What is a simulacrum: definition and meaning

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:40

The era of postmodernism in literature was marked by the emergence of new terms and concepts. One of the key was the simulacrum, the concept of which was developed by such thinkers as Georges Bataille, Jean Baudrillard, Gilles Deleuze. This concept is one of the key concepts in postmodern theory.

Definition

If you answer the question "What is a simulacrum?" in simple terms, it is a copy of something that does not have the original. Also, this concept can be characterized as a sign that does not have a designated object. When explaining the concept of a simulacrum in Russian, it is often said that it is a "likeness of a likeness" or "a copy of a copy". This concept itself appeared quite a long time ago - back in antiquity. Over time, many philosophers turned to it, changing or supplementing its meaning.

History of the term: antiquity

This concept was introduced by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. In his understanding, a simulacrum simply meant an image or a reproduction: a picture, a drawing, a retelling.

Used the term and Lucretius, he translated the concept of eicon with this word(similarity, display) introduced by Epicurus. For these two thinkers, it is an inconspicuous element that comes from the body. Lucretius believed that simulacra are of three types: appearing from the depths to the surface, emanating from the surface and visible only in the light, fantasies created by visions.

Middle Ages

The theological writings of this era say that man - God's image and likeness - becomes as a result of the fall only an image, in fact a simulacrum. Icons were also perceived as images of God, however, there was controversy on this issue: someone perceived such an attitude towards the icon as idolatry (Eusebius of Caesarea), and someone defended iconography (John of Damascus).

New time

Philosophical thought of this era was aimed at the knowledge of reality and getting rid of everything that interfered with this knowledge. According to Francis Bacon, such a hindrance was the so-called idols, which a person either created himself or assimilated (for example, a theater, a family, a city). An idol is a phantom, a mistake of the mind.

Thomas Hobbes associates them with the work of the imagination and with dreams. In modern times, the doctrine of images and idols was also developed by such thinkers as H. Volf, A. Baumgarten.

The most famous philosopher of the New Time Immanuel Kant had his own position. He denied fiction, not confirmed by experience, but at the same time recognized the significant role of the imagination in the work of the mind.

The era of postmodernism

In France, the philosophers Alexandre Kojève, Gilles Deleuze, Pierre Klossovsky, Georges Bataille are also activedeveloped the concept of a simulacrum. In Bataille's interpretation, this is the result of displaying in a work of art, the word "mystical", sovereign life experience.

Deleuze sought to overthrow Plato's theory, in which, as he believed, the simulacrum is simply an erroneous model. The simulacrum, in Deleuze's understanding, is an unsuccessful copy that gives rise to the illusion of similarity. It contradicts the image and is identified with elements of extraneous nature. The philosopher called this phenomenon "the triumph of the false pretender." The simulacrum itself can produce its own copies and lead to a mimicry of reality, creating a hyperreality.

Philosophers of postmodernism have turned to this term to show that art and creativity is the creation of images that express a person's state of mind, far from reality.

The term was given a new meaning by Jean Baudrillard, who also applied it to social reality.

What is a Baudrillard simulacrum?

The philosopher believed that this term can be called a socio-cultural phenomenon that acquires an ambiguous and inauthentic character. The philosopher transfers the definition from ontological and semiotic categories to reality. He tried to explain the simulacrum as the result of the process of simulation - the emergence of a hyperreal phenomenon with the assistance of models of the real, which do not have "its own origins and reality." Its property is the ability to hidelack of reality: for example, the state is a simulacrum of power, and the opposition is a protest.

Similarities and differences between Deleuze and Baudrillard

Both thinkers believed that the modern world is full of simulacra, which makes it difficult to see reality. Philosophers, although they relied on the term that Plato introduced, advocated the so-called "overthrow of Platonism." Both of them also noted the serial reproduction of simulacra.

