Re: [-empyre-] PATINAGE and TURNBABY by Babel

[Adrian Miles <adrian.miles@rmit.edu.au>]

around the 7/3/05 Edward Swick mentioned about Re: [-empyre-] 
PATINAGE and TURNBABY by Babel that:
>  > I questioned whether there is a viable thing called
> >  the "virtual" in the
> >  sense that the notion of the "virtual" belongs to
> >  that set of ideas
> >  associated with "realism" in representation (eg:
> >  virtual reality).
>
> To keep it simple one might consider virtual to mean
> that a person gets enough information from the virtual
> object to be able to experience as real.  That is It
> can be felt as real- seen as real and perhaps heard as
> real at the same time. Jargon can confuse reason so it
> is best to keep it simple, which may or may not be
> what artists do.  I prefer simplifying not
> complicating. Said with no intent to insult or harm. Ed

coming very late to conversation.

I'd suggest this is problematic, and these days ideas of the 
'virtual' as equivalent in some way with 'real' has been very heavily 
critiqued. (Sorry if this is not what you mean.)

I'd suggest the Deleuzean inspired work that proposes a much stronger 
distinction between the virtual and the actual has established a more 
robust and pragmatically useful approach. The virtual (in a crude 
nutshell) are that set of possibilities available, the actual are 
those possibilties actualised. eg right now in the next few minutes I 
might go to bed, keep writing, go to the toilet, attend to my kids in 
their sleep, put the dog out, change tv channels, etc. This is the 
virtual. The actual is what is actualised. both, however, are real.
--
cheers
Adrian Miles
____________
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