Admit it’s cool. Admit — even if you see it as the self-promotional, commercialized stunt it obviously is, even if you cynically view every “live” aspect as a perfectly constructed, no-risk proposition — that it is a unique, compelling spectacle.

What is most amazing about David Blaine’s latest stunt — staying underwater for a week in a bubble in the middle of Lincoln Center and then attempting to hold his breath for a world-record nine minutes before he emerges — is that it confounds me as a cultural critic.

On one level, as many of the cynical viewers in this New York Times article seem to assert, we want to call it an empty gesture, the perfect symbol of our spectacle-without-substance culture

But, on another level, I am drawn to it because of its “reality” — or at least its illusion of real trauma. It’s as if Blaine, through the extremity of his act, is attempting to break through the hardened veneer of our an audience that believes only in irony and the symbolic.

Then again, as I sit half-watching ABC’s 2-hour special, the manufacturing of the spectacle, the endless glorification of Blaine as “Superman,” and the endless, blatantly hypocritical concern with Blaine’s “troubling” heath reports makes any facade of substance slip further away with each passing minute.

Obviously, ABC has little invested in the real. You realize they can turn anyone into a David Blaine, if necessary.

Which brings up another sobering fact: these Blaine spectacles get only decent, not blockbuster ratings. Many more people, it seems, can tune this out than miss a CSI episode.

So why am I still watching? Ah, I haven’t yet revealed my own death-defying stunt. I’m going to watch ABC’s entire faux build-up to Blaine’s finale …. but I’m going to turn it off before it happens.

What do think that means?