What does the film "The Matrix" suggest about the nature of reality, our ability to distinguish between what is real and what is not, and the value of life in and out of the 'matrix'?
The film “The Matrix” suggests that we can never truly know our reality. That we only perceive what is real to us but can never been truly sure that it is what is the “real” world or the “truth”. Roughly it portrays the lives of a group of people who live in a make believe world that is created by a computer system. It is a video game that you play “life”. We are plugged in this virtual world and live out our lives according to the system that designs it that is comparable to a dream world. There are a few individuals that have escaped and are now in the real world outside of the fake video game life. It is a very complex thought and idea to understand. They escaped the “fake” existence that they had for their now “real” life. The interesting thought to go along with it is that they had escaped this first “fake” life and now live in the second “real” life. The thought that is interesting is what is to say that this “real” second life is not just another “fake” life? Is there a third or fourth life and so on?
We are now faced with this question to ourselves, what is real? Is our reality even “real” at all? According to the film we can’t really know what is real at all. We perceive in our own being what our own reality is. The only way we come to any conclusion is when our belief of reality is shared with others. It makes us more comfortable with our beliefs when others share them because we are not faced alone with the possibility of being wrong by ourselves. It feels much better to fail with others than alone. A tool that was used in the movie to perceive reality was that of choice. They offered the idea to Neo, the main character, to find out more about those deep questions he had and presented him with the option, in pill form, to discover his answers. That seems to be woven into the perception of ones own reality. We will believe what we want to. If we think there is more we will try and find that out. When we think that there is not more we will have no desire at all because we really do not believe there is more.
This raises another question that is sometimes entertained by some of us and disregarded by others. Should we even care about the real divine “truth” of all things? What is wrong with living in the matrix world? We believe it to be real and will live out our lives according to our consciousness. We would do the same things if in the fake world as in the real world. Nothing would change besides the thought they “oh hey this is the real world”. In the matrix their thought patterns did not change. If there was an evil force in the matrix I believe they would have fought against it like they did when out of the matrix. The idea of freedom seems to be connected to the idea of reality. So the idea that we are free I believe, thus far, to be one of the only differences between living in or out of the matrix. But if the idea that you are trapped without freedom inside a matrix you would live your life just like outside. It only seems to be question of ethics and what is true and right. For me at this point I would want to live in the real world and not that of a fake one, even if I would do the exact same thing. I want to believe I am free.
The interesting part that was never explained in the movie is how the first person was “enlightened” and discovered that they lived in the matrix and how they were able to escape. Apart from that little hiccup we will never be able to know what is really real and what is not.
In the film "The Matrix" Morrphius convinces Neo that there is more to life than what meets the eye. He helps neo to free his mind. To me the movie suggests that humans have all conformed to life as it is, never stepping outside their "box." We believe only what we can see taste touch and hear is real.
I have seen this movie many times and it has definetly start questioning the world as i know it and what i think/thought was real. Do i think that the movie may be far fethched yes but the fact that we now live in a world that is run by computers and we are making technological breakthroughs everyday do i think the idea of the movie could become a reality, ABSOLUTLY. I wouldnt be surprised if its taking place in the world right now
Kat D. PHI 101 The film shows a concept that reality isn’t graspable even to the extent of using the power of the human brain. Anything is as real as we think it is, and as long as we can believe, we can trick ourselves into making it real. This goes along the lines with the term “power of suggestion”. It’s the same as making yourself sick because you believe you are, or making yourself better with a pill (that doesn’t work) because you believe it will help. Hence the placebo effect. This movie was almost like an extreme video game of some sort. They way you were plugged in and consumed by what you saw. You can do/be anything and that’s the dream you’re living. Why wouldn’t you know the difference from this world to the real world? Well, in the matrix, it’s the way its always been. You live your life. In a sense, this computer world is real because it is there. It exists in some sense. What really interested me was that a few people made it out and began to live their real life. Perhaps no one thought that maybe when they were living their “real life” they were being plugged into another matrix. What if, there is no real world to begin with? Everything is just a matrix. Or there are so many matrixs’ that you become plugged into and it happens over and over and then you believe you are released multiple times, yet you are always trapped. This movie messed with a lot of perceptions on what is real and what is fake and, I believe, that is what makes it so interesting and hard to grasp. Life is something hard to put a value on. But along with reality, it is as valuable as you make it, as you think it is. Through the matrix life has no value. You’re a digital soul, in a digital world not making a real difference in the real world. But once you are “unplugged” you become someone you realizes what is around them and can comprehend such an intense situation. That is where you’re value rises, and it may seem irrational to put a price on life but being forced to look at life in this situation, the value starts when a human becomes adept to the real world.
