Philosophy, Reality and The Matrix

securitas writes "The NYT discusses The Matrix as a reflection of American society, the 'war on terror', political allegory and the impact of The Matrix on contemporary philosophy. NPR provides streaming audio conversations with Matrix thinkers, including Jake Horsley, author of 'Matrix Warrior: Being the One'; Prof. Frances Flannery Dailey on violence in the Matrix; and Prof. Greg Garrett, co-author of 'The Gospels Reloaded' and why he doesn't like the kind of hero that Neo has become. Finally, the CSM follows up its The Gospel According to Neo with an online chat transcript with Josh Burek, the author of the essay." As if that's not enough Matrix Philosophy, Here's more and Still more. And just a warning, clicking on any of those links might spoil the movie for you.

Comments

Is Matrix replacing Star Wars?

[TheGrayArea]

I wonder, is the Matrix replacing Star Wars as our great "moderm" myth? There were many of the same religiously themed comparisons of the Star Wars saga during it's heyday, and we appear to be seeing much more with the Matrix. Could it be that the Matrix taps into the current generations sense of "myth" better than Star Wars did for my generation?

Re:This is going to be instantly moded down

[Planesdragon]

Repeat after me, "The Matrix is a plot device, There is no deep philisophical meaning."

Bullocks.

EVERY great story, from Shakesphere to Comic Books, is great because it says something. The Matrix has as much a "philisophical meaning" as anything else that's ever been written--that is to say, the authors mean it to say something, and they pull it off with a fair bit of success.

Just because you're biased against movies doesn't mean that the Matrix isn't "deep." The fact that professional philosiphers can discuss the Matrix with a straight face should be enough to wipe away any prejudice against movies.

Re:This is going to be instantly moded down

[Otter]

But PLEASE people, It's just a movie, in the history of movies it's "pretty good" but it's not "great."

Well, it's an extremely influential, trendsetting movie in terms of costume, style, camera angles, effects and fight choreography. But I agree with you that this obsessing over its philosophical underpinnings is embarassing.

Junk Food for the Mind

[Stalyn]

The Matrix and its philosophical connotations I like to compare to candy or junk food. It tastes good and its fun to eat but its not really filling and too much of it makes you sick.

Real philosophy is boring, arduous, difficult to read and difficult to understand. The Matrix cuts down philosophy in small tasty bites easy to digest and easy to understand. Yet you shouldn't take the Matrix seriously. You have to understand its just a movie and really its there to entertain you. Its not there to show you that reality is an illusion therefore you should quit your job and try to jump off buildings.

There is nothing wrong with suspending yourself from reality and enjoying some good tasty philosophical junk food. But it's dangerous to never come back from that suspension.

Re:Junk Food for the Mind

[hobbesmaster]

Shakespeare wrote to entertain his audiences. The famous greek philosophers and playwrights wrote to entertain their audiences. Beethoven, JS Bach, Mozart, etc wrote their music to entertain his audience.

Why can't a modern movie designed to entertain this modern audience not be at the same level? Will secondary school English classes 200 years from now be analyzing 'The Matrix' as current students analyze 'Romeo and Juliet'? Its something to think about...

Re:Junk Food for the Mind

[hobbesmaster]

Heh you should rethink your premise.. that the Matrix is the same level of art as Shakespeare... Beethoven, JS Bach, Plato, Aristotle, ... etc. Sure I love the Matrix, its a great movie but I think its pop-culture art not art like Shakespeare.

But Shakespeare's plays, Beethoven's Symphonies, JS Bach's masses, etc. were pop culture art, just as The Matrix is pop culture art today. Now whether The Matrix will be viewed as profound in the future will determine whether its truely on the same level. Its just something to think about.

Re:Junk Food for the Mind

[Sycraft-fu]

"Real philosophy is boring, arduous, difficult to read and difficult to understand"

I really get angry when I hear things like this. People that seem to think for philsophy to be "real" it has to be impossable to read. No it doesn't. The reason so much philsophy is so dense is two fold:

1) You get a lot of philsophers that are, to put it plainly, pompus and think a dificult writing style makes them look more intelligent.

