1. A new virtual reality. In the passage, it talks about how we, as humans have come accustomed to the paradoxical world of virtual reality and my question, is why? The passage mentions how virtual reality was started due to the world wars and conflicts which is interesting at that fact but due to humans also being perceptive and used to war as well (due to the inevitability of war) are humans then programmed to also fall in the world of virtual reality as well. In my opinion, being a millennial, we have been exposed to these technologies at an adolescent age that essentially with time and practices it becomes 2nd nature to us. I think that was the intentions for our generation and it has so blatantly shown that we can fully grasp VR and somewhat just ordinate it in our ordinary lives. Will humans un-see VR? will we acknowledge its new accomplishments only fixate on its failures. How can we come so accustomed to something that is still a novice in its lifetime?
2. Hyperreal and Imaginary. “Disneyland is presented as imaginary in order to make us believe that the rest is real….when in fact all of the America surroundings is no longer real, but of the order of the hyperreal and of simulation.” Does this statement question our system as a whole? Disneyland being real or not isn’t the main concern, The main concert and or question is if “America” is not real as well then what is? more explanation would be helpful.

01_Baudrillard_pg366_The author talks about dissimulation and simulation; to dissimulate is to ‘feign not to have what one has,’ and simulation is to ‘feign to have what one hasn’t.’ He then puts forth the example of the patient who fakes illness can sometimes generate the symptoms. I’m reminded slightly of Benjamine’s concept of aura and authenticity; Is a simulation a work of art? Does it have an aura if it fundamentally misinterprets or misrepresents reality? is it a soul-less copy, even if it is accurate? Am I reading too much into this?

02_Baudrillard_pg369_‘Disneyland is there to conceal the fact that it is the “real” country, all of “real” America, which is Disneyland. I’m confused as to how Disneyland is the ‘real’ and Los Angeles is no longer real. How does this example relate to the broader concepts of simulation discussed?

03_Picon_pg307_‘The aim of the architect is no longer to propose an alternative, and allegedly better , world but to take the world as it is; to contribute to the further actualization of its potential rather than bring about the advent of a remote utopia.” I’m curious to know what the group thinks of this statement. I agree with it, and see much of my own design style summarized by it. Is the current state of design to optimize the world that already exists? or is this a step back, a safe and superficial wall of data and metrics to justify our reasons for design?

Q1: From Antoine Picon, “Architecture, Science, Technology and the Virtual Realm”:

pgs. 310-311

Picon states that ‘Hyperreality is meant for the cyborg”, describing this concept as fictional, something perhaps belonging to the far future. Given the highly integrated and proliferated the use of technology has become (in the 14 years since this writing), to what extent have we become ‘cyborgs’ now?

Q2: From Antoine Picon, “Architecture, Science, Technology and the Virtual Realm”:

pg.301

“If we do not actually see structures, we perceive them through the combination of visual and muscular intuition…Combining the eyes power of appreciation with kinesthetic sensations, this type of understanding is a cultural construction”

Is the reconstruction of these conditions the ultimate goal of virtual reality? If so, what are the limits we would impose on this when technology makes this feasible?

Architecture, Science, Technology And the Virtual Realm by Antoine Picon

1. The idea that globalisation has somehow affected Architecture’s sense of scale is interesting to me. In last week’s reading Principles of Self-Organization Ashby mentions how before the computer, systems of medium-size complexity were not achievable, as everything was either as simple as the watch and the pendulum or as complex as the human and the dog, thus rendering us unable to completely understand dynamic systems. In a way he was talking about scale, in terms of the amount of information. Picon speaks of scale in the more traditional sense, whereas with advancements in technology we can observe phenomena in both the macro and micro-scales. And, according to Ashby, it is the computer which has enabled us to study these complex dynamic systems. But how will this “blurring of the very big and the very small” change how we produce Architecture, or has it already?

2. Picon refers to the suspension of the traditional scale of perception and the intensity that it generates as hyperrealism. In Simulacra and Simulations Jean Baudrillard also uses this term to refer to another reality beyond the real which is usually hidden by different power structures. How are these two definitions of hyperrealism related? How are they different? I am just wondering what is meant by this term in both essays?

Simulacra and Simulations:

(Page 373)

“The established order can do nothing against it, for the law is a second-order simulacrum whereas simulation is a third-order simulacrum.”

What does Baudrillard mean by second- order and third- order simulacrum?

(Page 370)

“As much as electrical and nuclear power stations, as much as film studios, this town which is nothing more than an immense script and a perceptual motion picture, needs this old imaginary made up of childhood signals and faked phantasms for its sympathetic nervous system”

The ‘imaginary stations’ as Baudrillard calls them, are they second order or third order simulacrum? What is the significance of these imaginary stations like Disneyland in the urban fabric, that makes him say the above statement.

Architecture, Science, Technology and the Virtual Realm:

Are, order and proportion used as variables in the parametric architecture that shapes its dynamic behavior? Does this mean that computation is just a framework that uses the same basic principles of architecture like order, proportion, structure and similar, but opens up possibility of dynamic forms and mechanisms, augmenting the static aspect of architecture?

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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?

