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What do you think will become obsolete, in 50 years time?Current notions about privacy and anonymity, particularly when you’re online or in public.In 50 years, people will just assume that they’re being recorded at all times, and that there’s nothing they can do about it, so they just ignore it.Earlier this week, I was listening to an obscure song on YouTube via my phone. The next day, a question about the artist of that song showed up on my Quora feed. Maybe it was a coincidence. Maybe Quora has access to my YouTube history.Or maybe Quora has the ability to listen in on my computer’s microphone, and their computers figured out what I was listening to, and made the connection to a question I might like.Who knows?I’m not going to be paranoid about it though. I have my webcam covered at all times. If they want to listen to me via the microphone, they’ll mostly hear an eclectic mix of music and the occasional sneeze or sigh. I don’t really talk to myself when I’m online.In the future, people will have the same mindset as characters on Star Trek. That is, there’s always a computer listening to you. How else can you just say “computer” at any time and get a response, if it’s not always listening to you?It’s the same with public security cameras and face recognition technology. It’s only a matter of time, if not already possible, that just walking down the street could allow the cops to see every single picture you’ve ever been in online, just by doing a face match-up. That includes “private” photos you sent to someone. It’s naive for someone who sends “private” photos to think they are truly private.Everything you send gets stored somewhere for some amount of time. People who want to, and know how to, can access those things if they wanted to. Period.They’re already trying to write laws that will allow the police to access records from devices like Amazon Echo. In the near future, whenever a crime is committed, there’s a good chance that there’s a recording—either audio or video—of it, if you just look hard enough for it.A loss of privacy and anonymity will be an accepted fact of life, like pollution and taxes. Want to live in the modern world? It’s what you have to do. Don’t like it? Go live like the Amish.

It’s a paid service, costing you $6.95 Canadian per month.Start here: CBC News Network Live Streaming Service.The service is available internationally; you’ll need a connection capable of streaming at 300 ‘KBPS’ [sic] for the video.Typically, they have miswritten the unit, it should be either kB/sec or kb/sec, most likely the latter. Transmission is usually described in [kilo]bits per second, not [kilo]Bytes, which is for storage—and it’s important; the big-B one is at least eight times bigger.Either way, the stream is easy to subscribe to. Go for it!Note that the CBC audio news service is available free, as podcasts:This is the CBC One’s live audio stream from Ottawa:Radio One | OttawaAnd, if you happen to be from Manitoba, here is a localised stream of CBC Radio One live from Winnipeg. Some programmes will be different:Radio One | WinnipegA list of available CBC podcasts: Podcasts | cbc.ca Podcasts | CBC RadioThis is the CBC four minute on-the-hour News audio feed; you’ll get a new programme on this link every hour: http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/hourlynews.mp3This is the RSS feed for the daily, ten-minute news round-up: CBC News: World Report. It only links to a single daily feed and that content changes overnight — you should get a new programme every day.I listen to a lot of podcasts; I drive a truck in New Zealand, and travel through places where there is little or no radio reception.I can recommend others, if you’d like. You’ll need to tell me if you use a ‘podcatcher’ (software for managing RSS information feeds direct from broadcasters) or some podcast service like iTunes.

