Скачать или смотреть For a General Theory of Simulations

Watch the lecture with the full transcript in the Antikythera Journal at theoryofsim.antikythera.org

From Anthropology to Zoology, from Engineering to Urban Planning, every discipline produces, models and validates knowledge through simulations. Some computational simulations are designed as immersive virtual environments where experience is artificialized. Scientific simulations do the opposite of creating deceptive illusions. They are the means by which otherwise inconceivable underlying realities are accessible to thought: a technology for knowing what is otherwise unthinkable. Simulations are epistemological technologies, and yet they are deeply under examined. They are a vital practice without a vital theory. What would a general theory of simulations look like? In this talk Benjamin Bratton shows what such a theory of simulations would need to account for: shadows, stagings, scenarios, synthetic experiences, models, demos, immersions, ruses, toy worlds, miniatures, and projections.

Shadow Metaphysics
02:10 What Is a Shadow?
03:17 Shadow Boxing Peter Pan
04:21 Plato's Cave
05:18 Shadow Puppetry

Part 1: A General Theory of Simulation
06:44 Models vs. Simulations
07:18 Descriptive, Predictive, Projective
09:07 Reflexivity and Recursion
11:42 Thinking with Models
12:44 Instrumental and Existential Technologies
13:33 Models of Reality
16:34 Black Holes
17:56 Entertainment Engine
20:08 Geopolitics and Simulation

Part 1: Intelligence as Simulation / Simulation as Intelligence
21:12 Cognition as Prediction
23:07 Collective Intelligence
23:38 Dreams
24:44 Simulation Anxiety
26:01 Bending Reality

Part 2: Toy Worlds and Digital Twins
27:32 Toy Worlds
29:20 Virtual Environments

Part 2: Computational Virtual Environments
30:32 Toy Worlds for People
32:19 Baseline Reality
33:23 Nanome: Molecular Simulation
34:02 Augmented Reality
35:25 VR in Cinema

Part 2: Physical Virtual Environments
37:01 Cave of Forgotten Dreams
38:43 Space Exploration

Part 3: Ontological Asymmetry
40:44 Deliberate Obfuscation
42:01 Consider Butters
42:48 Breaking the Asymmetry
43:59 Abnormal Psychology of Simulations
44:54 Trauma and Simulation

Part 3: Political Simulationism
46:20 Simulation as Governance
47:37 Scenario Planning
49:16 Simulation and Counter-Simulation

Part 3: Simulation Before and After Violence
51:15 Anticipating Violence
52:06 Retrospective Causality
53:35 Film as Model

Part 3: Back to the Shadow: Persona
56:27 Digital Identity
58:17 Celebrity as Simulation
01:00:28 Shadow Cities

Conclusion: Simulation Anxiety
01:02:49 Questioning Reality
01:03:57 Art and Authenticity
01:05:01 Simulating Humans
01:07:01 Hawthorne Effect
01:08:33 Deliberate Reorientation