Does anyone have a VHS copy of the Martix that I can borrow?
I'm planning two big posts for later tonight--be prepared!!!
:) Meg
OK - I watched the first 45 minutes of the Matrix last night. I even noticed that there is an old hard copy edition of B"s Simulations and Simulacra in one of Keanu's (whatever) first scenes, where he is taking out a 3.5 inch floppy from a book. I am starting to understand the B stuff a little bit better. So, Meg - watch it! there was no understanding of B before Keanu.
Note added at 11:50am - I just realized that the picture in Karl's post is the book in the Matrix - wow I'm learning stuff.
Note added at 11:55am - I know this is not my post for the week and doesn't count as "real" academic thought - but I need to share my knowledge as I discover it.
WebCT, McDonald’s of American higher education, and cogs
I just wanted to add something to our discussion about WebCT. As I mentioned earlier, I worked as a TA for a 500-student lecture class and we used WebCT. The professor used it to give some quizzes for students’ extra credit. The professor, who taught mass communication, loved WebCT. What is interesting is that another professor who taught the same course referred it as the “McDonald’s of American higher education.” WebCT can definitely make possible mass production of college graduates.
In a sense, isn’t a university one of the cogs in the gigantic capitalist machine? Purdue buys all kinds of software and then will need to update them and spend money. Getting dependent on one kind of software for a certain purpose is like using one language for communication. As you rely on the language, you have to learn new terms in the language as they appear. A better analogy might be addiction. My father told me that before American tobacco merchants sold cigarettes in China last century, they handed out free ones. After people got addicted, American cigarette sales naturally soared. Aren’t the free software trials like the free cigarettes?
Closing in on distance
I had this blither on Feenberg’s Ch.4 sitting in a Word document when I got back from class today ready to post. But it’s gone now. Deleted. Actually, you get this far in life hanging around universities, and you almost forget the joy of chucking something you’ve written. Then there was the glow…and the cigarette…and
I chucked the first response because what I heard in class today, especially from Meg, helped me clarify (and maybe extend) what Feenberg is calling the “ambivalence” of computers—meaning that this function functions as both a (+) democratizing and (-) hierarchizing agent…the potential for freedom and rigidity in the same being (sounds a bit like the old cell-bags called humans).
When Meg, and others, started talking about public.private spaces or personal.communal spaces, I was intrigued because Feenberg (and his Rearticulation of Heidegger’s understanding of being) sees the both/and in a way that we can see distance in relation to technology, specifically cell phones. I don’t feel the cellular intrusion anymore because, for me, the phone has re-cast distance as “ambivalent” in Feenberg’s language. The guy next to me on the stoop, sharing air and smoke and his cellular conversation with his significant other with me, is both close and distant. That miniaturized link (nod to Alexis) has brought a space between us that is virtual(?), emergent, elastic. He can be beside me and be audibly intimate near a stranger because I am a stranger, because there is an incredible distance between us brought into being by the closeness-that-is-distance that he traverses through the phone. Distance re-defined, not as his intrusion into my personal space, which can be pretty extensive depending on my mood and the other person involved, but as an ability to be with you and not with you (as Karl described in his experience).
To me right now, this is an intriguing articulation of closing a distance while simultaneously opening one up. But I may be mis-remembering Feenberg’s argument.
One more example, for those who make it this far in this post-that-is-my-Heideggerian-fetish. I was disturbed for two weeks by cell phones in class rooms here sometime in the fall of 2001 (one went off, had to be taken care of by the student, etc.). But there was a pigeon (I think it was a pigeon) keeping her eggs warm next to the window glass in our room, HEAV111. She would occasionally tap her beak on the glass and audibly draw attention to herself. She probably got tired of all our noise, but she taught me quickly that my first-reaction to a cell phone was loaded with overdetermined ideas of tech-as-disturbance::bird-as-natural because she was intriguing (not distracting in a negative way). I stopped worrying about the phones and the bird, and am now intrigued by both, still thinking about the bird and what she taught me about distance and control…
]Naptime[
The Matrix DVD has been located! YEAH!! In honor of this auspicious occassion, here's a link for your blogging pleasure.
Baudrillard decodes The Matrix
Well, now I am ready to respond to the other half of the questions posted by Alexis. I had these questions myself. I believe B drew upon the following three theorists (at least):
McLuhan
B heavily quoted McLuhan’s most famous claim: “the medium is the message� (see p.82). He also referred to McLuhan on p.30 where he states: “the confusion of the medium and the message is the first great formula of this new era.�
Bourdieu (cited in B on p.14)
“The essence of every relation of force is to dissimulate itself as such.�
Derrida
B did not refer to Derrida explicitly but I think his discussion of ethnology, myths, and his using the term bricolage somewhere in the book indicates influence from Derrida (see Derrida “Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences� 1970)
Hey, I was just thinking about that flash mob business. I saw an article about it in People magazine and I was wondering how that publicity modifies the notion of virtual communities? Granted they still communicate virtually, but they are entering the public consciousness more and more. Are they leaving the realm of the virtual?
