This document discusses Jean Baudrillard's theories on simulation and the lack of meaning in a hyper-real world. It presents several quotes from Baudrillard on topics like the proliferation of information without meaning, the nonexistence of truth, and the evacuation of qualities like depth and authenticity in postmodern culture. The document provides context for Baudrillard's sometimes provocative views and examines what his work means for design and visual rhetoric.

1. Getting
“real”
With
Jean
Baudrillard

2. Let’s play the theory game. On the next several
slides are quotes from Baudrillard. Most are
from your reading ,but some aren’t.
We’re going to dissect them, re-write them, and
then use the discussion of them to define why
Baudrillard matters to us as we consider design
and visual rhetoric.
Baudrillard’s comments are in light green.
Dr. Phill’s talk-back to him is white.

3. Note before we start: Baudrillard is a bit of an
agitator. He’s going to at times say things about
religion, gender, life or terrorism that might be
upsetting.
I do not endorse his opinions, and I don’t expect
any of you to. What I want you to be able to do is
understand the thought-work he is doing.
If anything here offends you and you’d like to point
that out, we will all respect that. My goal is not to
create discussion of things beyond the thought
work being done. Sadly, I cannot control an author’s
content.

4. “We live in a world where there
is more and more information,
and less and less meaning.”
― Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation

5. “The secret of theory is
that truth does not exist.”
― Jean Baudrillard, Fragments: Cool Memories
III, 1990-1995

6. “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

7. “Postmodernity is said to be a culture
of fragmentary sensations, eclectic
nostalgia, disposable simulacra, and
promiscuous superficiality, in which
the traditionally valued qualities of
depth, coherence, meaning,
originality, and authenticity are
evacuated or dissolved amid the
random swirl of empty signals.”
― Jean Baudrillard

8. “Postmodernity is said to be a culture
of fragmentary sensations, eclectic
nostalgia, disposable simulacra, and
promiscuous superficiality, in which
the traditionally valued qualities of
depth, coherence, meaning,
originality, and authenticity are
evacuated or dissolved amid the
random swirl of empty signals.”
― Jean Baudrillard

9. “But what if God himself can be
simulated, that is to say can be reduced
to signs that constitute faith? Then the
whole system becomes weightless, it is
no longer anything but a gigantic
simulacrum - not unreal, but simulacrum,
that is to say never exchanged for the
real, but exchanged for itself, in an
uninterrupted circuit without reference
or circumference.”
― Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation

10. “How many faces, how many bodies can
you recognize, with your eyes closed,
only by touching them? Have you ever
closed your eyes and acted
unconsciously? Or loved someone so
blindly, you could almost feel their
energy in a dark room and be moved by
the powerful touch of their ideas?”
― Jean Baudrillard

11. “How many faces, how many bodies can
you recognize, with your eyes closed,
only by touching them? Have you ever
closed your eyes and acted
unconsciously? Or loved someone so
blindly, you could almost feel their
energy in a dark room and be moved by
the powerful touch of their ideas?”
― Jean Baudrillard

12. “If being a nihilist, is carrying, to the
unbearable limit of hegemonic systems,
this radical trait of derision and of
violence, this challenge that the system is
summoned to answer through its own
death, then I am a terrorist and nihilist in
theory as the others are with their
weapons. Theoretical violence, not truth,
is the only resource left us.”
― Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation

13. “The very definition of the real becomes:
that of which it is possible to give an
equivalent reproduction. The real is not
only what can be reproduced, but that
which is always already reproduced. The
hyper real.”
― Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation

14. The world has become so real that this
reality is only bearable at the expense of
perpetual denial. “This is not a world,” after
“this is not a pipe,” Magritte’s surrealist
denial of evidence itself – this double
movement of, on one hand, the absolute
and definite evidence of the world and, on
the other hand, the radical denial of this
evidence – dominates the trajectory of
modern art, not only of art but also of all our
deeper…

15. perceptions, of all our apprehensions of the
world...The world is the way it is. Once
transcendence is gone, things are nothing
but what they are and, as they are, they are
unbearable. They have lost every illusion
and have become immediately and entirely
real, shadowless, without commentary. At
the same time this unsurpassable reality
does not exist anymore. It has no reason to
exist for it cannot be exchanged for
anything. It has no exchange value.”
― Jean Baudrillard, "Violence of the Virtual and Integral
Reality."

16. What it all means:
Baudrillard in Dr. Phill’s terms…

17. While I’m not sure how I feel about the
person, I am very fond of Baudrillard’s
theoretical work. He is occasionally a bit
to playful, and he and I disagree on love,
on the rights of women, on personal
faith, etc. but…

18. Here’s what he tells us:
• There is no real anymore. We can’t get to
it.
• It doesn’t matter that there is no real.
What matters is that we recognize that
we’re divided from it and how we are
divided from it.
• Those who design/create have the power
to mimic and essentially “make” real (since
there is no real), we must “see” while
knowing we do not see.

19. • Since there is no real, nothing is more
real or less real, really.
• It’s okay not to understand everything;
people who claim they do are just
deceiving themselves
• We– designers and creators– have
more control than we ever thought

20. How does this lead back to our work as a
class? What can Baudrillard do for us?