 is new about all this. The human world is by nature full of fictionalization and metaphor and drenched in stories and metaphysical assumptions, much of it contrived by conscious and unconscious design to support the claims of those in power. But never before has a culture been scientifically invented in this way, using the tools of rationalization – including marketing studies and computers – to sell products and a way of life. These tools of rationality extract the essence of our own irrationality – our fantasies, imbued with fears and desires – and give them back to us in the form of their invented worlds. Real experiences and things have been replaced with simulacra – copies without an original. Due to the power of mass media advertising, our relationship to the signifier has changed. Now it hides the absence of a signified: conceals the inability to deliver real satisfaction by cleverly simulating it. Part of our hyper-real lives is the fact that our simulations are more real than real.