Reflecting on Virtual Reality Based on Baudrillard’s Philosophy of Technology

The French philosopher Jean Baudrillard, from a philosophical perspective, engaged in deep reflection on science, technology, and society. While criticizing and deconstructing modernity, his philosophy of technology explored the relationships among technology, objects, and human beings in the high-tech era, and reflected at the philosophical level on the profound impact of science and technology on the development of human society. In works such as *Simulacra and Simulation*, *Fatal Strategies*, and *The Perfect Crime*, Baudrillard deeply analyzed the domination of human beings by science and technology in the “hyperreal” world formed by media and information technology. In his 1995 book *The Perfect Crime*, Baudrillard described the grim situation in which the virtual strangles the real, completing the “perfect crime,” thereby prompting people to ponder the relationship between the virtual world and real existence. “The perfect crime” is an important concept in Baudrillard’s later philosophy of technology. The perfection of the “perfect crime” lies in making people live in this “perfect world” manufactured by technology, so that they are unaware of the crime it commits. Today, when we reflect on the theory and practice of virtual reality, Baudrillard’s concept of the “perfect crime” can provide considerable theoretical resources.

法国哲学家让·鲍德里亚（Jean Baudrillard）从哲学视野出发，对科学、技术和社会进行了深入思考。其技术哲学思想在批判与解构现代性的同时，探讨了高科技时代的技术、物与人之间的关系，并在哲学层面反思了科学技术对人类社会发展的深刻影响。在《拟像与仿真》《致命的策略》《完美的罪行》等作品中，鲍德里亚深入剖析了媒介与信息技术所形成的“超真实”世界中科学技术对人的支配。在1995年出版的《完美的罪行》一书中，鲍德里亚描述了虚拟扼杀实在完成“完美的罪行”的严峻境况，从而促使人们去思索虚拟世界与现实存在之间的关系问题。“完美的罪行”是鲍德里亚后期技术哲学思想的一个重要概念。“完美的罪行”的完美之处，是使人们生活在这个由技术所制造出来的“完美的世界”之中，从而意识不到它所犯下的罪行。今天，当我们反思虚拟现实的理论与实践时，鲍德里亚的“完美的罪行”概念可以提供不少理论资源。

Virtual reality in a broad sense is a “supra-empirical system” that humans create and can live in with digital identities, a digital world that interpenetrates and links with the real world, and a virtual world parallel to and deeply integrated with the real physical world. People imagine possessing in a virtual world what they cannot have in the real world, hope to avoid the problems of the real world and achieve solace for suffering, and anticipate immigrating through digitization to such a “virtual new continent” that “transcends” the real physical world. As a collection of virtual spacetimes in which people can immerse themselves and live, virtual reality is a world constructed by humans, based on reality and born of imagination, and ultimately capable of intervening in and transforming the original real world in return. The development of virtual reality may go through three stages: the first stage is the model-first shift from the real to the virtual (“reality + virtual”), realizing the digitization of the real world; the second stage is the creation-enhancing symbiosis of the virtual and the real (“reality × virtual”), constructing a superimposed virtual world that includes both the products of digital twins from the first stage and the original creations born in the virtual world; the third stage is the “hyper-‘hyperreal’” fusion of the virtual and the real (“reality = virtual”), achieving an “implosion” between the real and the virtual through brain-computer interfaces and the like, where the virtual world and the real world merge into one.

广义的虚拟现实，是人以数字身份创造并能生活在其中的“超经验体系”，是与现实世界相互渗透链接的数字世界，是与现实物理世界平行且深度融合的虚拟世界。人们想象在一个虚拟世界拥有那些在现实世界无法拥有的东西，能够避免现实世界的问题并实现对苦难的抚慰，期待通过数字化而移民到这样一个“超越”现实物理世界的“虚拟新大陆”。作为一个能让人沉浸生活其中的虚拟时空集合，虚拟现实是一个基于现实、生于想象的被人构造出来的世界，并最终能够反过来干预、改造原初的现实世界。虚拟现实的发展或经历三个阶段：第一阶段是模型在先的脱实向虚（“现实+虚拟”），实现现实世界的数字化；第二阶段是创造增进的虚实共生（“现实×虚拟”），构造出既包括第一阶段数字孪生的产品，又含有虚拟世界原生创造物的叠加虚拟世界。第三阶段是“超‘超真实’”的虚实融合（“现实=虚拟”），借助脑机接口等实现现实与虚拟之间的“内爆”，虚拟世界和现实世界融为一体。

Virtual reality may transcend the spatiotemporal determinations of the real world, thereby greatly expanding the temporal and spatial scope of human physical and spiritual activity, realizing a “trans-dimensional existence” for humans, and bringing more possibilities to humanity. From the perspective of development prospects, the rise of the virtual reality industry may affect all aspects of economy, politics, culture, and social life. The participatory and interactive nature of virtual reality can, in certain respects, stimulate human creativity. In an ideal state, its direction of development may align with the characteristics of an “association of free individuals.” [1]1 “Association of free individuals” (自由人联合体) is a term used by Marx and Engels in *The Communist Manifesto* and *Capital* to describe the future communist society, where individuals freely associate and develop under collective control of the means of production. However, regarding virtual reality, we must confront not only issues of technological progress, economic development, and changes in lifestyle, but also engage in reflection at the philosophical level.

