h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Hyperreality and the meaning of life: A look at the basics of Jean Baudrillards theory of hyperreality - A4770975
Author: Animeberserker - U1793524

This Guide entry looks at the basics of Jean Baudrillard’s theory of hyperreality with some of my own commentary thrown in for good measure. The entry is designed to give its readers an overview of some basic terms and concepts found in philosopher Jean Baudrillards work on simulacra, simulation, and ,of course, hyperreality.

I can see this entry has attracted very little comment. This is probably because nobody else has a clue as to what Baudrillard was on about and, even if they did, the practice of submitting warmed-over term papers for the EG is a definite turn-off.

My only exposure to Baudrillard's work has been through the book 'Intellectual Impostures', by Alan Sokal, but even this admittedly vignetted treatement has convimced me that most of his work was an obfuscatory load of bullsh*t. This entry appears to be true to the spirit of that work.

Well, my philosophical background (such as it is) is firmly in the analytic tradition, and a lot of the continental-style postmodern stuff leaves me rather cold. I wonder whether the emperor is wearing any clothes.

I think this entry could be improved by restructuring it so that the explanations for key terms (simulacra etc) come right at the start. It's probably better to give a simple, straightforward explanation of what B is on about at the start and leave the discussion of Marx until later on. Remember that you're writing for a generalist audience who won't know the intellectual background, and I'm not sure that the Marx stuff adds very much.

What puzzles me about this is the apparent lack of argument for any of this stuff. I don't have a problem with the stuff about media influences and about the problem of interpreting facts to fit a narrative, but none of this is particularly new. I really don't understand where all this stuff about the end of reality comes in.

It's true that the Gulf War as percieved by people watching it on television wasn't the genuine Gulf War but a reprsentation of it, but then who thought otherwise? Isn't this just a reinvention of the classic problems of epistemology - when I look at a tree, do I see the tree or merely a representation of the tree? How does he move from ' the war we saw on television was not the real war' to questions about whether war is still possible in the post industrial age, which just strike me as absurd.

I don't really follow the example of the life size map, or about the accident and the traffic light. What are these supposed to show? What is the 'desert of the real'?

Something that might be worth mentioning is the connection between B and 'The Matrix' - I don't fully understand what this would be, but I'd imagine it's something to do with simulations or something.

One other thing - you'll have to take out the first person references ('I', 'me' 'my' etc) as the edited guide doesn't allow these.

“I can see this entry has attracted very little comment. This is probably because nobody else has a clue as to what Baudrillard was on about and, even if they did, the practice of submitting warmed-over term papers for the EG is a definite turn-off.”


”My only exposure to Baudrillard's work has been through the book 'Intellectual Impostures', by Alan Sokal, but even this admittedly vignetted treatement has convimced me that most of his work was an obfuscatory load of bullsh*t. This entry appears to be true to the spirit of that work.”

First off, the whole point of writing the guide entry was to educate people about a person who they probably have not heard of. Secondly, I hardly think the comment about submitting a wormed-over term paper is fare, what are you basing that on anyway, the fact that I’m still in collage? Either way even, if it was a term paper, why does that matter? It’s the content of the article at stake, not the context of events that inspired me to write it.



Thirdly, it seems to me that these criticisms are not of constructive a nature. Pre-exposure to other beliefs that one holds can cause one to lash out at ideas that do not conform to their own beliefs, this is a sure sigh of a closed mind, and it seems to me that that is what is happing in this case. It seems, based on your comment, that you have not read a lot of Baudrillards work; nor do I know the extent of the biases in which this other author exposed you too, either way you seemed to have formed your own opinion on the subject, and are not willing to change it, but how about not posting any more unnecessarily cantankerousness comments such as:

“this admittedly vignetted treatement has convimced me that most of his work was an obfuscatory load of bullsh*t.”


To clarify, if your going to make a statement like that, which really serves no purpose, then don’t bother posting here again.

