Jean Baudrillard, a French philosopher and social theorist known for his provocative commentaries on consumerism, excess and what he said was the disappearance of reality, has died, his publishing house said. He was 77.
Baudrillard died on Tuesday at his home in Paris after a long illness, said Michel Delorme, of the Galilee publishing house.
The two men had worked together since 1977, when Oublier Foucault (Forget Foucault) was published, one of about 30 books by Baudrillard, Delorme said.
Baudrillard, a sociologist by training, is perhaps best known for his concepts of ``hyperreality'' and ``simulation.''
Baudrillard advocated the idea that spectacle is crucial in creating our view of events -- what he termed ``hyperreality.'' Things do not happen if they are not seen to happen.
He gained fame, and notoriety, in the English-speaking world for his 1991 book The Gulf War Did Not Take Place. In the first Gulf War, he claimed, nothing was as it appeared.
The public's -- and even the military's -- view of the conflict came largely through television images; Saddam Hussein was not defeated; the US-led coalition scarcely battled the Iraqi military and did not really win, since little was changed politically in Iraq after all the carnage. All the sound and fury signified little, he argued.
The Sept. 11 attacks, in contrast, were the hyper-real event par excellence -- a fusion of history, symbolism and dark fantasy, "the mother of all events."
His views on the attacks sparked controversy. While terrorists had committed the atrocity, he wrote, "It is we who have wanted it ... Terrorism is immoral, and it responds to a globalization that is itself immoral."
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