Bethany Henry-Dicken The film ‘The Matrix’ has had a large influence on the Y2K generation, making people poke their heads out of their nine to five and say ‘whoah.’ Then again, a lot of people just liked the graphics. Regardless of why the subject had chosen to watch the movie, it sticks the question in one’s brain, “Is the matrix real?” Some are truly contemplating this and some are simply toying with the idea of parallel worlds. I believe “The Matrix” implies that there is more on the current plane than you can see; and much more than you can understand. Perhaps this movie is an over exuberant example of a theory that could hold based around the rules of current era common sense. A world very familiar to Native South Americans, and other ritualistic tribes, it is the firm belief of many of these tribes that when one ingests Ayahuasca, an extremely potent botanical brew, that one may attain knowledge of a plant, directly from the plant itself. According to Jeremy Narby, author of “The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge”, when these people ingest these specific psychoactive chemicals, namely dimethyltriptimine [DMT], it unlocks a receptor in your brain that enables your pineal gland (located in your forehead) to pick up the very light photon rays that all DNA puts off. When you pick up these rays you connect with another dimension and bring your knowledge back into the ‘real world’ of sobriety. I believe this is a realistic interpretation of the scenario ‘The Matrix’ presents to the viewer; a world unseen that you live in, when in ‘reality’ there is a whole other dimension surrounding your being, all without your knowing it, unless you CHOOSE to be enlightened. As a human, we can only know what we see, and experience for ourselves. Though, like Descartes theorizes, if your senses fail you once, why not all the time? Granted, common sense and primal nature requires us to rely on our senses, but we as humans have evolved to question, and in this process we have made many discoveries. In the movie, Neo follows the white rabbit and finds himself in a world of doubt and possibility. Searching for an answer to what it was he was living, and what was real. The movie also resembles a dream world, sleeping in hibernation, grown like seeds, sown like crop. Sleeping physical life away, much like embracing today’s media. Blind, dreaming, and leading the way to mass suicide; all the while a world of activity and enlightenment waits. Upon leaving the matrix computer software and entering the year 21??, Neo realizes WWIII has long passed, and he had barely skimmed the rough and scabbed surface of reality. Perhaps this affected his value for his ‘Matrix’ life, the parents and computer programming, the food and sex. It was nothing, therefore there was nothing from that life to appreciate anymore other than simulated pleasure, and I imagine this is why they did not portray the character with much longing for his ‘Matrix’ life after his initial culture shock. And he moved on, he found the revolution to be a greater cause to fight than for simulated pleasure and pain. Then again, Neo didn’t really have much of a choice at that point. He did what all philosophers must do, uncover the truth and live with it because it can be bitter and cold.
The movie matrix is a movie that is based on what we see and believe is reality. In the movie the world we live in is the matrix that everything that we see, feel, smell, and even taste is all that is programmed by something more superior, that there is another world the real world then what we know and are use to. In some way I think the movie is trying to demonstrate that we maybe sometimes need to see our world different and maybe bring some change. Also to question that is what we know or what we see is it reality and how do we know and how sure are we that it is? Also this movie gets me thinking that maybe these movies are made prepare humanity for what the future maybe. I wouldn’t be surprised if the movie has some reality.
The film “The Matrix” suggests that the nature of reality as we know it might not be the truth. The nature of reality in this movie is demonstrated by displaying what mankind takes for granted as reality and the fact that people are willing to accept things as they appear instead of questioning the beliefs of the world. I feel our ability to distinguish between what is real and what is not is derived from our own personal beliefs. Each person possesses their own belief system determining their own reality. Much of what we believe to be real or true originates from our upbringing and what we are taught to believe. The value of life within the matrix is simply that of the value of life we posses in the external world. When we as humans believe in something strongly enough it then becomes our reality whether it is of truth or not, therefore the value to life is possessed both in and out of the matrix. Living within the matrix may be the life we envision to escape from the reality of life outside the matrix.
"The Matrix" is an action film based on Socrates' alegory of the cave from Plato's Republic. The story goes that people raised in a cave, chained to the wall so that they could see only shadows cast upon the wall in front of them, would naturally take the images they see to be reality. If a person escaped from his bonds, he could turn and see that the "real things" he knew were just projections of objects and that what he thought of as light was just the reflection on a wall of a torch set in a bracket. If this freed man were then to crawl out of the cave and peer around in daylight, he would see that even the torch light that he had just discoved was more real than his previous reality, was in itself just a created substitute for the light of the sun. Socrates goes one further. He then says that if that person tries to return to the cave and free his brothers in chains, they will hear his story and call him mad. And if he frees them against their will, they would sooner kill him than allow him to destroy the foundation of their reality.
In the Matrix, Neo learns the lie that he lives, escapes, and just like Socrates' hero returns to free others at his peril. In a sense, we are all trapped in a reality that is merely a reflection of the true world. We pour our energies into work or family, accept the "truths" of religion or political ideology, and will defend our place in these constructions tooth and nail. It doesn't take a philosopher of great ilk to prove that money, politics, religion, and even family values are not universal constants, but are merely constucts we accept to go about our daily lives. Anyone who would disregard one of these "truths" is labelled as crazy; anyone who would fight against them is labelled a heretic, radical, terrorist, comunist, or any one of a thousand slanderous titles.