“Well, my philosophical background (such as it is) is firmly in the analytic tradition, and a lot of the continental-style postmodern stuff leaves me rather cold. I wonder whether the emperor is wearing any clothes.”

First off, thank you for your constructive criticism, I Will attempt to answer your questions here, please let me know if these answers are of help.

“What puzzles me about this is the apparent lack of argument for any of this stuff. I don't have a problem with the stuff about media influences and about the problem of interpreting facts to fit a narrative, but none of this is particularly new. I really don't understand where all this stuff about the end of reality comes in.”

He is saying that by allowing our lives to be taken over by images and simulations of things we are destroying our true reality, it is it some ways similar to Plato’s notion that art detracts us from reaching the true forms. because we as a culture putt more infuses on the simulations of the real (such as the news, ads, video-games) instead of true reality, he believed that we will eventually destroy the real and live in a world of nothing but simulation and simulacra, ala the Matrix (Baudrillard’s theory’s were a major influence on the Wachowski Brothers, His name is even referenced on a book at the beginning of the movie.) The multi-million selling PC-Game the Sims is a good example. People spend 20-dollars to play the role of a virtual person that they dress, feed, clothe and even employee at a virtual work place, where they do virtual work. As a side note, it is said by some that Baudrillard truly believe that there is no “true reality” but I thought that might be beyond the scope of an introductory topic.


”How does he move from ' the war we saw on television was not the real war' to questions about whether war is still possible in the post industrial age, which just strike me as absurd.”

Baudrillard I believe makes that statement in “The Gulf War Did not take Place” which I believe I put in my resource list. You have to remember that the basses from which Baudrillard made his statement, here is an exert from a review of “The Gulf War Did not take Place:

Baudrillard argues that the style of warfare used in the ' (A war fought between a coalition led by the United States and Iraq to free Kuwait from Iraqi invaders; 1990-1991) Gulf War' was so far removed from previous standards of (The waging of armed conflict against an enemy) warfare that it existed more as (An iconic mental representation) images on radar and TV screens than as actual hand-to-hand combat, that most of the decisions in the war were based on perceived (The ability to comprehend; to understand and profit from experience) intelligence coming from maps, images, and news, than from actual seen-with-the-eye intelligence (Baudrillard 2001, 29-30).

I hope that helps clarify Baudrillard’s standpoint.



”I don't really follow the example of the life size map, or about the accident and the traffic light. What are these supposed to show? What is the 'desert of the real'?”

The life size map was an exact replica of the actual empire it represented. It was so lushly detailed that the inhabitants of the empire started to forget it was not the real empire (think about the best and most realistic video-game graphics or Movie effects compared to reality.) Over time, the empire accepted the simulation as the true reality, then, the simulation was destroyed and the inhabitants found out that, due to negligence, the true reality had disappeared, and replaced with a vast desert where the true reality once was. That desert, that us-to be the realty, was now “the desert of the real” (this term is also the subtitle to “the Matrix and Philosophy”)

The traffic light example was simply my attempt to exemplify the perverse behavior of human beings. By showing that the accident was natural and that the fact that the person fixated so long that he forgot what he was supposed to be doing was unnatural. It was supposed to explain the statement that the “pornographic” nature of the images is partly our own fault. We don’t have to look, but we do, because we have been conditioned to. However, we have played a hand in the conditioning as we have allowed things get to where they are.



”Something that might be worth mentioning is the connection between B and 'The Matrix' - I don't fully understand what this would be, but I'd imagine it's something to do with simulations or something”.

It does, and as I said, he was a major influence on the directors of “the Matrix”, along with Rene Descartes. For more information on those connections check out the link “’Did you ever Eat Tasty Wheat’: Baudrillard and the Matrix”
”One other thing - you'll have to take out the first person references ('I', 'me' 'my' etc) as the edited guide doesn't allow these.”

Thank you, I did not know that, I fixed it.