“Simulacra and Simulation”
“It is no longer a question of the ideology of work- of the traditional ethic that obscures the “real” labour process and the “objective” process of exploitation- but of the scenario of work.”(P375)

1.Nowadays, we already use robot replace labour force, is any possible the robot can replace the human, just like a movie called “Surrogates”.

“Architecture, Science, Technology and the Virtual Realm…”

“What is the reality of an architectural design? It is precisely a virtual reality. Through the maze of its determinations, design makes the actualization of an intention possible.” (P.296)

2.How architecture play a role in virtual?

“The blurring of the very big and the very small, and the crisis of scale that is its main consequence, tends also to reflect the fundamental evolution of our society. Specialists often say that globalization is characterized by the suppression of the intermediaries between the global and the local, between worldwide organizations and individual.”(P.308)

3.When reality and virtual boundary are blurring in the world, what influence on society?
In the virtual reality is any dimension can we measure?

1 – Architecture, Science, Technology, and the Virtual Realm – On page 303 Picon talks about the “destabilization of form” and continues to explain how in the past, Architecture was the end point of a body of research, which creates equilibrium, and the building form “dominates the movement”. In contrast, he says that architecture today can never achieve this when generated on the computer because there is no end. I’m not entirely sure what “dominates the movement” and his comparison of dance and flow to architecture means. In addition, I would like to under stand his point of view further, as I’m not sure I agree. Why cant a computer generated building also have been the end result of research?

2 – Architecture, Science, Technology, and the Virtual Realm – On page 309 Picon says “Digital architectural forms truly belong to this context of globalization………they evoke two apparently contradictory terms: landscape on the one hand, texture on the other.” I understand the relationship of globalization and landscapes, but I don’t see how texture relates to globalization. Also is this to say that landscapes and textures are somehow opposites, or simply the two most notable topics?

3 – Simulacra and Simulations – On page 373, Baudrillard gives the example of simulating a hold-up after first declaring that a simulation is more dangerous then the real thing. after giving the bank robbery example, is he saying that simulations cannot occur unless under isolated conditions because the “established order” will always interfere? Is the significance of this, that when reality and simulations are merged, neither remains real/true to themselves?

1 – Architecture, Science, Technology, and the Virtual Realm – On page 299, Picon is discussing how structure is a dynamic virtual reality. He talks about the tension, and how we don’t see the structure, just the assembly of parts. Does Picon mean that we never see the forces which stress the structure, and which the structure has to act against? Or is he talking more about the design of the structure and its embodied intent or thematic layout as envisioned by the designer?

2 – Simulacra and Simulations – What does Baudrillard mean by “the models” which symbols and the hyperreal are based off of? Is it the “real” which existed before the symbol, or is it something made in reference to the real, a middle step before the simulacrum?

3 – Simulacra and Simulations – He goes into great detail about describing the “real” through the simulations, for example Disney World or Watergate. However, he describes how these things don’t actually show us reality, but just serve to define how we live in a hyperreal environment. In this case, is Disney World a simulation as well, or a model? Or is it somehow more “real” than what we describe as reality?

1. Pinche : p304/5 “One of the most disconcerting features of virtual reality is that it seems to be synonymous with a high degree of arbitrariness. in other words, nothing can not guarantee the designer that his project is the best possible choice.” A couple thoughts on this. I’m not a particular fan of the current vogue for “VR-everything” in tech circles, and I have lingering doubts about the validity of 3d animation being anything special or unique. In large part this is for this ‘arbitrariness’, but there’s a different way of looking at this too. If these virtual spaces are nothing more than a ‘stop’ in an ‘endless geometric transformation’ aka animation, then is it not a new way to look at the image? We can look at these moments as captures from a larger flow that are not necessarily an end, but rather a new point of departure.
2. p 310 : “Computer generated architecture is about the unstable reality of infinite connections.” A lot of this article reminds me of Deleuze’s arguments from Cinema I and Cinema II, probably because Ive been reading those this last week as well. However, a simplifies reading of his idea of time could be beneficial here. The present manifests itself as reality. The past and future are always realigning themselves in relationship to the present as virtual. When we generate a ‘virtual’ model in a machine, we’re actually making that space real on one level. This can become something else in the future, or we can change the perspective on the past (both virtual images) based on this real present. So it might be helpful to think instead of the ability of the real (the computer generated architecture) as a destabilizing force on the past and future.
3. Baudrillard, p. 372
   

   “For example: it would be interesting to see whether the repressive apparatus would not react more violently to a simulated hold-up than to a real one? For a real hold-up only upsets the order of things, the right of property, whereas a simulated hold-up interferes with the very principle of reality. Transgression and violence are less serious, for they only contest the distribution of the real. Simulation is infinitely more dangerous since it always suggests, over and above its object, that law and order themselves might really be nothing more than a simulation.”

   If this act of transgression is no different from the real, how do we conceptualize a truly transgressive act that can reposition our understanding of reality? In a ‘post-truth’ era, where there is not fact that can’t be challenged on feeling, how can we re-establish a foundation of factual realism?

As an aside, this video about the uncanny valley seemed to be appropriate to the topics at hand.