RB Eco

Learning about Audio-Animatronics is the kind of thing I do at 3 am when nothing is on TV but the History Channel’s Modern Marvels. Walt Disney’s favorite president, I learn, was Abraham Lincoln. Recreating the Great Emancipator became Disney’s obsession, and the result is magic.* Animatronic Lincoln recites “The Gettysburg Address” in a way the Emancipator himself never could. Like a robot.

“The pleasure of imitation," writes Umberto Eco, "as the ancients knew, is one of the most innate in the human spirit.” This quote’s context in “The City of Robots” gives the word “spirit” an ironic spin. Eco’s essay has an M.-Night-Shyamalan-style twist toward the end. Not only are Disney theme parks full of animatronic robots, they’re full of living robots—the people.

The amusement park is a false reality created to falsify within the consumers a desire to spend. Therefore the only thing that is real, according to Eco, is merchandise. Amusement parks are three-dimensional advertisements we pay in order to be apart of the advertisement itself.

The three-dimensional advertisement’s financial success has resulted in its duplication all over the world.** “The pleasure of imitation” is motivated and enhanced by profit. And Honest Abe helps sell tickets.

* Disney magic.
**Even France.