I hope this helped, thanks for the input - Animeberserker

You comment that I have a closed mind. Well, I don't. I do however have the right to expect ideas to be presented in as clearly a fashion as possible before writing them off as academic charlatanry. This certainly hasn't been done by the postmodernist philosophers, most of who tend to confuse impenetrability with profundity.

Baudrillard and his like are charlatans who play word games, that's all. Alan Sokal showed that this was clearly the case (read A2671733), a good deal more clearly than they tend to make their own arguments. Certainly, we should be open minded, but not so open-minded that our bloody brains fall out.

Oh, and while we're at it:
'Baudrillard argues that the style of warfare used in the ' (A war fought between a coalition led by the United States and Iraq to free Kuwait from Iraqi invaders; 1990-1991) Gulf War' was so far removed from previous standards of (The waging of armed conflict against an enemy) warfare that it existed more as (An iconic mental representation) images on radar and TV screens than as actual hand-to-hand combat, that most of the decisions in the war were based on perceived (The ability to comprehend; to understand and profit from experience) intelligence coming from maps, images, and news, than from actual seen-with-the-eye intelligence (Baudrillard 2001, 29-30).'

Absolute piffle. Try telling that to the families of those hapless Iraqi soldiers who perished on the Basra Road under the onslaught of the A-10 tankbusters.

I suppose there's two different kinds of points that I want to make here. One type would be about how to improve the entry so it can go in the edited guide, and another type is about what the Baudrillard's argument is (or indeed if it *is* at all) and whether it is defensible. There's some overlap because I generally (and possibly arrogantly) assume that if I can't understand an entry on a philosophical topic, then the general reader won't either. I think a lot of the points I made earlier about how to make it clearer still stand. I'd really like good, clear entries on these kind of thinkers to go into the edited guide, because I think they need demystifying.

Imagine that X likes to play games like 'The Sims' and also online games like Everquest and that sort of thing, and participates in various online communities. X also likes watching films and TV programmes, and X gets her news from the TV. If I understand B correctly, he's arguing that large bits of X's life aren't real in some sense - they're simulations of the real.

So far so good. But X knows that her computer games aren't real in the sense that the Sims aren't real people. She also knows that her TV programmes and films aren't real, although while she's watching them they may seem so. If X is remotely media-savvy, she'll know that the news she's watching has been edited and constructed in a particular way. Some people might think that X would be happier if she spend more time talking to real people face-to-face and that she's living some kind of less authentic and fulfilled life than she could do.

However, it seems very unlikely that she would ever *forget* that she's playing a game, watching TV and so on. Even if she were to show symptoms of psychological Sim-addiction, she would still know it was a game. B needs an *argument* - it's not enough just to assert that games, videos, etc lead to some kind of detachment from reality - never mind end up 'destroying' reality. The only example I can think of would be something like the 'Better than Life' video game in the TV show Red Dwarf - in which everyone's dreams come true and they don't know they're playing a game. But such things are not possible technically, and, I suspect, psychologically.

[On the subject of the life size map, the entry actually says the opposite - that the map disintegrated.]

I'm still no clearer as to why the Gulf War didn't happen. It's a showy bit of rhetoric, but it doesn't stand up to rational analysis. It was a different kind of war - though I think lots of wars have been fought on the basis of second hand intelligence rather than first hand sensory experience - but why does that mean it didn't happen? There is an interesting point to be made here about cameras on smart bombs, embedded journalists etc, but none of this supports the claim that the war didn't happen.

On the ambulance/traffic lights example, I really don't think that is at all convincing. What reasons are there to think that the person staring at the accident is doing so because of excessive simulcra, rather than because of something innate in human beings that's always been there? Hence public executions, Roman circuses, the ultra-violent theatre of Renaissance Britain and so on and so forth.

I can't help thinking that Baudrillard has some quite interesting cultural observations to make, but entirely overplays his hand in dressing it up as some sort of profound philosophy - although I'm open to being convinced otherwise.

