With Turing machines that think the world, with Lacan’s language that thinks the ‘real’, with Barthes’ language that signifies the world, with the optical apparatus’ images that witness the 'real', with the gramophone - the sound of the ‘real’, and with the computer pictures that simulate the ‘real’, the legacy of modernity’s obsession with representation and its apparatuses resides between illusion and alibi. As Zizek reminds us, the issue is not between reality and simulation, but within the reality of illusion itself. This talk will take aim at the ‘reality principle’ as the core tragedy of a culture inebriated by a desperate illusion.