So if you want out of the Matrix that is the wool pulled over your eyes, the lie perpetrated to sooth you into obedience, don't wait for a savior to shake the foundation of the world around you. You need to do the shaking your self. You are the only one who can choose freedom or acceptance. You must decide what is real and what is a dream.
What does the film "The Matrix" suggest about the nature of reality? The nature of reality in the eye of the beholder. It seems to me after watching the movie that it is all a dream basically you went to sleep and dreamed that you were unstoppable and could jump from building to building. Everyone has there own interpation of what is real and what isn't. If you died in the The Matrix then you died in real life but who's to say the matrix is real or not? I often wonder if the world that we live is real or not or just a figure of are imagination or even just a dream. After all the government I believe determinds what we watch through the day. Do we really have a mind of our own? In the movie if you could feel,touch,taste,smell it was real. I think it just basically comes down to what every individual thinks is real and nothing else matters.
What I get from the film "The Matrix", is that the reality I have is within reach and that I do not need to depend on anothers otherstanding, but by what I have already been taught. We each hold the key to what is real within ourselves weather we want to see it or not it is there sometimes so much so in our face that it makes us the "One".
The Matrix is simply an illusion. It does make you wonder what are you really thinking while your asleep. While in sleep, are you in another world? Why do you wake up before dying in your dreams? I don't believe any of the Matrix can be real based on how Neo learned skills thru software and on the fly. Maybe in our dreams we can do that, but the reality is we control our destiny
The movie the Matrix makes me think of a lot of crazy things even though I think the movie’s rubbish. The characters in this film are fighting a machine, which has trapped human kind in a dream world, as they use their bodies for energy. I think the plot of this story is of course pure science fiction but in a way it does start to make you question reality. In some ways I do believe we have a form of controlled reality in our own society, in which people walk around unaware. In the movie the character Cypher makes a very interesting comment. “Ignorance is bliss”. I believe there are many people who would agree. If u went home today and turned on your T.V., you could probably find a reality show of some form on. People watch these shows to escape from their own life by getting a glimpse from someone else’s. In this attempt to escape they adapt personality traits that in some way mirror the characters. We do not just see this on T.V. shows. Commercials tell us what to purchase by using sex and famous people to influence our decisions. We don’t think we are being influenced but subconsciously we are. When you buy clothes or beer, are you doing this because you like it, or because Paris Hilton wears that outfit or women like men who drink this brand? When we look at what we buy or say, aren’t we looking at who we are? When we begin to look at ourselves, aren’t we beginning to climb the ladder of the question of reality ? Who am I, why do I think what I think, what do I know, can I know anything at all…? There are many other elements out their influencing people and in a way controlling their reality. The Matrix could be real and it is sometimes fun to play with unanswerable questions, but at the end of the day you have to accept whatever reality you have created and move on.
The film “The Matrix” suggests that reality is an illusion created by our minds in order to justify our beliefs and choices. The choice in whether or not to learn more about the ‘true’ nature of existence or to continue to live in a ‘fake’ world is an illusion in itself. If the true existence can be revealed from the fake one, how are we to know that the new, true existence is not simply another illusion to give us the feeling of choice? Also, if life is perceived as real by the individual, what is to say that it is not real?
The Matrix also hints at even if we did know the truth about a false existence, we may find more value in ignorance than in knowledge of the truth. This is displayed in the betrayal of the entire crew of the ship in order to get plugged back into The Matrix. The allure of the false reality was so strong that he wanted to go back into it in order to escape from the true reality.
Like everybody else said, "The Matrix" is the director's vision to explain the thing called "reality". What is the matrix? The matrix is an allegory about life and the societies that run the world behind the scenes. Every day, we look through the superficial eyes noticing only the same concepts of normality. Should we want to step farther into the unknown and try to know more, we have to be willing to give our lives for the end answer! Like sheep being led by their shepherd, we move not questioning authority. The brain sees what the eye misses, either the information gets retained and stored for use or the information gets overlooked. Just because I believe the world is going to end on Dec. 21, 2012 does not mean that the person standing next to me has ever known about the date. Yet, I go through my life believing either he does or he doesn’t know what that date means. The only common denominator in the equation between the two of us is that we are both humans with different views. Is one able to separate itself from the everyday norms to find the answer if everything is unknown?
The film “The Matrix” illustrates the idea that the only thing we know for certain is that nothing is certain. “The Matrix” makes you think “what if;” what if there is something more to the big picture that we are missing. It makes you think that there could be limitations upon us that we cannot see, holding us back from our true potential. In the film, people are shown as almost robots, looking at what is in front of them rather than what is all around them. All we know is the world we have lived in, but who is to say that there is nothing outside, or even inside, our world affecting us. The film suggests that we are so stuck in our own realities that we are unable to see what is really going on around us. What if we were so stuck in our ways that we had no ability to distinguish what is real and what is not? There is still so much that we have not discovered that it makes it hard to know exactly what is real. We have all these limitations and boundaries that have been placed in our minds, but in “The Matrix” people can have blinding speed and incredible strength. Life inside the matrix is one where your mind can be completely free from laws, rules, or sciences; whereas, life outside the matrix is full of boundaries and limitations. This can be applied to real life where we have created our own individual realities, and no one can tell you right or wrong because everything is so uncertain.