”Imagine that X likes to play games like 'The Sims' and also online games like Everquest and that sort of thing, and participates in various online communities. X also likes watching films and TV programmes, and X gets her news from the TV. If I understand B correctly, he's arguing that large bits of X's life aren't real in some sense - they're simulations of the real.

So far so good. But X knows that her computer games aren't real in the sense that the Sims aren't real people. She also knows that her TV programmes and films aren't real, although while she's watching them they may seem so. If X is remotely media-savvy, she'll know that the news she's watching has been edited and constructed in a particular way. Some people might think that X would be happier if she spend more time talking to real people face-to-face and that she's living some kind of less authentic and fulfilled life than she could do.

However, it seems very unlikely that she would ever *forget* that she's playing a game, watching TV and so on. Even if she were to show symptoms of psychological Sim-addiction, she would still know it was a game. B needs an *argument* - it's not enough just to assert that “games, videos, etc lead to some kind of detachment from reality - never mind end up destroying' reality.”

One other example Baudrillard uses, which I think was in “Simulation and Simulacra”, was the one- dimensionality of television and how false realities crop-up from televisions images, So, Lets talk about posers as an example. Say a young impressionable kid sees the newest gangster rap video on MTV. Lest suppose the kid lives in a white suburb and has never been to a poor section of town were said life style in this song takes place. The kid sees the way the people in this video dress and act, and assumes that, because he does not know the reality of the true environment, only what is being portrayed on TV, that these people truly act and dress like that, the kid likes it, so he imitates it, thinking he is imitating true reality and not a copy of reality. That is another example of how simulations and simulacra are destroying “true” reality, according to Baudrillard.

“On the ambulance/traffic lights example, I really don't think that is at all convincing. What reasons are there to think that the person staring at the accident is doing so because of excessive simulacra, rather than because of something innate in human beings that have always been there? Hence public executions, Roman circuses, the ultra-violent theatre of Renaissance Britain and so on and so forth.”

I guess that example doesn’t work to well, however to clarify, the example was not supposed to point out that the person in question stares at the accident because of an over-stimulation of simulacra. It was simply to make a statement about the human condition and to show that we all play a hand in what is advertised and distributed to us. Yes, it might be something inherit in human beings that causes us to look at violence, I don’t deny that, but the example was used to make readers aware that, even if it is inherit, we can change the habit, we can expel it just as we have expelled other traits that some would say are inherit to humans, we can not look, but yet, we do. Just like we can choose to not watch “reality” TV, but enough people do to keep it popular and so it is still there. Now, I am not to say that things are simply going to disappear if we do not look at them, but certainly, you could not disagree that if your examples of executions, circuses, violent theater act, where not popular they probably would have stopped, as some of them did. Television is a medium designed around selling advertising, if these things were not popular or were not targeting a specific audience that might buy an advertiser product, they would not be on TV. In short, I was just trying to show that by watching and wanting more, more is produced and I guess that my example was to far removed from the subject at hand for people to make the connection. You’re not the first person to tell me you don’t get it; however, some have understood my point as well.


I can't help thinking that Baudrillard has some quite interesting cultural observations to make, but entirely overplays his hand in dressing it up as some sort of profound philosophy - although I'm open to being convinced otherwise.

.
“'Baudrillard argues that the style of warfare used in the ' (A war fought between a coalition led by the United States and Iraq to free Kuwait from Iraqi invaders; 1990-1991) Gulf War' was so far removed from previous standards of (The waging of armed conflict against an enemy) warfare that it existed more as (An iconic mental representation) images on radar and TV screens than as actual hand-to-hand combat, that most of the decisions in the war were based on perceived (The ability to comprehend; to understand and profit from experience) intelligence coming from maps, images, and news, than from actual seen-with-the-eye intelligence (Baudrillard 2001, 29-30).'

