Where to begin

Perhaps with a quick note on the title of the blog. "This world" is joined to Westworld in a number of different ways, the most obvious being contrast -- Westworld is an amusement park based on an imaginary past, while this world is, well, everything else. This world, then, is the real world, so-called, while Westworld is just a mockup, a very elaborate simulation, albeit a physical or "analog" one rather than a digital ruse as in, say, The Matrix or Ready Player One. And yet, Westworld also functions as an analogy to our real world, almost as an allegory of it, though it will take a few more posts to say how. And then, on a deeper level, there's a sense in which Westworld undermines any idea of transcendence, or of other, "higher" worlds or levels, leaving us precisely with this world.

What that might mean is the point of this blog.