Taking off from what Lu said about the movie Chicago, I think that the transference of the events into a fictional representation is simulation. In cultural memory, no matter what “actually” happened, the story becomes the reality. With this in mind, I’m interested in what Baudrillard would say about claims that television (fictional and the portrayal of “real” events) and movies cause violence in that they present a scenario, which is clean and safe in its simulation but viscous in its “reality” (or perhaps its rewritten physical manifestation), that provides not only inspiration for the violence but also provides a virtual blueprint for reenacting the simulation. I realize that Baudrillard states that violent acts (his example is “holdups”) such as these are in some sense simulation because those involved are influenced by what they’ve seen presented as the real. In that sense, the blueprint idea can be explained as a result of this influence. However, Baudrillard also states that “the media are producers not of socialization but of exactly the opposite, of the implosion of the social in the masses” (82). Perhaps I am misreading Baudrillard, but wouldn’t this imply a both/and scenario for the causation of violence.
Karl mentioned Bolter and Grusin's Remediation in one of his posts, and this is how I relate B & G's theory of remediation to B's simulacra. B& G saw a double logic in remediation:immediacy and hypermediacy. On the one hand, our culture demands that all traces of mediation be erased. Reality TV (as unreal as Michael finds it to be) is just one notorious example. Web cam sites are another. On the other, we keep experimenting with and multiplying our media in a conscious and intentional way (even mediation for the sake of mediation for me is still intentional in a general way). Ideally, B & G concludde, our culture "wants to earse its media in the very act of multiplying them." (and perhaps it's not so much a matter of wanting to as a matter of being destined to). B's simulacra turn this ideal into reality (reality not in the sense of being real, but reality in the sense of being PERFECTLY simulated). For B, mulitiplication seems to be key to simulation. Multiplication of media erases not only the medium but the message (since the medium is the message) as well, which in turn produces staged communication with phantom content to fulfil the staged desire of the audience: perfect simulation.
Jingfang
I am my own hyperreality. I have the tools at my disposal to create scenes, events, people who do not exist outside of a referring-to-themselves. The computer as code-generator, the computer as code-/language-machine...a perfect simulator of simulations, microelectronic switches, code-perfected. The more real than real...the commodified...the coming-at-a-healthy-price. God is in the TV.
Fun fact: many of the aerial cityscapes in The Matrix (e.g., when Morpheus and Neo enter the jump simulation) are actually satellite photography montaged with photographs of circuit boards. I can do this, too. What, are you going to tell me that that's NOT real?
Re: Alexis
Here is where B discusses the beginning of the era of simulacra and of simulation:
p.6 “The transition from signs that dissimulate something to signs that dissimulate that there is nothing marks a decisive turning point. The first reflects a theology of truth and secrecy (to which the notion of ideology still belongs). The second inaugurates the era of simulacra and of simulation, in which there is no longer a God to recognize his own, no longer a Last Judgment to separate the false from the true, the real from its artificial resurrection, as everything is already dead and resurrected in advance.”
B also talks about the orders of the simulacrum but I cannot remember the page numbers. Did he specify when exactly the era of simulacra began? I am not sure. My guess is it began with the mass media. Actually I think the movie, “Chicago” (and the true story behind it) is an excellent example of simulation—“absolute manipulation” (p.31). The lawyer is convinced that this world is show business and he is so good at using press conferences, making sure his client package herself for courtroom appearances, making up lies, etc. to manipulate the jury verdict. Though it was in the 1920s, it is amazing to see how the tabloids and the radio actually played such an important role in saving the life of the murderess.
Wow, I am still stunned by B’s “theoretical violence” (p.163) I will write more later. J
Re: Karl (beingw/2brains), Mike (theory/praxis), B (distances/gaps)
I think Karl’s mention of 2 brains is intriguing and worth pushing in light of Baudrillard’s ideas of simulation, specifically the distances he notes between the real and imaginary, between perception and either of those [this is “the gap that leaves room for an ideal or critical projection” (121-22)] in his riff on the death of science fiction. I’ve (never) bought, and therefore, have always bought, the theory-practice debate/segregation/wayofseeing. It’s one binary that disturbs me—and that’s a good thing. That disturbance points to what I’d say is a human need to split off conscious thought from conscious action, to live as something “above” the chemical/intellectual goings-on that lead to the re-actions through which I think we experience losses of control. Huh….