Absolute piffle. Try telling that to the families of those hapless Iraqi soldiers “

“I'm still no clearer as to why the Gulf War didn't happen. It's a showy bit of rhetoric, but it doesn't stand up to rational analysis. It was a different kind of war - though I think lots of wars have been fought on the basis of second hand intelligence rather than first hand sensory experience - but why does that mean it didn't happen? There is an interesting point to be made here about cameras on smart bombs, embedded journalists etc, but none of this supports the claim that the war didn't happen.”

As I stated in the entry:

He did not say the gulf war did not happen, he simply said that what was televised for mass consumption by the non-enlisted citizens of America, being that they are images, are copies of the real events and therefore unreal. The true reality of the events that transpired in the Gulf War lie solely with those whom experienced the war first hand, all other secondary images, and thoughts are simulation. In short, the images we see on television, even the actualities portrayed on the news, are not real. Despite our cognitive notion to believe otherwise, the only events that are real are those that an individual experiences first hand.

So, think of it this way, their were two wars, the televised one, which was not real, and the real one, which was only real to those that fought in it.

“I can't help thinking that Baudrillard has some quite interesting cultural observations to make, but entirely overplays his hand in dressing it up as some sort of profound philosophy - although I'm open to being convinced otherwise.”

I think it far to point out that I stated in the entry that his theories are widely criticized, and that they are hard take in by some. If I remember correctly some of his biggest critics have ask him directly that, if what he is saying is true and we are loosing our culture diversity to mechanized culture, how do we fix it? Apparently, Baudrillard view is either that we are too far down the road and cannot turn back, or that he simply doesn’t have an answerer.

Also, on the comment:

“entirely overplays his hand in dressing it up as some sort of profound philosophy”

Remember the root word for philosophy is “love of Wisdom”, and though you may not agree with Baudrillards work, a good deal of other philosophers have also been proven wrong over the years, that doesn’t make their theories any less interesting or in this case any less culturally relevant. Either way, the article’s intent was not to necessarily change your mind, but to expose you to his way of thinking, and in that regard, it worked. I hope this helped, take care - Animeberserker

Hi,

I've been following this thread with interest. As somebody else who has trouble deciphering much (read: all) of Continental post-modernism, I think that I've learnt more from the arguments on this thread than within the Entry itself. If you could re-write bits of your Entry to include some of the explanations you've made, that would be quite useful, I think.

Another thing that would be useful for people who don't know an awful lot about philosophy would be some context. For instance, perhaps some of the objections of notable philosphers (Sokal included) could be put in the Entry... you would do that with a proper overview of any controversial philosopher - for instance, an article about Leibiniz's (appalling spelling, sorry) 'Best of all Possible Worlds' theory wouldn't be complete without mentioning Voltaire's Candide or poem about the Lisbon Earthquake. It might shed a little more light on where B fits in the scheme of current thought.

A snappier title might help to entice more readers, too. Maybe something like 'Jean Baudrillard's Theory of Hyperreality' would be perfectly fine.

Finally, isn't a lot of this argument a 20th Century update of the idea that nothing we see is real as such, and is only a representation made to us by our senses (Idealism, I believe it's called, but I'm sure someone smarter than I am can correct me on it)? Technology simply presents another layer, so the flow of experience goes something like:

Soldier in Gulf War -> image of soldier on TV screen, made up of small pixels of light -> visual representation of TV image on retina -> binding of experience, perception of image -> processed by consciousness, interpretation made.

Take the TV away. Say YOU'RE the soldier. Now it goes:

Soldier -> visual representation of actual image on retina -> binding of experience, perception of image -> processed by consciousness, interpretation made.

Maybe I'm missing the point here, but there doesn't seem to be anything profound about the difference. For somebody that's interested in experience and consciousness like me, in fact all the important stuff is identical. I'm sure I must have missed something, can you help me out?

Matt

"the only events that are real are those that an individual experiences first hand."

This is the sort of garbage that entire academic careers are now built upon. This is the indulging in sophistries that passes for reason in cultural studies departments.

This is all rather trite and shallow, and I really don't see how this entry can avoid the question that prefigures all of this: is B a charlatan, and aren't his admirers simply watching him play in an academic sand-pit?

