The Perfect Crime: Are We Accidentally Erasing Reality?
Are we accidentally erasing reality? Dive into Baudrillard's chilling vision of a world where the digital clone threatens to replace the original.
Today, I'd like to take you on a bit of a philosophical journey. Buckle up, because we're about to dive into some mind-bending ideas courtesy of French philosopher Jean Baudrillard.
One of my favourite Jean Baudrillard books is "Simulacra and Simulation" (1981), which influenced the movie "The Matrix." One of the most overt philosophical references occurs near the beginning of "The Matrix" when Neo stashes his illegal software inside a hollowed-out copy of a book by French postmodern philosopher Jean Baudrillard entitled "Simulacra and Simulation."
I recently came across a passage that summarizes some of Baudrillard's key ideas. While not a direct quote from a single source, it encapsulates his thoughts on simulation and the digital world:
"The perfect crime is that of an unconditional realization of the world by the actualization of all data, the transformation of all our acts and all events into pure information: in short, the final solution, the resolution of the world ahead of time by the cloning of reality and the extermination of the real by its double… There is, in fact, no room for both natural and artificial intelligence. There is no room for both the world and its double." — Jean Baudrillard
These ideas, drawn from various works by Baudrillard, including 'The Perfect Crime' and 'Simulacra and Simulation', have been rattling around in my brain.
At first glance, it might seem like Baudrillard was prophesying a distant future, perhaps influenced by the sci-fi of his time. But despite his passing in 2007, his words resonate more than ever in our increasingly digital world.
Think about it. How much of our lives have we already transformed into data? Our friendships are maintained through social media likes and comments. Our memories are stored in cloud photo albums. Our work, increasingly, takes place in virtual spaces. We're creating a digital double of our world, bit by bit.
But Baudrillard takes this a step further. He suggests that this digitalisation isn't just a harmless copy—it's a "perfect crime" against reality itself. The more we convert our world into data, the more we risk losing touch with the 'real' world.
It's a chilling thought, isn't it? That in our quest to capture and quantify every aspect of our lives, we might accidentally erase the very reality we're trying to preserve.
And what about AI? Baudrillard boldly claims there's no room for both natural and artificial intelligence. As someone who's both excited and wary of AI advancements, this gives me pause. Are we creating our own intellectual successors? Or are we crafting the tools of our own obsolescence?
I don't have all the answers, but I can't help but wonder: in our race to create a perfect digital copy of our world, are we at risk of losing the original?
What do you think? Are we guilty of Baudrillard's "perfect crime"? Or is this just the next step in human progress? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
Until next time, keep questioning reality (or its digital double)!
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The Nature of Morality and Reality in a Simulated Experience
In such a simulation experience, how would you even be able to say that you have a body or a brain?
I do not see myself as only the individual human personality which has grown from the blank-slate default.
I also understand (from the human personality perspective) the idea that a broader aspect of my overall mindfulness/the mindfulness I am involved with, was indeed asked to participate and did indeed agree to participating.
I do not require having any direct memory of that agreement in order to logically trust it did indeed occur.
We don't know and cannot know with any more certainty than logic allows for re that.
The way my human personality regards the issue is to ask myself whether I would trust a "higher moral agent" personally involved in the growing of a human personality (as in a "avatar" re Simulation Theory) and the answer I have come up with is YES.
I don't think I (or anyone mindful at that level of per-human intelligence) would knowingly enter such a reality experience without taking full precautions, so we can eliminate the idea of suffering as pain as some kind of curse placed upon we within said experience.
Thus, the reports to do with NDE take on a significant meaning in relation to agreement, co-creation (of reality experience) and the idea of securing/saving the precious growth moving forward, adds purpose to said experience.