葉啟政

Chi-Jeng Yeh

天命、技藝、天命、技藝、愛比米修斯的過失、個人化、延異

destiny, technique, the fault of Epimetheus, individualization, differance

迅速發展的傳播媒體科技，做為一種彌補人類天生之「缺陷」的技藝，以「體系化」的理性方式營造著象徵符號。此時，不但真實與虛擬的界限日益模糊，而且圖像與聲音並用的意念呈現方式，帶來非線性的統覺想像和感覺，這使得人們產生輕飄的惰性感。在這樣的情況下，歷史「死亡」，以恆也被懸擱，這正是持具個人主義所支撐之厚重的啟蒙理性瓶生出來的一種輕飄的歷史命運。

The contemporary liberal capitalist society has been visibly embodied with “individualization” as its structural logic. Enforced by the highly developed mass media technique (such as TV, internet), a gigantic “cultural industry” is formed into a system in which symbol becomes a valuable commodity and is systematically manipulated through a rational way. Furthermore, it promotes “the social” to make consumption endorsed with its own nature and social logic in function as well. As long as symbolic consumption constitutes as a social mechanism carrying a unique cultural significance, the distinction between real and virtual becomes blurred and eventually unnecessary. However, the combination of image and sound as the form of presentation embedded in electronic mass media creates a situation in which, instead of a linear mode of rational thinking, a nonlinear form of appreciative imagination plays a primary role in running people’s daily life into a manner of lightness. Human being is thus committed to a destiny in which history is dead and eternity is suspended.