Jorge Luis Borges once told a myth of the mapmakers of the Roman Empire. The cartographers were commissioned to create the perfect map. They drew a life-sized map, that actually covered, inch for inch, the territory. Exact to the most perfect detail. By the time they had finished the map, the territory had changed and most of the old pieces of the map were rotting.
Jean Baudrillard changed this myth and explained that the most analogous situation to present-day life would be that the territory is actually rotting away underneath the map. That people are confusing map with territory, food with the menu, simulacra and simulation. That people are now taking models of simulated reality of a reality that never existed and blending it with concepts of classical reality. We gamers should experience this as much as anyone.
I've wondered through this concept for many a year, watching. Jean seemed downright pessimistic about such a mixing of real and hyperreal. I must confess that I don't expect great things from it, but I'm not worried yet. In fact, I may be so bold as to characterize this as being one of the most fascinating things to ever happen. I feel lucky it happened in my lifetime, to witness it. To witness a change in conceptual reality, is just amazing. It's a pity but many people don't seem to even realize it's happening. Too close to the problem, perhaps. They don't know what they're missing, it's all quite extraordinary.
Does anyone have any further opinions on this? Is it a good or a bad thing?
-Sin
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