Try studying a subject where facts exist and evidence does matter (such as science), as opoised to one where the ability to generate reams of carefully crafted postmodern metatwaddle seems to matter most of all.

This, byt the way, si what Sokal and Bricmont have to say about Baudrillard:

"In summary, one finds in Baudrillard's works a profusion of scientific terms, used with total disregard for their meaning and, above all, in a context where they are manifestly irrelevant. Whether or not one interprets them as metaphors, it is hard to see what role they could play, except to give an appearance of profundity to trite observations about sociology or history. Moreover, the scientific terminology is mixed up with a non-scientific vocabulary that is employed with equal sloppiness. When all is said and done, one wonders what would be left of Baudrillard's thought if the verbal veneer covering it were stripped away"

Baudrillard really has very little that is interesting to say. All he does is 'language-up' rather trite observations. In any non-tenured profession he would have been sacked by now.

“This is the sort of garbage that entire academic careers are now built upon. This is the indulging in sophistries that passes for reason in cultural studies departments.

This is all rather trite and shallow, and I really don't see how this entry can avoid the question that prefigures all of this: is B a charlatan, and aren't his admirers simply watching him play in an academic sand-pit?

Try studying a subject where facts exist and evidence does matter (such as science), as opoised to one where the ability to generate reams of carefully crafted postmodern metatwaddle seems to matter most of all.

This, byt the way, si what Sokal and Bricmont have to say about Baudrillard:

"In summary, one finds in Baudrillard's works a profusion of scientific terms, used with total disregard for their meaning and, above all, in a context where they are manifestly irrelevant. Whether or not one interprets them as metaphors, it is hard to see what role they could play, except to give an appearance of profundity to trite observations about sociology or history. Moreover, the scientific terminology is mixed up with a non-scientific vocabulary that is employed with equal sloppiness. When all is said and done, one wonders what would be left of Baudrillard's thought if the verbal veneer covering it were stripped away"

Baudrillard really has very little that is interesting to say. All he does is 'language-up' rather trite observations. In any non-tenured profession he would have been sacked by now.”

So why is it that people such as Plato and Aristotle are still looked at as geniuses for creating factious hierarchical societies and proclaiming that man has three souls (this is of course only relevant if you believe in a any soul in the first place) and such other things we would write of as nonsense by today’s standards, yet we would not be where we are today, and especially in science, if it were not for their influence. Most of Plato’s and Aristotle’s theories don’t hold their weight any more, that does not make them any less interesting in to learn, does it? Yet, Baudrillard is automatically a quack for pointing out his own philosophy, which is criticized for the exact same reasons that Plato and Aristotle’s where at there time of conception, and those reasons are that they seem imposable, impenetrable and down right silly to those who have already made up their mind about it and don’t like abstract thought. Well you know what, think what you will but if everyone thought that way their would be no progress. So, yes you may say his theories are out there and you may say they don’t hold weight in science. But every time I reply to you I feel like I have to restate this same important fact, and that is, that this is one opinion on our social condition, its, the entry was not intended to necessarily change your mind; and again, as has already been pointed out numours times, even if one does not feel any of his arguments hold up as valid sciences, so what, philosophy is not science. In Philosophy, or actually in life too, one does not have to use words as they are normally applied in everyday use, if they choose to use a word in an alternant meaning they can do so, as long as it is explained (irony anyone?). Therefore, nominalism does not necessarily have to apply to his theories. The other fact is, like I said, philosophy means “love of wisdom” and if you are a person who likes to here different perspectives of things from people who more educated than you or from your equals, that is, if you actually want to here and experience an alternate view of the state of contemporary culture, then one could look beyond the flimsiness of the scientific proof or grandiloquent language of his writings to view his theories as cautionary, revolutionary and abstract, and as we well no abstractities are not something sciences is good at.