There are your perceptions, there are my perceptions, and then there is the truth. In “The Matrix” the line between reality and fantasy is erased completely. This movie suggests that it can be almost impossible to tell the different between what is real and what is not. This suggestion can be applied toward what we know about our reality. Our values in the world we live in might be different than those of others and therefore might actually have no value at all to what really matters in life.
Our views can be changed but reality cannot. Our perception, for a time, is the only thing that matters to us. If we think we are right and there are no opposing facts that contradict us, then by our own logic we are right but our perception of something might only be a small window of the truth we do not know. A good example of this concept lies in the past; the days when people thought the world was flat. Some people believed the world was a repeating loop of continents while many others followed the theory that there was a point where the world dropped off. These are both examples of how what we think we know something that could be completely wrong.
There are many things that can mess with our ability to distinguish between what is real and what is not. In the film, computers could create a world that imitated reality almost perfectly. A real world example of this would be our dreams. Our minds can be fooled into believing what is not real, into feeling what isn’t there, and sensing things that aren’t even around us. When you are dreaming, you can feel the water on the beach when there is no body of water near you. Sometimes, in a dream, you will smell something lingering around your bedroom and falsely cast that smell into your fantasy. Internal and external influences can alter our perception and form a world so close to the real one.
In the film, if you die in the Matrix you die in real life. This gives the world we live in and world that is generated in our mind equal value. In some ways this can be true outside of that movie. How important things are to us may not have any influence on others. A good example of this would be an individual who does community service to make himself feel better versus a gang member who does community service as a punishment. The gang member who is serving his punishment may not really care about the quality of whatever community work he does while the volunteer holds his work at a much higher standard. What we value in our mind is important only to us.
Reality can be deceptive and elusive. There are many things that can mess with our ability to distinguish between what is real and what is not. In the film, if you die in the Matrix you die in real life. This makes life seem much less valuable and the risks we take in life seem small compared to what we could be doing. In the end, only our perceptions matter to us while reality is the ultimate truth behind all the curtains we put up.
In the beginning of the matrix neo was two people Mr. Anderson who was a computer annalist and Neo, a man searching for the matrix and Morpheus. I think this is metaphor for explaining the sixth seance, the ability to fill the world that we cant smell touch or see.
Then Morpheus and Trinity appear and tell Neo that there is a matrix and that the world that he knows is not what it seems, and that he is accusally in a prison. Another metaphor for the physical and spiritual world. an I got to ask the question, the physical world that we know, are we dead in a since that we don't understand the realulty, that there is more to this world then we care to understand, an when we free are minds we change the way we perceive the world around us.
In the movie, “The Matrix,” the reality of the world is presented as an empty-destroyed nature making it an unworthy place to be in. This is when Neo first sees the world he has lived in as Morpheus transports him from his reality. He presents Neo a better way of living within the matrix, encouraging him to discover its freedom and truth. The reality is- not having one and “making” it possible to “choose” your own. Being connected or plugged into such reality you wished for; submerging your mind on doing whatever it wanted without limits, boundaries and rejects. This is what the matrix offered; opportunity of power, greatness, and in to some extent, immortality.
Now, considering value of life, clearly demonstrates that is not much valuable. One becomes enslaved to be programmed, activated and powered -on in order to function and complete whatever task. This makes people dependent of such technology in order to live. It does bring you possibilities where before one would not imagine to perform but can only be obtained by detaching from your reality of human being. You got to learn to let go of almost your whole being and have no limitations within you to prevail. Most important, fears, doubts, anything vague keeping you, like Neo, from completing his mission. It is at the time of his “death” that he understands that the bullets shot at him could be controlled, or perhaps, did not exist at all.
The film presents questions to what is real and/or not. It also demonstrates freeing humans to the truth. A truth that can become an everyday reality that can lead you to want “out” as Cypher wished for. He is a great example of a devalued life he had within the matrix.
The matrix got thinking alot about alot of things about the ifference between the reality of real and artificial. Based on my percecption the reality is something that is alive something that gives live whether its a cell, or something throught the universe. In the film neo is asked do you believe in faith and he responds no, because he doesn't like to give into something he has no control over, like how nowadays many humans have control over their networks, technologies, software, or whatever they can control. although they try over humans ,animals, or plants over and over it's never been done. Maybe because something living requires alot more. but throughtout the film he begins to belive in himself on what he has been told. Along time ago humans had strong beliefs and because of that there was a strong connection between human and the ecological system. No different from the plant and animal kingdom, humans still are apart of the world. Neo then begins to realize that their is something in him that makes him different from the agent programs designed by the machines. his soul that feeds his will is what makes him limitless compared to the machines who are limited.
