Has anyone read Simulacra and Simulation?

[LandOfAus]

I had read that this is one of the works that inspired "The Matrix" and I'm considering getting into it.  

 

Has anyone read it?  Worth it?  Thoughts?

 

One thing that makes me hesitant is that I finally feel like I've got a really good grasp on an-cap, but the author who wrote this is heavily into Marx.  Any time someone starts talking about Marx, my head just can't take it.  They seem to speak a jargonized language that's been so chopped up and compartmentalized that it's almost impossible to understand what the author is discussing without a PhD in political philosophy.

[ProfessionalTeabagger]

I had read that this is one of the works that inspired "The Matrix" and I'm considering getting into it.  

 

Has anyone read it?  Worth it?  Thoughts?

 

One thing that makes me hesitant is that I finally feel like I've got a really good grasp on an-cap, but the author who wrote this is heavily into Marx.  Any time someone starts talking about Marx, my head just can't take it.  They seem to speak a jargonized language that's been so chopped up and compartmentalized that it's almost impossible to understand what the author is discussing without a PhD in political philosophy.

I recommend watching at least the first couple of minutes of this review. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mllRWv6uSXA

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[lux]

I certainly agree that 99.9% of all self-styled philosophers are sophists, but I think you might be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

 

I have an academic background in philosophy, especially continental philosophy, and here is what I understand: Much of postwar continental philosophy has been quite explicitly a response to abuse and violence, particularly the violence of the Holocaust.  One of the biggest reasons that many continental philosophers of the last century have hesitated to take any concrete stance on moral and even ontological issues is because of the perceived abuse of positive philosophy by violent ideology.  These thinkers have seen, many of them firsthand and in nauseating detail, that if you say that something IS GOOD or IS BAD, or even that something (like God, for example) IS, you can justify all sorts of atrocities on the basis of those assertions.  So why are continental philosophers obsessed with sex, death, and power?  Because the pre-war obsession with morality, rationality, idealism, etc. contributed to the horrors of the 21st century.

 

Personally, I think the lack of courage among continental philosophers to stand up for the good, beauty, and truth--while historically 100% justified--has led to an impoverished state which (continental) philosophy may only just be starting to recover from (and really it's too early to tell).

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