The fundamental difference in understanding what a simulacrum is for these two philosophers was that for Deleuze it was an exclusively theoretical concept, while Baudrillard saw the practical application of the term in the socio-cultural life of society. Philosophers also differ in the meanings of the concepts "imitation" and "simulation": for Deleuze, these are fundamentally opposite concepts, and Baudrillard connects them, calling imitation the first stage of simulation. Baudrillard also sees the development of the simulacrum, distinguishing three stages depending on the historical era. For another philosopher, the simulacrum is static. There is another fundamental difference in the relation of the simulacrum to truth: in Deleuze he denies it, in Baudrillard he replaces it. As for the movement of the simulacrum, opinions also differ here: Baudrillard believes that the simulacrum moves and develops linearly in history, Deleuze - that it is cyclical, always returning to the starting point of development.

Four stages of image development according to Baudrillard

Simulation, according to the philosopher, is the final stage in the evolution of the image. In total, Baudrillard distinguishes four stages:

Basiccopy of reality. This could include, for example, a photograph or a video.
Distortion and alteration of reality, such as a resume of a job seeker.
Faking reality and hiding its absence. A symbol that hides the absence of what it symbolizes.
Dissolution of all ties with reality. The transition of a sign from the category of meaning to the category of simulation, turning into a simulacrum. If at the previous stage its function was to hide the absence of reality, now this is not necessary. The sign does not hide the absence of the original.

Three orders of simulacra according to Baudrillard

Each era had its own type of copy. They changed in accordance with the change in the law of values.

Fake is a type of simulacrum that existed from the beginning of the Renaissance to the Industrial Revolution.
Manufacturing is the predominant species during the Industrial Age.
Simulation is the main type of modern reality.

The first type of simulacrum depends on the natural laws of value, the second - on market value, the third - on the structural laws of value.

There was no Gulf War

This work is a collection of three short essays by Jean Baudrillard, which very clearly illustrates his understanding of the concept of a simulacrum. In the titles of the works, the philosopher refers to the play "There was no Trojan War" by Jean Giraudoux ("There will be no war in the Gulf", "Is there really a war in the Gulf", "War inthere was no bay").

The author refers to the Gulf War. He argues that this event was not a war, since well-armed American troops almost did not attack Iranian ones. Almost nothing is known about the casu alties on the opposing side of America. People learned about the fighting through the media, which did not make it clear which events happened in reality, and which were distorted, exaggerated, stylized.

The main idea of this collection is to show people how modern media replace reality. The ability to tell about an incident in real time makes the story about it more meaningful and important than the event itself.

"Simulacra and Simulation" by Jean Baudrillard

This is one of the most significant treatises of the philosopher. In this work, he explores the links between reality, symbols and society. There are 18 chapters in the treatise. Any of them can be described as a separate work.

It is noteworthy that a quote was chosen for the epigraph, referring to the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes and explaining what a simulacrum is:

A simulacrum is not at all what hides the truth, it is the truth that hides that it does not exist. The simulacrum is the truth.

But, in fact, this phrase is absent in Ecclesiastes.

Main ideas of Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulations:

Postmodernism is a time of widespread simulation. Reality has become a model, the opposition between sign and reality has disappeared.
Modern Baudrillard society has replaced the reality with an image and a symbol, therefore, all the experience that humanity has received is a simulation.
Society is so overflowing with simulacra that any meaning seems unimportant and fickle. The thinker called this phenomenon “the precession of simulacra.”
There is a shift from the signs that mask the phenomenon to the signs behind which it is not. This marks the beginning of an age of simulation where there is no God and no judgment.
When the era of simulation comes, history is transformed into mythology, the past becomes a fetish. History breaks into the genre of cinema, not because of the need to reproduce the events of the past, but because of the nostalgia for the reference that was lost with the advent of hyperreality.
Cinema tries to achieve complete, maximum identity with the real, but only coincides with itself.
Information not only does not coincide with the essence of the phenomenon, but also destroys it, neutralizes it. Instead of inducing communication, instead of creating meaning, information only simulates them. By these processes, according to Baudrillard, the media achieve the collapse of everything social.