[Vision2020] Simulation, Hypermarkets, Hypercommodity

[Ted Moffett]

Joe et. al.

Thanks for the references to essays and books relating to the Matrix film
themes.  I will read.

Baudrillard insisted later in his career he was not a post modernist, though
he gets lumped into that "school" of thinking.

>From the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/baudrillard/

A sharp critic of contemporary society, culture, and thought, Baudrillard is
often seen as a major guru of French postmodern theory, although he can also
be read as a thinker who combines social theory and philosophy in original
and provocative ways and a writer who has developed his own style and forms
of writing.

For some years a cult figure of postmodern theory, Baudrillard moved beyond
the postmodern discourse from the early 1980s to the present, and has
developed a highly idiosyncratic mode of philosophical and cultural
analysis. This entry focuses on the development of Baudrillard's unique
modes of thought and how he moved from social theory to postmodern theory to
a provocative type of philosophical
analysis[1<http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/baudrillard/notes.html#1>
] In retrospect, Baudrillard can be seen a theorist who has traced in
original ways the life of signs and impact of technology on social life, and
who has systematically criticized major modes of modern thought, while
developing his own philosophical perspectives
-----------------------
I am inclined to view his work as a kind of sociological psychoanalysis of
the effects of modern technology relating to media, control of the public
via advertising and marketing, the Internet, video games, virtual
reality...at times reading like an almost prose poetry description of new
trends of consumption and capitalism exploring a psychoanalytic "unveiling"
of the mutating unconscious fabric of modern life.  Perhaps he was not a
philosopher so much as a psychoanalytic sociological economist...A
recovering Marxist? Ha!  How could someone be a psychoanalytic sociological
economist and not be a philosopher?

Coming from the analytic perspective, as you called it, if I was to say that
I have difficulty "to get my head wrapped around" Baudrillard, is too kind.
I am inclined to declare that much of what Baudrillard writes is nonsense,
almost written deliberately to confound.  But then I don't understand his
theories, and their theoretical background, well enough to make this
statement.

However, I am stunned by how perceptive are many of his descriptions of the
aforementioned mutating fabric of modern life.  I find his writing often to
inspire the pure joy of discovering new ways of viewing the world, even if
there are major problems with the truth of his perspective.  I love novel
uses of language.  He appeared to be attempting to find creative ways to
illuminate the changing landscape of meaning, moving faster than we can find
concepts to describe, as we race into a globalized society, culturally,
economically, technologically etc. which perhaps explains in part why he
declared, at a certain point, he was not a post modernist, and his unique
style of writing and thinking.

I just did a search for information on Baudrillard's "System of Objects,"
the first work of his I read. I was pleased to find someone else offering a
explication of Baudrillard echoing to some extent my limited suggestions.
What does "schizofunctional" mean?  Never mind.

Comments below from this web site:

http://www.egs.edu/faculty/baudrillard.html

The two books of Baudrillard's post-Marxist phase, *The System of Objects
and Consumer Society* — published in France in 1968 and 1970 examine the
psychological imperatives of consumption in an advanced capitalistic
economy. The first argues that meaning, not use, is primarily transferred
through consumer objects and that the individual in effect buys a group
identity and a metaphysical order with each over-determined purchase. The
second contends that the individual — to the extent that he matters at all —
merely fulfills the needs of the productive system under the *illusion* that
he is servicing his private wants.

Pressing Freudian and Saussurean categories into the service of a basically
Marxist perspective,* The System of Objects* offers a cultural critique of
the commodity in consumer society. Baudrillard classifies the everyday
objects of the "new technical order" as functional, nonfunctional and
metafunctional. He contrasts "modern" and 'traditional' functional objects,
subjecting home furnishing and interior design to a celebrated semiological
analysis. His treatment of nonfunctional or "marginal" objects focuses on
antiques and the psychology of collecting, while the metafunctional category
extends to the useless, the aberrant and even the "schizofunctional."
Finally, Baudrillard deals at length with the implications of credit and
advertising for the commodification of everyday life.
--------
Ted Moffett


On 7/22/07, Joe Campbell <joekc at adelphia.net> wrote:
>
> Ted,
>
> To my knowledge, Baudrillard's philosophy has not been mentioned by my
> students, though it wouldn't surprise me if I missed a reference. As I
> mentioned, I tend not to focus on ethics or political theory in my classes
> since my own specializations are in the areas metaphysics and epistemology.
> And post-modernism is anti-analytic, so it is hard for me to get my head
> wrapped around it. I do plan to explore the connection between Baudrillard
> and the Matrix given what you've said.
>
> Your comment about the Matrix not being totally 'fake' is an interesting
> one. There is a difficult article on this topic -- The Matrix as
> Metaphysics, David Chalmers -- available on the Matrix website:
>
> http://whatisthematrix.warnerbros.com/rl_cmp/phi.html
>
> The site contains several nice essays written by contemporary
> philosophers. Among my favorites are:
>
> Dream Skepticism; Brain-In-A-Vat Skepticism; The Experience Machine,
> Christopher Grau
> What's So Bad About Living in the Matrix, James Pryor
> Plato's Cave and the Matrix, John Partridge
> Neo's Freedom… Whoa!, Michael McKenna
> Wake up! - Gnosticism & Buddhism and the Matrix, Francis Flannery-Dailey &
> Rachel Wagner
>
> The first reference -- a set of three essays -- is my favorite and is the
> most accessible. These and other essays are collected together in the first
> book noted below; I've used the second book for a class before and it is
> very good, too.
>
> The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real, edited by
> William Irwin (Open Court, 2002)
> Philosophers Explore The Matrix, edited by Christoper Grau (Oxford
> University Press, 2005)
>
> Lastly, I recently came across a set of essays on Baudrillard and the
> Matrix, which I hope to explore in the coming weeks, on this website:
>
> http://altreligion.about.com/library/bl_matrix.htm
>
> Thanks!
>
> Best, Joe
>
>
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