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20 comments:
Trent Aldridge PHI 101
The film “The Matrix” suggests that we can never truly know our reality. That we only perceive what is real to us but can never been truly sure that it is what is the “real” world or the “truth”. Roughly it portrays the lives of a group of people who live in a make believe world that is created by a computer system. It is a video game that you play “life”. We are plugged in this virtual world and live out our lives according to the system that designs it that is comparable to a dream world. There are a few individuals that have escaped and are now in the real world outside of the fake video game life. It is a very complex thought and idea to understand. They escaped the “fake” existence that they had for their now “real” life. The interesting thought to go along with it is that they had escaped this first “fake” life and now live in the second “real” life. The thought that is interesting is what is to say that this “real” second life is not just another “fake” life? Is there a third or fourth life and so on?
We are now faced with this question to ourselves, what is real? Is our reality even “real” at all? According to the film we can’t really know what is real at all. We perceive in our own being what our own reality is. The only way we come to any conclusion is when our belief of reality is shared with others. It makes us more comfortable with our beliefs when others share them because we are not faced alone with the possibility of being wrong by ourselves. It feels much better to fail with others than alone. A tool that was used in the movie to perceive reality was that of choice. They offered the idea to Neo, the main character, to find out more about those deep questions he had and presented him with the option, in pill form, to discover his answers. That seems to be woven into the perception of ones own reality. We will believe what we want to. If we think there is more we will try and find that out. When we think that there is not more we will have no desire at all because we really do not believe there is more.
This raises another question that is sometimes entertained by some of us and disregarded by others. Should we even care about the real divine “truth” of all things? What is wrong with living in the matrix world? We believe it to be real and will live out our lives according to our consciousness. We would do the same things if in the fake world as in the real world. Nothing would change besides the thought they “oh hey this is the real world”. In the matrix their thought patterns did not change. If there was an evil force in the matrix I believe they would have fought against it like they did when out of the matrix. The idea of freedom seems to be connected to the idea of reality. So the idea that we are free I believe, thus far, to be one of the only differences between living in or out of the matrix. But if the idea that you are trapped without freedom inside a matrix you would live your life just like outside. It only seems to be question of ethics and what is true and right. For me at this point I would want to live in the real world and not that of a fake one, even if I would do the exact same thing. I want to believe I am free.
The interesting part that was never explained in the movie is how the first person was “enlightened” and discovered that they lived in the matrix and how they were able to escape. Apart from that little hiccup we will never be able to know what is really real and what is not.
In the film "The Matrix" Morrphius convinces Neo that there is more to life than what meets the eye. He helps neo to free his mind.
To me the movie suggests that humans have all conformed to life as it is, never stepping outside their "box."
We believe only what we can see taste touch and hear is real.
I have seen this movie many times and it has definetly start questioning the world as i know it and what i think/thought was real.
Do i think that the movie may be far fethched yes but the fact that we now live in a world that is run by computers and we are making technological breakthroughs everyday do i think the idea of the movie could become a reality, ABSOLUTLY. I wouldnt be surprised if its taking place in the world right now
Kat D. PHI 101
The film shows a concept that reality isn’t graspable even to the extent of using the power of the human brain. Anything is as real as we think it is, and as long as we can believe, we can trick ourselves into making it real. This goes along the lines with the term “power of suggestion”. It’s the same as making yourself sick because you believe you are, or making yourself better with a pill (that doesn’t work) because you believe it will help. Hence the placebo effect.
This movie was almost like an extreme video game of some sort. They way you were plugged in and consumed by what you saw. You can do/be anything and that’s the dream you’re living. Why wouldn’t you know the difference from this world to the real world? Well, in the matrix, it’s the way its always been. You live your life. In a sense, this computer world is real because it is there. It exists in some sense. What really interested me was that a few people made it out and began to live their real life. Perhaps no one thought that maybe when they were living their “real life” they were being plugged into another matrix. What if, there is no real world to begin with? Everything is just a matrix. Or there are so many matrixs’ that you become plugged into and it happens over and over and then you believe you are released multiple times, yet you are always trapped. This movie messed with a lot of perceptions on what is real and what is fake and, I believe, that is what makes it so interesting and hard to grasp.
Life is something hard to put a value on. But along with reality, it is as valuable as you make it, as you think it is. Through the matrix life has no value. You’re a digital soul, in a digital world not making a real difference in the real world. But once you are “unplugged” you become someone you realizes what is around them and can comprehend such an intense situation. That is where you’re value rises, and it may seem irrational to put a price on life but being forced to look at life in this situation, the value starts when a human becomes adept to the real world.