虚拟现实或能超越现实世界中的时空规定性，从而极大提升人类肉体和精神活动的时间与空间范围，实现人的“变维度生存”，带给人类更多的可能性。从发展前景来看，虚拟现实产业的兴起或将影响到经济、政治、文化、社会生活等方方面面。虚拟现实所具有的参与性、交互性等，可以在某些方面激发人的创造性。在理想状态下，其发展方向或符合“自由人联合体”的特征。不过，关于虚拟现实，我们要面对的不仅是技术进步、经济发展、生活方式变化等问题，还需要从哲学层面进行反思。

Baudrillard believed that human society has entered a stage of simulation dominated by code: high technology causes the real to collapse, simulacra create the “hyperreal,” and “the distinction between the real and the unreal has become blurred; the unreal surpasses the real, becoming more real than the real.” What we face is not reality itself, but the illusion of the real. If Baudrillard’s theory of the “simulacrum” is regarded as the prototype of the concept of virtual reality, then the “perfect crime” that murders the real can be seen as a kind of prophecy of virtual reality: this crime has neither motive nor criminal, leaves no trace, and attains a state of supreme perfection, to the point of being undetected, while people remain immersed in the “perfect dream” created by technology. “The perfect crime is the crime of creating a flawless world and leaving this world without a trace.” Baudrillard believed this is precisely the most insidious and dangerous aspect of modern technology, a “crystal revenge” of technology against humanity, which will bring disaster to human beings.

鲍德里亚认为人类社会已处于由代码所主宰的仿真阶段：高新科技使真实坍塌，拟像创造了“超真实”，“真实与非真实的区别已经模糊不清了，非真实超过了真实，比真实还要真实”，我们所面临的并不是真实本身，而是真实的幻象。如果把鲍德里亚的“拟像”理论视作虚拟现实概念的雏形的话，谋杀实在的“完美的罪行”或可看作对虚拟现实的某种预言：这种罪行既无动机也无罪犯，没有留下任何痕迹，达到了至善至美的境界，以至于不被发觉，人们还依然沉浸在技术所带来的“完美梦境”之中。“完美的罪行就是创造一个无缺陷的世界并不留痕迹地离开这个世界的罪行。”鲍德里亚认为这恰恰是现代技术最为险恶、最为危险的地方，是技术对人类的“水晶复仇”，会给人类带来灾难。

With the development of virtual reality technology, we have not only failed to escape the dizzying “hyperreal” state of existence that Baudrillard pointed out, but have instead fallen into a “hyper-‘hyperreal’” state of existence within a “real dream.” The goal of virtual reality in the third stage is neither to copy or imitate, nor to replace reality itself with symbols, but to replace the real with digital certainty. The real is no longer the real world itself, but humanity that has already been digitized. At that point, humans will live in a manner akin to a “dream,” and ultimately the disappearance of the boundary between the real and the virtual, bringing about the “hyper-‘hyperreal,’” will transform the real from existence into non-existence. “Nothingness is perfect because it has no opposite.” The perfection of technology will even eliminate the existence of the other—this is the “perfect crime” Baudrillard depicted. But “the crime is never perfect; in the perfect crime, perfection itself is the crime,” because we create an ideal reality that is itself nothingness. If the philosophical question of the past was “Why is there something rather than nothing?” and the philosophical question of today is “Why is there nothing rather than something?” then the philosophical question of the future may be “What is something, and what is nothing?” or even require thinking about “whether humanity lives in a virtual world created by other civilizations.”