Also, DrMatt, thanks for the comment I read your post and will respond to it latter, its 3am and I’m tired, for now I will leave you all with a quote from Mr. Baudrillard:

Capital in fact has never been linked by a contract to the society it dominates. It is a sorcery of the social relation, it is a challenge to society and should be responded to as such. It is not a scandal to be denounced according to moral and economic rationality, but - challenge to take up according to symbolic law. - Jean Baudrillard

(Sounds kind of similar to DNA’s opening comment about little green pieces of paper in H2G2 no?)

Don't lecture me on the 'flimsiness' of scientific proof. The single refutable proposition is the bedrock of science and the reason why it makes progress. 'Philosophy' does not deal in such propositions, and the reason why it makes no progress whatsoever. In fact, 'postmodern thought' is a tacit admission of this glaring problem: it's more or less given up actually trying to *establish* anything of any substance.

You haven't addressed at all in your over-reverential entry the criticisms that I and many others have made of this garbage. People woke up and smelled the coffee years ago, especially around 1996. Yet young people still waste years of their lives studying fashionable vacuity. How does it feel to be studying the contents of the Emperor's New Wardrobe?

"Say a young impressionable kid sees the newest gangster rap video on MTV. Lest suppose the kid lives in a white suburb and has never been to a poor section of town were said life style in this song takes place. The kid sees the way the people in this video dress and act, and assumes that, because he does not know the reality of the true environment, only what is being portrayed on TV, that these people truly act and dress like that, the kid likes it, so he imitates it, thinking he is imitating true reality and not a copy of reality. That is another example of how simulations and simulacra are destroying “true” reality, according to Baudrillard."

But hasn't it always been the case that people living in one place have had incorrect assumptions about the lives of people living in another? During WWI, some British solidiers were apparently astonished to find that the French lived in *houses* rather than huts or hovels. I would argue that the media actually gives us a much better idea about how others live than we've ever had before. Although TV shows etc may be simulations, they are more accurate that wild rumour or prejudice. Even if it were true that the child watching MTV mistakes a simulation for an accurat portrayal, it's not at all clear why this should destroy 'true' reality. Rather than talking of creating a false hyperreality, isn't it just easier to say that the child is just *wrong*.

On the ambulance/traffic light example, I don't think it illustrates the point at all. A much better way of making the point in the guide entry would be to say more about reality TV shows. They proved popular, so more and extreme versions were produced. They're often banal and boring, but people watch anyway. And because people watch, more are produced. If people didn't watch, they wouldn't be produced. But I think the market for reality TV shows is finite and that ratings have dropped through overkill. Supply may create its own demand, but the demand is not inexhaustable.

I don't have much else to say on the Gulf War example. B wrote a book or paper entitled "The Gulf War Did Not Take Place", which is a somewhat misleading title if that's not in fact what he's claiming.

"Despite our cognitive notion to believe otherwise, the only events that are real are those that an individual experiences first hand."

Are there any arguments for this strange claim? Why think that the French Revolution cease to be 'real' once the last participant died?

The basis to this 'theory of hyperreality' is that people form wrong or incomplete assumptions about things because of what they have to go on. And somebody got a professorship on the basis of this?

What amazes me is that people get paid to produce this drivel.
I refer again, to the estimable Sokal: 'Baudrillard's text continues in a gradual crescendo of nonsense'. Obviosuly, if B was actually to state what he was getting at he could do it in one or two sentences. Hardly a good justification for a tenure-track appointment is it?

On the subject of Baudrillard's worth as a philosopher, I think DrMatt is exactly right about the Idealism comparision (and also in his suggestions on how to improve the entry). Does B ever engage with these arguments? I think the entry needs to include some of the criticisms that have been made.

It's true that philosophy does come from a root meaning 'love of wisdom', but I think that there is such a thing as good philosophy and bad philosophy. Good philosophy doesn't have to mean correct philosophy - it can also mean innovative or original. A good work of philosophy is structured clearly, uses clear language where possible, sets clear goals for itself and presents arguments and counterarguments in a sensible and orderly manner. It attempts to reach conclusions which are justified by the arguments. For example, I admire Robert Nozick's 'Anarchy, State, and Utopia' as a thoroughly accomplished and very challenging work of philosophy although I disagree with nearly every word of it.