Is it possible for a single question to bust the Matrix trilogy wide open? Might this question be the one that explains it all?Of course, nothing is so easy. However, Jean Baudrillard's philosophy shows us the Matrix as a real thing in our everyday lives, and not a fantasy.Here's the short answer: Simulacra and Simulation explains how a modern "system of control" comes into being and sustains itself. In paying homage to Simulacra, we witness the Wachowskis mastering complex philosophical ideas. Simulacra author Jean Baudrillard spoke out against the Matrix films with the best criticism of the films that I've read. Yet, like most areas in philosophy, who is correct is not as interesting as how they disagree.I have divided this into 2 sections:Baudrillard's PhilosophyThe Debate over the MatrixBuckle your seat belts...1. Baudrillard's PhilosophyWhat is "real" in a mass-produced society?Baudriliard's work explores the nature of reality in a modern, industrialized society. His simulacra does not mean computer simulations, rather, useful copies or imitations. Quoting Émile Littré:Whoever fakes an illness can stay in bed and make everyone believe he is ill. Whoever simulates an illness produces in himself some of the symptoms.In this way, we might consider a photo as a simulacra of human eyesight, or an audio recording as a simulacra of a live musical performance. A flight simulator is a simulacra of a real airplane. Such simulacra are not real or complete like the originals they copy, but in many ways are just as useful.Simulacra can be abstract as well. Road signs can refer to a real place or simply an idea ("caution ahead"). As User-13743967034596023228 accurately points out, symbols and letters are simulacra. Money is perhaps the most recognized simulacra, such that we sometimes forget that money is utterly worthless except for the value human beings give it - truly an abstract idea that you can hold in your hand.However useful simulacra are, they often become corrupted. Baudrillard broke down simulacra into various stages, depending on how out-of-touch the simulacra is from reality:For example, the Beatles broke up before I was born and I have only experienced their music through simulacra - records, movies, etc. They have never been "real" to me - I have never met them or see them perform. Yet when I listen to their recordings, I find talented musicians, genuine creativity, and a simple yet profound philosophy guiding their work. The simulation is an echo of reality.In Britney Spears I find the opposite. Every part of Britney's career is managed or manipulated - her voice is auto-tuned, her songs ghostwritten, her music heavily processed and engineered. There are accusations of lip-synced performances, plastic surgery, staged romances, etc. If I am a fan of Britney, am I not a fan of a phantom?The System of Control arisesBuilding on this, Baudrillard argues that simulacra possess the ability of self-preservation. Yes, these inanimate objects actually fight to supplant reality. This isn't science fiction, Baudrillard used many examples from real life.When simulacra become useful and popular, systems will arise to produce the simulacra. Demand for movies gives rise to the movie industry, music leads to the music industry, and so on.These industries inherently want to survive - everyone wants a profitable outcome, a guaranteed hit. Photos become photoshopped. News stories turn into puff pieces. Movie crews control every aspect of light, sound, and stage, all to get that perfect shot. Products become so tightly controlled that any random experience or raw talent is slowly lost. We get more Britneys and fewer Beatles.While searching for an example, I discovered I was myself an unknowing accomplice of such systems of control. During a recent day trip, I shared this photo with my friends...... when my real experience was this:In the top photo, I had cropped away the unpleasant realities to present a heightened version of my trip. I had even considered digitally erasing the telephone wires and park ranger. For all intents and purposes, the top photo is a fantasy.But why did I do this? I probably wanted more "Likes" on my Facebook page (both forms of simulacra). Perhaps I wanted more followers on my Instagram feed (again, 2 forms of simulacra).I had fallen down Baudrillard's rabbit hole. The Matrix has me...The Desert of the RealThis loss of genuine experience can become so acute that we lose touch with reality itself - what Baudrillard calls the Desert of the Real.Baurdrillard infamously claimed that Disneyland cannot be fake because the fantasy does not end when one leaves the theme park. Obsession with mythology - the Hollywood Dream Machine - extends in hundreds of miles in every direction. Even the "lands" within Disneyland are homages to other fantasies - the American Dream, the Wild West, Tomorrowland, etc. Disney cannot corrupt what was never real to begin with.The Desert of the Real is the world we find in the Matrix films. Humanity is so preoccupied with living inside a false simulation that the real world is all but an ancient ruin of a distant, forgotten past.Baudrillard has pinpointed the feeling of alienation from modern, mass-produced pop culture. If you find yourself feeling disconnected from your own society, like nothing has truth or