Bethany Henry-Dicken
The film ‘The Matrix’ has had a large influence on the Y2K generation, making people poke their heads out of their nine to five and say ‘whoah.’ Then again, a lot of people just liked the graphics. Regardless of why the subject had chosen to watch the movie, it sticks the question in one’s brain, “Is the matrix real?” Some are truly contemplating this and some are simply toying with the idea of parallel worlds. I believe “The Matrix” implies that there is more on the current plane than you can see; and much more than you can understand. Perhaps this movie is an over exuberant example of a theory that could hold based around the rules of current era common sense. A world very familiar to Native South Americans, and other ritualistic tribes, it is the firm belief of many of these tribes that when one ingests Ayahuasca, an extremely potent botanical brew, that one may attain knowledge of a plant, directly from the plant itself. According to Jeremy Narby, author of “The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge”, when these people ingest these specific psychoactive chemicals, namely dimethyltriptimine [DMT], it unlocks a receptor in your brain that enables your pineal gland (located in your forehead) to pick up the very light photon rays that all DNA puts off. When you pick up these rays you connect with another dimension and bring your knowledge back into the ‘real world’ of sobriety. I believe this is a realistic interpretation of the scenario ‘The Matrix’ presents to the viewer; a world unseen that you live in, when in ‘reality’ there is a whole other dimension surrounding your being, all without your knowing it, unless you CHOOSE to be enlightened.
As a human, we can only know what we see, and experience for ourselves. Though, like Descartes theorizes, if your senses fail you once, why not all the time? Granted, common sense and primal nature requires us to rely on our senses, but we as humans have evolved to question, and in this process we have made many discoveries. In the movie, Neo follows the white rabbit and finds himself in a world of doubt and possibility. Searching for an answer to what it was he was living, and what was real. The movie also resembles a dream world, sleeping in hibernation, grown like seeds, sown like crop. Sleeping physical life away, much like embracing today’s media. Blind, dreaming, and leading the way to mass suicide; all the while a world of activity and enlightenment waits.
Upon leaving the matrix computer software and entering the year 21??, Neo realizes WWIII has long passed, and he had barely skimmed the rough and scabbed surface of reality. Perhaps this affected his value for his ‘Matrix’ life, the parents and computer programming, the food and sex. It was nothing, therefore there was nothing from that life to appreciate anymore other than simulated pleasure, and I imagine this is why they did not portray the character with much longing for his ‘Matrix’ life after his initial culture shock. And he moved on, he found the revolution to be a greater cause to fight than for simulated pleasure and pain. Then again, Neo didn’t really have much of a choice at that point. He did what all philosophers must do, uncover the truth and live with it because it can be bitter and cold.
The movie matrix is a movie that is based on what we see and believe is reality. In the movie the world we live in is the matrix that everything that we see, feel, smell, and even taste is all that is programmed by something more superior, that there is another world the real world then what we know and are use to. In some way I think the movie is trying to demonstrate that we maybe sometimes need to see our world different and maybe bring some change. Also to question that is what we know or what we see is it reality and how do we know and how sure are we that it is? Also this movie gets me thinking that maybe these movies are made prepare humanity for what the future maybe. I wouldn’t be surprised if the movie has some reality.
Tareney Frank
PHI 101
The film “The Matrix” suggests that the nature of reality as we know it might not be the truth. The nature of reality in this movie is demonstrated by displaying what mankind takes for granted as reality and the fact that people are willing to accept things as they appear instead of questioning the beliefs of the world. I feel our ability to distinguish between what is real and what is not is derived from our own personal beliefs. Each person possesses their own belief system determining their own reality. Much of what we believe to be real or true originates from our upbringing and what we are taught to believe. The value of life within the matrix is simply that of the value of life we posses in the external world. When we as humans believe in something strongly enough it then becomes our reality whether it is of truth or not, therefore the value to life is possessed both in and out of the matrix. Living within the matrix may be the life we envision to escape from the reality of life outside the matrix.
Posted for Yoseline Castillo:
"The Matrix" is an action film based on Socrates' alegory of the cave from Plato's Republic. The story goes that people raised in a cave, chained to the wall so that they could see only shadows cast upon the wall in front of them, would naturally take the images they see to be reality. If a person escaped from his bonds, he could turn and see that the "real things" he knew were just projections of objects and that what he thought of as light was just the reflection on a wall of a torch set in a bracket. If this freed man were then to crawl out of the cave and peer around in daylight, he would see that even the torch light that he had just discoved was more real than his previous reality, was in itself just a created substitute for the light of the sun. Socrates goes one further. He then says that if that person tries to return to the cave and free his brothers in chains, they will hear his story and call him mad. And if he frees them against their will, they would sooner kill him than allow him to destroy the foundation of their reality.
In the Matrix, Neo learns the lie that he lives, escapes, and just like Socrates' hero returns to free others at his peril. In a sense, we are all trapped in a reality that is merely a reflection of the true world. We pour our energies into work or family, accept the "truths" of religion or political ideology, and will defend our place in these constructions tooth and nail. It doesn't take a philosopher of great ilk to prove that money, politics, religion, and even family values are not universal constants, but are merely constucts we accept to go about our daily lives. Anyone who would disregard one of these "truths" is labelled as crazy; anyone who would fight against them is labelled a heretic, radical, terrorist, comunist, or any one of a thousand slanderous titles.
So if you want out of the Matrix that is the wool pulled over your eyes, the lie perpetrated to sooth you into obedience, don't wait for a savior to shake the foundation of the world around you. You need to do the shaking your self. You are the only one who can choose freedom or acceptance. You must decide what is real and what is a dream.
