THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT
Reality bites! A phrase to often used to describe the bitter truth of life. It’s not something we want to accept but let’s face it; my childhood dreams of becoming a professional sports star are long extinguished. I’m not tall enough, big enough, fast enough, strong enough, and the list goes on. That’s the reality of it all. Though this is not everyone’s reality. So what is it really? In philosophy, reality is the state of things that actually exist, rather than they may appear or might be imagined. For many of us reality may be getting a job, paying bills, and to be crude, for all of us, the certainty of death. It is not something that we want to face, even though we are repetitively told we must. These are the harsh realities of life.
So why not escape reality, and save ourselves from this dull, distressing life and escape to somewhere that is more exciting, more beautiful, more inspiring, more terrifying, and generally more interesting than what we encounter in everyday life. Well, the fact is, we do just that. We engage in simulations of reality each day, and we do so by choice. For example, dining out at an Italian restaurant we not only enjoy the food but also engage ourselves in the theme of the evening. The interior design with the wall paintings, the dimmed lighting, the smell of garlic and even the waiter with a profuse moustache add to the feeling that we are in Italy when we are not. Thus demonstrating a simulation of reality. These simulations are continuously surrounding us more and more in the growing pop culture of today, to such an extent that whole fake cities and worlds have been constructed, such as Las Vegas and Disneyland, that are designed to represent reality, allowing a person to exist temporarily in a world outside of what is real. Everything inside these areas are simulations of reality, nothing is real, and people are led to believe that everyone is playing along in these fantasy worlds, adding to a dream like feeling. They are created to look absolutely realistic, thus allowing it to be more desirable for people to buy into these realities. But it is all a façade to mask its true existence as nothing more than a set of equipment and apparatus designed to bring imagination and fiction to what is called real.
Simulations of reality not only exist in these ‘fairytale’ like places but all around us, in everyday life. It can be seen in the current cultural condition of consumerism where the reliance on sign value is paramount. Take the ‘Levi’ brand for example, where by wearing these jeans one may be perceived as fashionable or sexy. Or how a Rolex watch can be used to indicate one’s wealth. However, the jeans and the watch itself have little actual value, but rather the status symbol associated with it is how we derive its value. Through the advertisement of different brands, our consciousness is tricked into believing that additional value needs to be assigned according to the simulation of reality that certain products have associated. In addition to this, other examples exist such as McDonald’s ‘M’ arches symbol, which promises to us endless amounts of identical food from the store, but in reality, the ‘M’ represents nothing at all. It can be seen that these examples add to our replicated world, to such an extent that we seek simulated stimuli over the original that they were designed to represent. One could argue that we live in a world where everything is a copy and nothing is real.
This is particularly true in our technologically advanced post-modern society, where simulations of reality are becoming ever more authentic that we can no longer distinguish between what is real and what is not. Real life examples of this can be drawn by pointing to the concept of mediated reality that attempts to alter one’s view of reality through the use of computers and other technological equipment. This interactive technology may allow us to alter our surrounding landscape to a way that we see as more living. As this phenomenon becomes ever more prevalent we may begin to accept these simulated versions of a reality, to such an extent that the simulated version is more valuable and has more meaning to us than the original. This state of being refers to the condition of hyperreality where one’s ability of consciousness to distinguish reality to a simulation of reality is no longer inherent to oneself.
To help explain this concept we will look to several theorists who argue that hyperreality has a viable existence.
So why not escape reality, and save ourselves from this dull, distressing life and escape to somewhere that is more exciting, more beautiful, more inspiring, more terrifying, and generally more interesting than what we encounter in everyday life. Well, the fact is, we do just that. We engage in simulations of reality each day, and we do so by choice. For example, dining out at an Italian restaurant we not only enjoy the food but also engage ourselves in the theme of the evening. The interior design with the wall paintings, the dimmed lighting, the smell of garlic and even the waiter with a profuse moustache add to the feeling that we are in Italy when we are not. Thus demonstrating a simulation of reality. These simulations are continuously surrounding us more and more in the growing pop culture of today, to such an extent that whole fake cities and worlds have been constructed, such as Las Vegas and Disneyland, that are designed to represent reality, allowing a person to exist temporarily in a world outside of what is real. Everything inside these areas are simulations of reality, nothing is real, and people are led to believe that everyone is playing along in these fantasy worlds, adding to a dream like feeling. They are created to look absolutely realistic, thus allowing it to be more desirable for people to buy into these realities. But it is all a façade to mask its true existence as nothing more than a set of equipment and apparatus designed to bring imagination and fiction to what is called real.
Simulations of reality not only exist in these ‘fairytale’ like places but all around us, in everyday life. It can be seen in the current cultural condition of consumerism where the reliance on sign value is paramount. Take the ‘Levi’ brand for example, where by wearing these jeans one may be perceived as fashionable or sexy. Or how a Rolex watch can be used to indicate one’s wealth. However, the jeans and the watch itself have little actual value, but rather the status symbol associated with it is how we derive its value. Through the advertisement of different brands, our consciousness is tricked into believing that additional value needs to be assigned according to the simulation of reality that certain products have associated. In addition to this, other examples exist such as McDonald’s ‘M’ arches symbol, which promises to us endless amounts of identical food from the store, but in reality, the ‘M’ represents nothing at all. It can be seen that these examples add to our replicated world, to such an extent that we seek simulated stimuli over the original that they were designed to represent. One could argue that we live in a world where everything is a copy and nothing is real.
This is particularly true in our technologically advanced post-modern society, where simulations of reality are becoming ever more authentic that we can no longer distinguish between what is real and what is not. Real life examples of this can be drawn by pointing to the concept of mediated reality that attempts to alter one’s view of reality through the use of computers and other technological equipment. This interactive technology may allow us to alter our surrounding landscape to a way that we see as more living. As this phenomenon becomes ever more prevalent we may begin to accept these simulated versions of a reality, to such an extent that the simulated version is more valuable and has more meaning to us than the original. This state of being refers to the condition of hyperreality where one’s ability of consciousness to distinguish reality to a simulation of reality is no longer inherent to oneself.
To help explain this concept we will look to several theorists who argue that hyperreality has a viable existence.