Anyway, Baudrillard, for me (and I’m writing here of his way of writing), is disorienting because he wants to be. To engage (there’s that Trek language bleeding into mine, sheesh…) with his concepts is to experience disorientation with/from the “real”s that I experience. Pedagogy emerging from a reading of Baudrillard can be critical and not at the same time. I can see a cultural phenomenon and re-interpret it while “knowing” that my way of interpreting is informed by the (simulatedly “real”) values I’m critiquing/interpreting. I’m implicated and not distant from the phenomenon, as we all are in that critical moment, or we couldn’t even recognize the events we want to interpret. They would be so un-real.
All this is why it makes so much sense for Baudrillard to deal with science fiction that purports an alternative reality that isn’t “real-ly” alternative. That’s why Ballard’s Crash is so important a text for him (though I haven’t touched that puppy in a long time; perhaps it deserves another read). Back to distance: if we think about Baudrillard trying to approach that distance he describes in his theorizing and always coming back to it with different examples, I think we can begin to see how his ideas are working (without stasis) around the real and the imaginary. So frillin' nebulous and joyful!
Wow, I sure came off as the bad guy! Anyway, Mike, thanks for your explanation of the simulacra (they are what they claim to be, representing nothing but themselves). That explanation made the concept more easy to work with. I was having trouble with the idea that simulacra are perfect copies of something that did not exist. But I have some more questions. Generally, I am curious to know who or what influenced Baudrillard, in other words, what other theories is he drawing on (if anyone knows). Also, and maybe I missed this in the reading, but what is causing/caused the simulacra to begin, to start? Is it the crumbling of meaning. of reality? Have they (the simulacra) always been around, but we are finally beginning to take note of them? And finally, are there multiple simulacra floating around and we are caught in one of them? If so, can we move from one simulacra to the next? (Maybe this final question has to do with the orders, a concept I couldn't quite grasp). Anyway, these are just questions I am throwing out (not to be argumentative, but just to learn).
I thought I was the only one who was reading and posting this late. I've been commenting, then I hit reload and there were 3 new posts! This is a reminder to read the subconversations going on in the comments :-)
In response to Karl, Jennie, and Alexis (with a note on my earlier posting):
I start with an invocation of Kenneth Burke (more interestingly of the Burke's character "The Lord" from "Prologue in Heaven," the epilogue to Rhetoric of Religion) by saying, "Yes, but it's more complicated than that."
I say this not to any one post(er), but to all. I was the one who made the reference to the Platonic Forms in class on Thursday, but I wasn't really referring to the allegory of the cave, in specific. What I meant was that Plato, throughout his corpus, seemed to be getting on to something that it took us until postmodern theory to get our minds around: that the word is not the thing(.), . . . But that the word is really all we have. (And by word here, I can mean all manner of things from actual words, to signs, signifiers, texts, insert your term of choice here.) Plato's notion of the Forms is that they exist, perfect(ed) unto themselves: they have their being quite apart from human knowledge and experience . . . they simply are. All we can know are the imperfect representations of the Forms: those things experientially available to us as imperfect human beings. With physical objects, we easily grasp what Plato means: the things we call chairs are varied, they are not all the same (some are padded, some have wheels, some have arms, some rock, etc.); we call them chairs, however, because they (in Plato's terms) share in the being of the Form of the Chair--their essence (if you will) is such that they can be identified with that perfect Form, no matter how imperfect a representation of that Form they may be. With such things as Beauty, Truth, and Justice, however, our minds have a harder time (forgetting for the moment that many of us believe that there is no such thing as perfect truth, perfect beauty, or perfect justice); what we as humans call truth, beauty, and justice, therefore, may share in the being of these Forms, but Plato's contention is that the human psyche is utterly incapable of knowledge of these Forms in their full representation--and, he argues, that since representations of beauty are so (sexually) maddening, were the human psyche to experience these Forms themselves, madness would surely ensue. Only the philosopher can handle the imperfect representations of beauty (or--at least--handle them well); therefore, the philosopher should be in charge, because (by extension) only the philosopher is equiped to handle such things as Truth and Justice, too (that's really the thrust of the Republic).
