“Everywhere we live in a universe strangely similar to the original.” This quote by Jean Baudrillard very well demonstrates the essence of his theory: that there is none. In a world where media and informational technologies dominate the society, the representations and simulations we consume—whether it’s movies, the internet, news, or social media—they heavily influence our perception of reality.
Baudrillard’s theory begins with stating that everything everyone “knows” is a billion steps removed from direct experience. Almost everything that we interact with through media is not the thing itself, but its reproduction or what Baudrillard states as its “simulation.” To grasp this concept better, we need to look at the two main concepts that Baudrillard introduces in his book.
First, we have “simulacra.” These are what we call copies without an original. They are replicas without an authentic source. On the other hand, we can also explain these by referring to them as representations of a thing masking the fact that whatever they represent doesn’t actually exist. At first glance, this may be challenging to understand. However, we can better understand this concept via looking at Baudrillard’s “Four Stages of Simulacrum.” Baudrillard explains phases of an object by simply examining their behavior and their direct relation with reality. Allow me to give an example based on cacao beans: -First Stage: Reflection of a profound reality => Cacao Beans -Second Stage: Masking a profound reality => Chocolate. It contains cacao beans but masks its existence by modifying its contents -Third Stage: Masking the absence of a profound reality => Powdered chocolate milk. It no longer contains cacao beans, but masks its absence by simply reminding you of it -Fourth Stage: No relation to any reality whatsoever (pure simulacrum) => Chocolate company. It no longer has a relation with cacao beans (reality); it becomes entirely self-referential, only serving to reflect other images or simulacra.
Now for the second concept, which is simulation, is simply to feign to have what one doesn’t have. It is a model that mimics the operation of an existing system. A child who simulates an illness not to go to school by recreating symptoms. Maybe by coughing relentlessly or speaking in a raspy voice to eventually experience the real symptoms. At this point, all the symptoms are there, but without an underlying cause. This is a simulation.
And why are these two concepts so important? Because it gives us a subtle but a thorough understanding of the postmodern. As I stated in the very beginning, modern society is made up mostly of simulacra, considering many of the symbols we encounter “appear” to be symbols of real things, whereas they are really symbols of something that doesn’t exist. With AI taking over almost everything, the very line that allocates the difference between “produced” and “authentic” is getting thinner. Via generating models of a seemingly real thing without having an origin or reality disaffiliates people from their understanding of what is real and what is imaginary. Ending up with the civilization turning into a procession of falsehoods. This concludes in the very loss of meaning and authenticity in the postmodern world. Where simulacra are no longer representations of a reality, but they precede and determine the reality themselves as we live in a culture increasingly getting detached from the original reality.
Though Baudrillard's theories are viewed as being controversial and debatable, their pertinence to the present day, particularly in relation to digital and virtual reality, is hard to deny. Assisting us in understanding the dynamics of our simulated world. And the incessant mass production of non-real information that ultimately ends with corrupting the sense of purity and credibility in society.