随着虚拟现实技术的发展，我们非但没有摆脱鲍德里亚指出的让我们充满眩晕感的“超真实”的生存状态，反而陷入“真实梦境”的“超‘超真实’”的生存状态。第三阶段的虚拟现实，其目标既不是复制或模仿，也不是以符号替代真实本身，而是以数字的确定性取代了真实。真实不再是现实世界本身，而是已经数字化的人类。彼时人类将以一种“梦境”的方式生活，最终真实和虚拟界线消失带来的“超‘超真实’”，将使真实从有变为无。“无是完美的，因为它无有对立。”技术的尽善尽美甚至将消灭他者的存在，这就是鲍德里亚所描绘的“完美的罪行”。但“罪行从来都不是完美的，完美的罪行中，完美本身就是一种罪行”，因为我们创造了一种理想的实在，而这种实在本身却是虚无。如果说过去的哲学问题是“为什么是有而非无”，今天的哲学问题是“为什么是无而非有”，那么未来的哲学问题或将是“什么是有，什么是无”，甚至要思考“人类是否生活在其他文明创造的虚拟世界中”。

The “perfect crime” is manifested not only in the murder of the real, but even more so in the murder of illusion. Baudrillard defined illusion as the inconsistency between the thing itself and its appearance. The three stages of virtual reality development are: the shift from the real to the virtual is the stage of the carnival of illusion, where illusion is everywhere and at all times; the symbiosis of the virtual and the real is the stage of the blurring of illusion, where illusion appears and disappears from time to time; the fusion of the virtual and the real is the stage of the end of illusion, where real native intelligence and virtual native intelligence cannot be distinguished, the virtual is the real, the illusory realm is the real realm, “illusion disappears into all reality,” and virtual existence itself becomes all that is real. “The capacity of the object opens a path for itself through the skills we impose upon it,” stripping the subject of all illusion, stripping the subject of “all connotations of meaning and value.” At this point, humans themselves become a node in the virtual network, become a productive force of reality, and the time of existence is the time of labor. A rigorous technological system can precisely control individuals; seemingly infinitely expanded life experiences are absolutely transparent in time and space, actually creating an absolute mode of control over humans—pure governance of consciousness. For humanity, which has always sought liberation, this is perhaps the true “perfect crime” of virtual reality.

“完美的罪行”不仅体现在谋杀实在上，更体现在谋杀幻觉上。鲍德里亚把幻觉界定为事物本身与表象不一致。虚拟现实发展的三个阶段：脱实向虚是幻觉狂欢阶段，幻觉无处不在、无时不在；虚实共生是幻觉模糊阶段，幻觉时而出现、时而消失；虚实融合阶段是幻觉终结阶段，现实原生智能和虚拟原生智能无法区分，虚即为实，幻境即实境，“幻觉消失在全部的实在中”，虚拟生存本身成为一切真实。“客体的能力通过我们强加于它的技能为自己开辟一条道路”，剥夺了主体所有的幻觉，剥夺了主体“所有含义和价值的内涵”。此时，人自身成为虚拟网络中的一个节点，成为实在的生产力，生存时间即为劳动时间。严密的技术体系可以对个体进行精准控制，看似无限拓展的人生体验在时空上却是绝对透明的，实际上创造了一种对人的绝对布控模式——纯粹的意识治理。对于一直寻求解放的人类来说，这恐怕才是虚拟现实真正“完美的罪行”。

Baudrillard’s later philosophy of technology, although imbued with a pessimistic technological determinism, presciently reminds us of the inherent defects of a highly technological society. This philosophical meditation on the future digital existence of humanity remains of great value today. Today, we actually already exist in a manner of co-presence of the virtual and the real—many people spend more time in the virtual space of the internet than in real society, especially when confronting some widely concerned major events; many people already feel that what they see and hear in the virtual space of the internet is the real world they perceive, entering a state where illusion replaces rational cognition. Whether future virtual reality brings a “perfect world” or executes a “perfect crime” depends on whether we can balance instrumental rationality and value rationality, using technology with “good knowledge” and “good governance.” In the midst of the waves of rapid social change, we must never forget Marx’s warning: “All our invention and progress seem to result in endowing material forces with intellectual life, and stultifying human life into a material force.” [2]2 This quotation is from Marx’s 1856 speech in London, often cited in Marxist critiques of capitalist technology.

鲍德里亚的后期技术哲学思想，尽管充满了悲观的技术决定论色彩，但其前瞻性地提醒着我们高度科技化社会的内在缺陷。这种对未来人类数字化生存的哲学沉思，至今仍富有极大价值。今天，我们实际上已经以一种虚实共在的方式存在着——很多人生活在网络虚拟空间的时长超过现实社会的时长，特别是在面对一些广为关注的重大事件时，不少人已经觉得在网络虚拟空间看到的、听到的就是他们感知到的真实世界，进入了幻觉取代理性认知的状态。未来虚拟现实是带来“完美的世界”，还是实施“完美的罪行”，这取决于我们能否平衡工具理性和价值理性，用“善知”和“善制”来使用技术。在社会急剧变化的浪潮中，时刻不能忘记马克思的警示：“我们的一切发现和进步，似乎结果是使物质力量成为有智慧的生命，而人的生命则化为愚钝的物质力量。”

Online editor: Paul

网络编辑：保罗