But, I digress. . . . What I'm really trying to say here is that I wasn't so much saying that one could simply substitute simulacrum for shadow. Instead, what I was saying is that Plato's forms seem to be the "original" (nudge-nudge-wink-wink) perfect simulation without originating simulated. Baurillard tells us that simulacra are things that are what they claim to be, that represent what they claim to represent, while representing only themselves, much as Plato's Forms are (for Plato) the originals from which all representations draw being. And therein lies the difference: Plato's Forms are unknowable (in the main) but are the ontological basis for all things which we call by the same name; Baudrillard's simulacra, on the other hand, are ontologically linked to nothing but themselves, though they may have subsumed other "realities" within them, but they are--as themselves--more real than any "reality" they have subsumed.
The way I look at this more and more is in terms of "reality" tv. Let's face it: there's nothing real about reality tv. Okay, so the participants are not "portraying" "characters" and these "real" people are "really" in these situations. But the situations are totally ludicrous! Never, never, never would you or I find ourselves with a real need to get from LA to Phoenix, and to go the whole way round the world to do it (The Amazing Race fascinates me); never, never, never would any "real" person be given the choice of $1 million or marriage; and don't get me started on the inanity that is Survivor. If you want reality tv take the Wal-Mart panoptic system (look for the cameras in the parking lot, not to mention the store) and broadcast that:
Your challenge: Purchase a 24-pack of Coca-Cola, a bottle of shampoo, a bottle of conditioner, a package of boxer shorts and the new Marilyn Manson CD; all the while dodging crying children, packs of marauding high school students, and the seventeen college age couples trying to figure out what they need to buy since they're finally shacking up together for the first time; try to figure out how to pay for your purchases since payday is nowhere in sight; and find the one open checkout line without the stupid "I need change" light blinking. (Trick objective: Wal-Mart doesn't sell the Manson CD). Now that's reality tv.
I digress yet again. . . . Of course Baudrillard wants us to see "the living, breathing simulation"; of course he wants us to see that there's nothing to see--he's inviting us to pay attention to the man behind the curtain. This is true of all culture, not just popular culture. That postmodern theory--all theory, really--undoes itself is nothing new: deconstruction can be deconstructed, and of course the idea of the simulation breaks down--but does that make it any less useful an idea?
As to the idea of an ahistorical age: there is no age of humanity that has been without history--I would contend that history is a (if not the) project of civilization, its hallmark. What has differed from age to age are the principles guiding the creation of history, and even these are not consistent within our broadly defined periods of history: the so-called Modern age that gave us the objectivist notions of history that make (most of) us rankle today also contained the Romantic period, and Romantic historians have given us such concepts as "the noble savage." Every period has its own historical epistemology, but every period has had some activity that counted as "doing history."
Theory/Praxis:Theory guides praxis. Praxis informs the articulation of new or refined theory. Praxis (alert: reductio ad absurdam coming) is how we deal with the reality we know; Theory is what we know of that reality and how we know it. Both theory and Praxis have their basis in code. And I'm not talking here about the machine code of the Matrix (though that's always one possibility). Social codes, legal codes, ethical and moral codes, and at the basis of all of these, in a moment definitive of the human situation: linguistic codes, and even more basically, the pre-linguistic neural codes of the human brain. Not all experience is mediated by language (but most is); all experience is mediated by the chemical and electrical firings of the human brain. Period. We cannot know anything but that our brains process it--encode it. We have experienced nothing as it is; everything has been encoded for us by/in our brains. All knowledge is subject to the electrochemical frailties of our grey matter. At base, the theory/praxis dichotomy is false: not only because both terms are bound up an implicated in each other, but also because knowing, how we know, and dealing with what we know are always already processes of encoding, both linguistically and electrochemically. We cannot know the unmediated reality, our language and our brains--our codes--have always already simulated both reality an our experience of it for us.
And now for something completely different. I posted an article from the 01 Sept 2003 Lafayette Journal and Courier earlier. This piece is on the phenomenon of "flash mobs" that gather to do something and then move on. They coordinate by email, text message, and so forth. Virtual Community?? Also the article mentions Smart Mobs and quotes Howard Rheingold (author of Smart Mobs). Thought it might be interesting.
Karl - I don't hate you (and none of us could possibly hate the guy with the two flashy lights on the Cactus dance floor). I just do not really care for the theory-practice binary, as you rightfully identified it. I think theory such as B's (because I still can't spell his name) allows the T/P binary to be continued and does not call for a breakdown and application. I am at a point where I need theory that promotes, explains, calls for practice - and I have a hard time seeing how B could do that.
Edited Post:
Secret e-mails call 'flash mobs' to action
Timepiece synchronized, Aaron Landry slipped into a Minneapolis pub one recent Sunday afternoon, an hour before the appointed time.
Landry, a 24-year-old network administrator from St. Paul, had received his preliminary orders via e-mail from an organizer whose identity he didn't know, and maybe would never know. For full article, click here.