The film “The Matrix” suggests that we can never truly know our reality.
The film “The Matrix” suggests that we can never truly know our reality.
Takiyah Ross
2/17/2011
PHI 101 PP3
What does the film "The Matrix" suggest about the nature of reality?
The nature of reality in the eye of the beholder. It seems to me after watching the movie that it is all a dream basically you went to sleep and dreamed that you were unstoppable and could jump from building to building. Everyone has there own interpation of what is real and what isn't. If you died in the The Matrix then you died in real life but who's to say the matrix is real or not? I often wonder if the world that we live is real or not or just a figure of are imagination or even just a dream. After all the government I believe determinds what we watch through the day. Do we really have a mind of our own? In the movie if you could feel,touch,taste,smell it was real. I think it just basically comes down to what every individual thinks is real and nothing else matters.
What I get from the film "The Matrix", is that the reality I have is within reach and that I do not need to depend on anothers otherstanding, but by what I have already been taught. We each hold the key to what is real within ourselves weather we want to see it or not it is there sometimes so much so in our face that it makes us the "One".
The Matrix is simply an illusion. It does make you wonder what are you really thinking while your asleep. While in sleep, are you in another world? Why do you wake up before dying in your dreams? I don't believe any of the Matrix can be real based on how Neo learned skills thru software and on the fly. Maybe in our dreams we can do that, but the reality is we control our destiny
The movie the Matrix makes me think of a lot of crazy things even though I think the movie’s rubbish. The characters in this film are fighting a machine, which has trapped human kind in a dream world, as they use their bodies for energy. I think the plot of this story is of course pure science fiction but in a way it does start to make you question reality. In some ways I do believe we have a form of controlled reality in our own society, in which people walk around unaware.
In the movie the character Cypher makes a very interesting comment. “Ignorance is bliss”. I believe there are many people who would agree. If u went home today and turned on your T.V., you could probably find a reality show of some form on. People watch these shows to escape from their own life by getting a glimpse from someone else’s. In this attempt to escape they adapt personality traits that in some way mirror the characters.
We do not just see this on T.V. shows. Commercials tell us what to purchase by using sex and famous people to influence our decisions. We don’t think we are being influenced but subconsciously we are. When you buy clothes or beer, are you doing this because you like it, or because Paris Hilton wears that outfit or women like men who drink this brand? When we look at what we buy or say, aren’t we looking at who we are? When we begin to look at ourselves, aren’t we beginning to climb the ladder of the question of reality ?
Who am I, why do I think what I think, what do I know, can I know anything at all…?
There are many other elements out their influencing people and in a way controlling their reality. The Matrix could be real and it is sometimes fun to play with unanswerable questions, but at the end of the day you have to accept whatever reality you have created and move on.
Stephen Mangrum
PHI101
The film “The Matrix” suggests that reality is an illusion created by our minds in order to justify our beliefs and choices. The choice in whether or not to learn more about the ‘true’ nature of existence or to continue to live in a ‘fake’ world is an illusion in itself. If the true existence can be revealed from the fake one, how are we to know that the new, true existence is not simply another illusion to give us the feeling of choice? Also, if life is perceived as real by the individual, what is to say that it is not real?
The Matrix also hints at even if we did know the truth about a false existence, we may find more value in ignorance than in knowledge of the truth. This is displayed in the betrayal of the entire crew of the ship in order to get plugged back into The Matrix. The allure of the false reality was so strong that he wanted to go back into it in order to escape from the true reality.
Like everybody else said, "The Matrix" is the director's vision to explain the thing called "reality". What is the matrix? The matrix is an allegory about life and the societies that run the world behind the scenes. Every day, we look through the superficial eyes noticing only the same concepts of normality. Should we want to step farther into the unknown and try to know more, we have to be willing to give our lives for the end answer! Like sheep being led by their shepherd, we move not questioning authority. The brain sees what the eye misses, either the information gets retained and stored for use or the information gets overlooked. Just because I believe the world is going to end on Dec. 21, 2012 does not mean that the person standing next to me has ever known about the date. Yet, I go through my life believing either he does or he doesn’t know what that date means. The only common denominator in the equation between the two of us is that we are both humans with different views. Is one able to separate itself from the everyday norms to find the answer if everything is unknown?
The film “The Matrix” illustrates the idea that the only thing we know for certain is that nothing is certain. “The Matrix” makes you think “what if;” what if there is something more to the big picture that we are missing. It makes you think that there could be limitations upon us that we cannot see, holding us back from our true potential. In the film, people are shown as almost robots, looking at what is in front of them rather than what is all around them. All we know is the world we have lived in, but who is to say that there is nothing outside, or even inside, our world affecting us. The film suggests that we are so stuck in our own realities that we are unable to see what is really going on around us. What if we were so stuck in our ways that we had no ability to distinguish what is real and what is not? There is still so much that we have not discovered that it makes it hard to know exactly what is real. We have all these limitations and boundaries that have been placed in our minds, but in “The Matrix” people can have blinding speed and incredible strength. Life inside the matrix is one where your mind can be completely free from laws, rules, or sciences; whereas, life outside the matrix is full of boundaries and limitations. This can be applied to real life where we have created our own individual realities, and no one can tell you right or wrong because everything is so uncertain.
