idealized simulation, a fuzzy area between simulacra and simulation, the midpoint perhaps. But what does one have to do to track down this mysterious real that is escaping us? My impression is that Baudrillard thinks we have lost hold of it. And so we must evolve (devolve?) to a state of pure simulacra." More...
Postmodern Theories and Texts - Simulacra and Simulation
"In the first case, the image is a good appearance--representation is of the sacramental order. In the second, it is an evil appearance--it is of the order of maleficence. In the third, it plays at being an appearance--it is of the order of sorcery. In the fourth, it is no longer of the order of appearances, but of simulation."
More...
Pathways - Simulacra
The simulacrum is never what hides the truth--
it is truth that hides the fact that there is none.
The simulacrum is true.
--Ecclesiastes
"Such would be the successive phases of the image:
it is the reflection of a profound reality;
it masks and denatures a profound reality;
it masks the *absence* of a profound reality;
it has no relation to any reality whatsoever: it is its own pure simulacrum.
In the first case, the image is a good appearance--representation is of the sacramental order. In the second, it is an evil appearance--it is of the order of maleficence. In the third, it plays at being an appearance--it is of the order of sorcery. In the fourth, it is no longer of the order of appearances, but of simulation.
RESPONSES TO THE PEOPLE VS. O. J. SIMPSON
THE SIMULACRUM IS TRUE (1):
In other words, the actual guilt or innocence of Simpson gets determined by how the trial gets acted out, specifically for the cameras. The hypervisibility of high-profile court cases makes justice ob-scene. The fact that the living room voyeur sees more than the jury serves to make him/her feel s/he sees everything. Nothing can't be seen, and so the image has no depth and therefore no meaning, except what is generated by this difference between juror/victim and TV audience/ consumer. Whatever meaning can be generated depends on that difference. More...
10/18/2003
Plots, Characters & Commentary to follow...
