Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulations, 1981: Lecture Notes

Baudrillard, Simulacra
and Simulations, 1981

Lecture Notes
Jean Baudrillard
Simulacra and Simulations
“ It is more difficult for us to imagine the real, History, the depth of time, or three-
dimensional space, just as before it was difficult from our real world
perspective to imagine a virtual universe or the fourth-dimension. The
simulacra will be ahead of us everywhere. The simulacrum is never that
which conceals the truth — it is the truth which conceals that there is none.
Since the world is on a delusional course, we must adopt a delusional
standpoint towards the world.”
“Everywhere one seeks to produce meaning, to make the world signify, to render
it visible. We are not, however, in danger of lacking meaning; quite the
contrary, we are gorged with meaning and it is killing us”
Jean Baudrillard
* This is all available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra

• Borges’ story of the map as an analogy of
simulacra
• The hyperreal as the copy of the copy
which becomes the “reality”
• Signs and systems, let’s take a step back
to de Saussure

Ferdinand de Saussure offers a ‘dyadic’ or two-part
model of the sign, which is not a link between a thing
and a name, but a concept and a sound-pattern.
• A simulation is an imitation of a real state
or object. It can be used in many contexts
including the modeling of natural systems
(ie. Disney World), human systems (ie.
The behavior of a “sick” patient), and in
technology (or the technology of defense
where the goal is to test real-world practical
scenarios) to gain insight into those
systems.
• Simulacrum (plural: simulacra) is from the
Latin, simulare, “to make like, to put on an
appearance of”. Put simply, we can think
of the simulacrum as the sign. For
example, the cult image which represents a
deity is a simulacrum. A painted still-life of
a bowl of fruit and a company logo are both
simulacra. However, Baudrillard takes us
one step beyond this.
• Simulacra becomes more specific in Baudrillard’s
semiotic context. Here, the simulacra is a copy of
a copy which has been so dissipated in its relation
to the original that it can no longer be said to be a
copy. The simulacrum, therefore, stands on its
own as a copy without a model. For example, the
cartoon Betty Boop was based on singer Helen
Kane. Kane, however, rose to fame imitating
Annette Hanshaw. Hanshaw and Kane have
fallen into relative obscurity, while Betty Boop
remains an icon of the flapper.*
• The divine irreference of images:
• Representation starts from the principle that the sign and the real are
equivalent (even if this equivalence is Utopian, it is a fundamental axiom).
For example, a patient who feigns illness demonstrates symptoms and can be
believed as ill.
• Conversely, simulation starts from the Utopia of this principle of equivalence
and inverts its value. To continue the example, the feigned illness becomes
the reality: the patient is ill (as opposed to the previous value of the patient as
healthy, but faking illness)
• Whereas representation tries to absorb simulation by interpreting it as false
representation (faking illness), simulation envelops the whole edifice of
representation as itself a simulacrum (illness to the capacity of how we have
previously recognized illness).
• Hyperreal and the imaginery:
• Disneyland:
• “You park outside, queue up inside, and are totally abandoned at the exit. In
this imaginary world the only phantasmagoria is in the inherent warmth and
affection of the crowd, and in that aufficiently excessive number of gadgets
used there to specifically maintain the multitudinous affect. The contrast
with the absolute solitude of the parking lot - a veritable concentration camp -
is total. Or rather: inside, a whole range of gadgets magnetize the crowd into
direct flows; outside, solitude is directed onto a single gadget: the automobile.
By an extraordinary coincidence (one that undoubtedly belongs to the
peculiar enchantment of this universe), this deep-frozen infantile world
happens to have been conceived and realized by a man who is himself now
cryogenized; Walt Disney, who awaits his resurrection at minus 180 degrees
centigrade.”
• Putting it to the test:
What would happen if you were to fake a hold-up at

a 7-11? What would happen if you walked in
wearing a ski mask, a black shirt, black pants or
jeans, and used a fake gun, while screaming at
the counter-person, “This is a hold up. Give me
your money or I’ll shoot!” If you claimed after the
event that you were only simulating a hold-up,
what would be your outcome?

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Baudrillard, Simulacra

and Simulations, 1981

* This is all available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra

* This is all available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra

What would happen if you were to fake a hold-up at

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