1
Reflecting on the nature of the architectural profession, Picon regards it as the practice of transition between the virtual and the real (pp.295-296). If, in addition to this, we consider Alberti’s argument that an architect should be making drawings of buildings, then the domain of the profession is that of potential space; of events in stand-by mode. In this light, how do BIM programs, which bridge intention (drawing) and reality (end-product) seamlessly, render the architect a maker again?

According to Foucault, subjectification is the process through which an individual turns his or herself into a subject. Here, Picon suggests that nowadays the process of subjectification happens through information and communication technologies as “the individual is defined to a large extent by his or her capacity to be hooked up to giant networks” (pp.310). Worth noting is that this technologically enabled subject, the cyborg, embodies a full acceptance of the world as it is. Later, Picon concludes that “the new virtual dimension of architecture is synonymous with the possibility to participate fully in the development of the world”(p.311). However, who will contribute to this participatory world-making? Is the cyborg actually capable of participation, or is it merely a passive spectator?

2
Baudrillard elaborates on the politics of simulacra through medical, military and religious examples. He then traces the way the image becomes a simulacrum through the successive ways it deals with reality (pp.368): At first, it reflects it, then it distorts it, it conceals its absence and it finally becomes a ‘reality’ in and of itself. In his examples, Baudrillard focuses in the ways institutions craft images to manipulate perception of what is real. However, throughout history images have not been exclusively institutionally produced. What about images that are individually produced? Or images that are not even man-made, but natural phenomena assigned with meaning? How was the imaginary fueled by natural signs interpreted as fate or god-sent?