I think Baudrillard's thought is a deserving subject for a guide entry, as I've said before, just because of his cultural signifiance. However, on the basis of this thread and what I've read elsewhere I don't rate him as a philosopher because he rather helps himself to very strong and very controversial conclusions without really arguing for them. For me, one of the prime virtues of a philosopher is clarity - saying what you mean with accuracy and precision, not irony and ambiguity. Many analytic philosophers do not regard Baudrillard as a philosopher at all, but as a cultural theorist.

Although Plato's political philosophy wouldn't find much favour now, I rate it quite highly because he starts with an account of human nature and then moves on to what he sees as an appropriate form of political organisation. It was also one of the very first attempts to do so, and has been very influential - the 'philosopher king' is arguably the intellectual justification for the 'noblesse obligee' defence of aristocratic rule. Aristotle's virtue ethics are still taken very seriously, and the Nichomachean Ethics is one of the best things I've ever read. Both Plato and Aristotle said some things that we wouldn't take very seriously now, but taken in context their achievement and influence is remarkable. Perhaps its too early to say, but I don't see anything in B that strikes me as influential or novel.

"Capital in fact has never been linked by a contract to the society it dominates. It is a sorcery of the social relation, it is a challenge to society and should be responded to as such. It is not a scandal to be denounced according to moral and economic rationality, but - challenge to take up according to symbolic law. - Jean Baudrillard "

What does this mean?

" I don't see anything in B that strikes me as influential or novel"

I don't see anything that strikes me as comprehensible, and I'm probably better educated than 99% of the people who use this site.

An example of good philosophy is Karl Popper's philosophy of science. He explains how science works and why it is different from other modes of thinking. Mathematics has the idea of absolute proof. Science only has the idea of falsifiability. This was a radical and novel insight when it was published. Popper then goes on to extend the scope of this idea towards society: the idea of an 'open society' which acknowledges that we all make judgements on the basis of imperfect information.

What, I wonder, is Baudrillard's 'project'? What possible meaning could all his crap have for anybody living in the real world?

>>we all make judgements on the basis of imperfect information<<

Including reaching final judgment on Baudrillard only by way of what Alan Sokal thinks?

This thread is way too dense for me - but I'd just like to say that I have read a fair bit of Baudrillard and never found it less than interesting; that I have difficulty associating him automatically with some of the rather better candidates for 'emperor's new clothes' (Deleuze, say, who really is virtually impenetrable), largely because his writing - especially the recent stuff - is much more lucid than some of the characterisations on here are making it seem; and that I've certainly learnt things from it.

(Incidentally, the difference between a man with a sword being asked to kill the individual six feet away from him and the man sitting behind a TV screen in a jet fighter hundreds of miles away from his missile's target, a man who has grown up sitting behind a TV screen playing games which are less and less distinguishable from the 'real thing' - that does seem to me a difference in kind rather than a difference in degree; and the key question is whether it makes the actions of the second man far easier to carry out with no real consideration of their ethical dimension. It should be said that Baudrillard wrote his essays on the Gulf War *at the time*, in hope of influencing people's thinking, especially regarding French participation in the war).

Anyway - the entry seems a bit too specialist to me, that's really all I have to say.

Except that - I'm also a fan of Sokal's. But his position needs handling with care, I think: rubbishing all post-structuralist and postmodern philosophy on the back of the excesses, not so much of Baudrillard, but of Baudrillard's disciples in the academy (the situation is even worse with Derrida, another writer whose proponents have done him far more harm than good), those who take the work as being some sort of holy writ (which it isn't and doesn't pretend to be) - this goes too far. The books themselves ... are actually quite fun. Anything wrong with that?

No, but if it's all a joke, then why is it being treated so reverently?