permanence, perhaps exhausted from the constant need to separate reality from marketing - you are living out Baudrillard's philosophy.Tricks to enslave us furtherNow things start to get truly interesting. Consider this video, where Hungarian pop singer Boggie become photoshopped before our very eyes:Every feature on Boggie's face is transformed into simulacra, a digital object to be manipulated, copied or deleted. The message here is a paradox - should I feel sad for this woman or happy for her?Baudrillard felt this was a trick, quite common to simulacra and their "systems of control." Boggie is criticizing the same system that promotes her.The trap here is that we image ourselves escaping from these tricks while we actually fall deeper into the fantasy. The desired effect has been achieved, the Systems of Control have won simply by getting us to watch.Baudrillard felt that Watergate was another such trick. The American political system appeared to be rejecting a criminal element, yet Baudrillard felt that Nixon's actions were common to the rest of Washington DC, and Nixon's impeachment was simply an illusion to maintain public faith in government.2. The Debate over the MatrixLet us connect the dots between Baudrillard and the Matrix films:The Machines create the Matrix as a computer simulation for human beings to live inside - a complete yet corrupt simulacra of life.A complex and ever-changing System of Control keep humans trapped inside the Matrix, despite their free will.The Real World lies in ruin, unused for hundreds or thousands of years - the Desert of the Real - while most humans are obsessed with living inside the Matrix.The Machines created the Prophesy of the One as a trick to trap human beings into sacrificing Zion, their only connection to reality.Unfortunately, I cannot summarize the Wachowskis' solution in a single answer because the entire Matrix trilogy is dedicated to it, with all their layers of symbolism and imagery. However, some very clear themes do rise up.Baudrillard's objections to The MatrixBaudrillard felt the Matrix films got things backwards. Instead of removing audiences from illusion, the films draw them further in. In the Matrix universe, reality is the simulation, and The Real World is entirely fantastical. The films criticize people who live in a fantasy by creating a fantasy for them to live in:The radical illusion of the world (Plato's classic Cave Allegory) is a problem faced by all great cultures, which they have solved through art and symbolization. What we have invented, in order to support this suffering, is a simulated real, which henceforth supplants the real and is its final solution, a virtual universe from which everything dangerous and negative has been expelled. And The Matrix is undeniably part of that.As Baudrillard suggests, "The Matrix is surely the kind of film about the matrix that the matrix would have been able to produce," meaning, in terms of the Matrix Universe, the Machines would have created these films as propaganda meant to control us.The Wachowskis evolve the problemI cannot completely agree with Baudrillard. While he is undeniablely correct about the films, Baurdrillard has blind spots of his own.First, Baudrillard evokes a problem which the Wachowskis cannot possibly hope to escape from - any work of fiction is by its very nature unreal. It would be impossible for a movie to explore these ideas, or for that matter, other forms of simulacra like writing or the Internet, even Quora itself. All are "tainted" by the decay of simulacra.Baudrillard mentions his preference for films like Mulholland Drive or The Truman Show (shown below) but truthfully they contain the same problems as The Matrix and Baudrillard is merely expressing a preference for one type of fantasy over another type. He has fallen for the same tricks as our Boggie video, confusing the unreal with real.Objective vs Subjective nature of simulacraMost important, Baudrillard does not explore how human beings contribute to his systems of control. Baudrillard makes a classic mistake, common to philosophers, in discussing his ideas in purely objective terms.Baudrillard completely removes individuals from his writing in order to explore empirical truth. Baudrillard's systems of control are ghost towns where the beings running them are never mentioned or seen. He sees the "machine" but not who built it, or who runs it.In contrast to Baudrillard's obsession with the objective, the Wackowskis attempt to resolve the subjective problems of simulacra, by exploring how our human minds might be the very reason why simulacra has any power at all. In a movie, we can actually watch a human being (like Neo) interact with this philosophies first hand.It is not that we are enslaved to our media. The wiser observation is that these works of art occur entirely in our head. Our eyes might see the movie, but it's our minds which understand it.There is no chicken and egg paradox here - the mind clearly creates the simulacra, and stops using it if the simulacra no longer serves it's purpose. We need not fear simulacra because it is our minds that create the fear and the simulacra both. From the simulacra arises the system of control, and yet we are in the driver's seat all along. Perhaps this is all part of the beautifully burden of being a human being.