There are your perceptions, there are my perceptions, and then there is the truth. In “The Matrix” the line between reality and fantasy is erased completely. This movie suggests that it can be almost impossible to tell the different between what is real and what is not. This suggestion can be applied toward what we know about our reality. Our values in the world we live in might be different than those of others and therefore might actually have no value at all to what really matters in life.
Our views can be changed but reality cannot. Our perception, for a time, is the only thing that matters to us. If we think we are right and there are no opposing facts that contradict us, then by our own logic we are right but our perception of something might only be a small window of the truth we do not know. A good example of this concept lies in the past; the days when people thought the world was flat. Some people believed the world was a repeating loop of continents while many others followed the theory that there was a point where the world dropped off. These are both examples of how what we think we know something that could be completely wrong.
There are many things that can mess with our ability to distinguish between what is real and what is not. In the film, computers could create a world that imitated reality almost perfectly. A real world example of this would be our dreams. Our minds can be fooled into believing what is not real, into feeling what isn’t there, and sensing things that aren’t even around us. When you are dreaming, you can feel the water on the beach when there is no body of water near you. Sometimes, in a dream, you will smell something lingering around your bedroom and falsely cast that smell into your fantasy. Internal and external influences can alter our perception and form a world so close to the real one.
In the film, if you die in the Matrix you die in real life. This gives the world we live in and world that is generated in our mind equal value. In some ways this can be true outside of that movie. How important things are to us may not have any influence on others. A good example of this would be an individual who does community service to make himself feel better versus a gang member who does community service as a punishment. The gang member who is serving his punishment may not really care about the quality of whatever community work he does while the volunteer holds his work at a much higher standard. What we value in our mind is important only to us.
Reality can be deceptive and elusive. There are many things that can mess with our ability to distinguish between what is real and what is not. In the film, if you die in the Matrix you die in real life. This makes life seem much less valuable and the risks we take in life seem small compared to what we could be doing. In the end, only our perceptions matter to us while reality is the ultimate truth behind all the curtains we put up.
In the beginning of the matrix neo was two people Mr. Anderson who was a computer annalist and Neo, a man searching for the matrix and Morpheus. I think this is metaphor for explaining the sixth seance, the ability to fill the world that we cant smell touch or see.
Then Morpheus and Trinity appear and tell Neo that there is a matrix and that the world that he knows is not what it seems, and that he is accusally in a prison. Another metaphor for the physical and spiritual world. an I got to ask the question, the physical world that we know, are we dead in a since that we don't understand the realulty, that there is more to this world then we care to understand, an when we free are minds we change the way we perceive the world around us.
In the movie, “The Matrix,” the reality of the world is presented as an empty-destroyed nature making it an unworthy place to be in. This is when Neo first sees the world he has lived in as Morpheus transports him from his reality. He presents Neo a better way of living within the matrix, encouraging him to discover its freedom and truth. The reality is- not having one and “making” it possible to “choose” your own. Being connected or plugged into such reality you wished for; submerging your mind on doing whatever it wanted without limits, boundaries and rejects. This is what the matrix offered; opportunity of power, greatness, and in to some extent, immortality.
Now, considering value of life, clearly demonstrates that is not much valuable. One becomes enslaved to be programmed, activated and powered -on in order to function and complete whatever task. This makes people dependent of such technology in order to live. It does bring you possibilities where before one would not imagine to perform but can only be obtained by detaching from your reality of human being. You got to learn to let go of almost your whole being and have no limitations within you to prevail. Most important, fears, doubts, anything vague keeping you, like Neo, from completing his mission. It is at the time of his “death” that he understands that the bullets shot at him could be controlled, or perhaps, did not exist at all.
The film presents questions to what is real and/or not. It also demonstrates freeing humans to the truth. A truth that can become an everyday reality that can lead you to want “out” as Cypher wished for. He is a great example of a devalued life he had within the matrix.
The matrix got thinking alot about alot of things about the ifference between the reality of real and artificial. Based on my percecption the reality is something that is alive something that gives live whether its a cell, or something throught the universe. In the film neo is asked do you believe in faith and he responds no, because he doesn't like to give into something he has no control over, like how nowadays many humans have control over their networks, technologies, software, or whatever they can control. although they try over humans ,animals, or plants over and over it's never been done. Maybe because something living requires alot more. but throughtout the film he begins to belive in himself on what he has been told. Along time ago humans had strong beliefs and because of that there was a strong connection between human and the ecological system. No different from the plant and animal kingdom, humans still are apart of the world.
Neo then begins to realize that their is something in him that makes him different from the agent programs designed by the machines. his soul that feeds his will is what makes him limitless compared to the machines who are limited.
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