Philosophy In The Matrix

Descartes wonders what else that he can know by using this same logic, but first must establish the idea of God and that God is not deceiving him. He reasons that God exists because he as a mortal could not create the idea of such a powerful being, and only a being as powerful as God could have caused an idea of a God that is perfect. Descartes goes on to reason that because God is perfect, then God would not deceive him about anything. It’s not that Descartes is being deceived, but rather his lack of knowledge or understanding about the matters at hand is causing the problem he is facing.

The Matrix and the Allegory of the Cave focus on one central idea: What is real?. They engage the audience in a fictional world where people live in false realities without knowing it. They make us question our own knowledge. Their storylines connect in that the protagonist discovers that everything he knows is a big lie and now he must discover the truth. The protagonist is thrown all of the sudden into the real world and then, he continues to seek the absolute truth. Neo and the prisoner inquire whether knowing the truth is a blessing or a curse.

The Matrix is a film about the enslavement of humankind by artificial intelligence, sentient beings, with mechanical bodies, created by people to service humanity, and the discovery of a person, Neo, that possesses abilities that can defeat the Artificial Intelligence and manumit humanity. The majority of human beings have their consciousness/minds trapped within the Matrix, a computer simulated world in which their minds are born, live in, and die, while their bodies are connected to it via cerebral connection but, remain in a dormant slumber and are never used. While they are connected to the matrix, their bioelectricity is harvested, powering the artificial intelligence. Neo, with the help of Morpheus (the leader in the resistance

We are blinded, only see shadows, hear echoes, and the world around us is a mere shadow of what truly exists “Hence, the only way to believe oneself to have knowledge is to be simpleminded; those sophisticated enough to see the relativity of everything, but still not wise enough to turn their faces toward the light, can only despair, or delight, in the lack of real knowledge” (BS). In relation to his beliefs are the ideas of the famous Rene Descartes. He doubted the certainty of the external world and came to the conclusion that our senses can’t be trusted. Additionally, Descartes ' stated that you can’t trust your senses because there has been times when you are dreaming or imagining what you have experienced rather than it being real. Certainly it becomes questionable whether in fact we can believe if any of our principles are true. In The Matrix, Neo finds out the truth and answer to his question. The Matrix is just an illusion of the world around and the humans are plugged in by a computer program. Those who are plugged in have never truly saw the world for what is. Similar to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, the humans are prisoners forced to see shadows which are copies of things in the real world. When Neo is finally confronted with the truth he can’t imagine the thought of ever going back. Instead he plans on exposing the truth by revealing how the world they live in truly looks.

After the early 21st century, humans built these machines, which are now held in a nuclear-winter-like setting. Being deprived of sunlight as an energy source, they have enslaved the human race and are farming people as a source of bioelectrical energy. The humans are kept in an unconscious state in podlike containers in a vast holding field, plugged in to a central computer. In the scenario of The Matrix, everything in the world; cars, buildings, cities, and countries are part of a complex computer-generated virtual reality, which within the humans interact. Everything they see, smell and hear is part of this virtual construct and does not really exist. A computer merely stimulates their brains and deceives them into believing that they are all living normal 20th-century lives, eating sleeping, working and interacting together. They are all blinded to the truth about how and why they exist. After a handful of people have escaped from the nightmarish world of the Matrix, they find out the truth and reach out to those still consumed with the falsities of this world. One of these, a man named Morpheus, hacks into the Matrix and contacts Neo, telling him,

The Matrix is the war between man and machine, and the possibility that reality is a deception. In a sense, the Matrix is a constant struggle of identity and reality. This struggle of identity and reality is based around the character of Thomas Anderson, an ordinary person living a mundane life.

breaking down a door and pointing a gun at the head of a woman on a

The matrix, as presented in the eponymous film, operates as an Althusserian Ideological State Apparatus (ISA). The Matrix1 presents a world in which "the state [as] a 'machine' of repression" is made literal where robots rule the land (Althusser 68). It is true that they rule by force (sentinels and agents) and these constitute the Repressive State Apparatus, but their primary force of subjugation is the matrix, their ISA. The film traces the path of one man, Neo, in his painful progress from the ideology of the matrix to the "real world," or the ideology of the "real."2

To understand the analysis of the matrix in this essay, the major characters will be introduced. First is the character of Neo, the anagram of Neo is ‘One’. He is said to be leading double lives, one as Neo, a computer hacker and the other as Thomas Anderson a computer-programmer. Referring back to the bible, Thomas was regarded as the doubting one, while Anderson means ‘son of man’, as Jesus was referred to during his earthly ministry. He later turned out to resist the matrix and save the human race from ignorance.

This first paragraph that begins the story is perfect in showing The Matrix ideas. Humans live in pods in large fields were they are grown. So like in the story they are prisoners even as children and they are plugged into the matrix or "chained so they cannot move." The fire behind the prisoners is like the matrix program it self, it's there to make illusions and make the prisoners think what they see is "real." Lastly there are the puppeteers who make shadows using the fire and create illusions. The puppeteers can easily be linked to the machines that hold the humans as prisoners and make what happens in the matrix happen. Such as the puppeteers make shadows in the fire to trick the humans, the machines do the same thing in The Matrix, it's just in a more advanced and complicated way. The machines create

Deception is the foundational issue prevalent in The Matrix, Plato’s allegory of the cave, and Rene Descartes meditations. In each of these excerpts the goal of answering the question of what is real and how to uncover the truth is essential. Another question that arises throughout all three excerpts is whether or not the individuals will be able to handle the truth when it is finally learnt. In The Matrix Morpheus reveals to Neo that the life he had previously accepted as an absolute reality is really a virtual reality that is manipulated by a computer which is essentially controlling the mind of every individual as they lie unconscious connected to this

The first section will explore how the philosophical question of determining dream from reality is brought up in the movie, Inception. By using scenes and dialogue from the movie, the personal dilemma of determining dream from reality for Cobb will be illustrated. The second section will use Descartes’ Rationalist theory and Hume’s Empiricist theory to examine Cobb’s dilemma and to explain the challenges faced by one who questions whether they are dreaming or in reality. In the third section, the writer of this paper will provide advice to Cobb on how to handle his dilemma of dream versus reality and compare and contrast which philosopher, Descartes or Hume, would agree with that advice. The paper ends with a conclusion highlighting the philosophical question of whether one can determine the difference between dreaming and reality, Cobb’s dilemma of dream versus reality, and how Descartes and Hume would view it.

Imagine living through life completely bound and facing a reality that doesn’t even exist. The prisoners in Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” are blind from true reality as well as the people in the movie “The Matrix” written and directed by the Wachowski brothers. They are given false images and they accept what their senses are telling them, and they believe what they are experiencing is all that really exists. Plato the ancient Greek philosopher wrote “The Allegory of the Cave”, to explain the process of enlightenment and what true reality may be. In the movie “The Matrix”, Neo (the main character) was born into a world of illusions called the matrix. His true reality is being controlled by the puppet- handlers called the machines who

During the film Neo has a hard time equating the magnitude of his situation, he does not believe in himself. Neo felt comfortable in his state before he was unplugged,

The Matrix has been doing remarkably well in sales since its release in the cinema last summer and its recent video releases. This is largely due to stylish advertising techniques and word of mouth. The Matrix has been approved by critics who enjoy the film and also the ones who dislike the theme. Among young viewers, it has already achieved great status. So what else is the film about? Firstly the film copies the theme from many popular films that came before it, and involves intelligent science fiction, a large chunk of action and breathtaking special effects,