2) However more importantly is that most of the philsophy you get in intro courses is really, really old. People just used to speak and write differently than they do now. Like Locke, for example, isn't all that hard to read once you can program your mind to accept his style of writing. It is just real different from what you are used to.

Now that doesn't mean that all philsophy has to be or is that way. Read some good, modren philsophy. My favourite example is John Searle. Even though I disagree with most of what the man writes, he is very famous and very, veyr clear spoken. His arguments are easy to grasp and what he says is important. His Chnese room argument I think is idiotic BUT it has been a very important counter argument to strong AI and sparked a whole lot fo talk.

Also, just because something isn't a straight out philsophical paper, doesn't mean that it isn't valid for provoking thought and raising idealogical questions. Just don't let yourself get trapped into thinking that soething has to be difficult to be good philsophy.

Re:Junk Food for the Mind

[jfengel]

I'm in the unusual position of being both a hacker and a Shakesperean actor. So I'm going to indulge myself on the subject of Shakespeare for a moment.

Shakespeare was clearly popular entertainment of the day, and not everything that dropped from his pen was Great Art. I don't mean the low, ribald comedies; I mean Pericles and Cymbeline and others.

Even his greatest works usually need to be trimmed of some fat. Shakespeare's audience understood the language natively, so his actors could speak faster than I should. His Romeo and Juliet fit into two hours; it takes me longer than that to perform a cut-down version.

And yet, I think you really need to perform Shakespeare to see why people think he's so great. It's difficult to describe, but the words just feel good on your tongue. You'd think it would be hard to memorize an hour's worth of text in a slightly foreign, sometimes over-florid language. But it usually isn't. It sticks in your mind like a good Monty Python line. You just can't get it out of your head.

I grew up despising Shakespeare because all I'd done was read it, under duress. That's the worst possible way to deal with it. It's meant to be performed. You should see it performed, not by Olivier or somebody else performing for your parents or grandparents.

And not by your high school, either, since the student plays are rarely educated enough to mean more than reading it. You need to find experts who love the plays and who will show you why they love them so much. The right community theater, or the right professional troupe, who really understands why these plays are good and aren't just repeating conventional wisdom ("Hamlet's a great play and you're going to sit down and watch me do it, dammit.")

Even better, go out and perform them yourself. It's easier than you think.

Thank you for your time if you've bothered reading this, and not modding me too far down if you don't care.

a quote from the chat

[Anonymous Coward]

Josh Burek: There's no question that comparing Neo to Christ is, at a minimum, a stretch. Which is precisely why the perception that the two are somehow equivalent is so fascinating. Christians who've seen the film seem to have very mixed feelings about the movie's message. There's a lot of allusions to "truth," but very little emphasis on morals and ethics. One film expert I talked to suggested that the very fact that Christians are so eagerly embracing "The Matrix" as a modern parable of Christ's story suggests deep insecurity.

Coming from someone (Josh Burek) who has serious theological training and years of analysis of christian theology, it is far more accurate than most of the articles, interviews, books and posts about the movies. Unlike christianity, eastern religions believe in cycles and doesn't take a bipolar perspective. christian religions believe the world and life is linear, which leads to the idea that things are either good or bad, right or wrong. Eastern religions take the perspective the line between everything is slippery. Opposing forces are always pushing back and forth to maintain a balance. Violence is a necessary part of the cycle; therefore there's no problem that Neo loves to fight and shoot guns. In bhuddism, truth is not a constant state, like heaven. Truth or enlightenment is seeing the greater picture. The greater picture doesn't necessarily mean not fighting.

Re:This is going to be instantly moded down

[nEoN nOoDlE]

I agree with you... The Matrix is just a plot device, but you can take any movie and use it as a basis for explaining real philosophical points.

I read the Philosophy of Star Trek awhile back and the author didn't make any claims that the writers intended to put deep meaning into the episodes but he did use Kirk's actions in some episode, for example, as a good starting point to delve into the basics of, say, existentialism.

I doubt that the Wachowski's didn't realize that they were throwing in philosophy into the script. I read an article where Hugo Weaving had to ask the brothers what German Philosophers he had to read to understand certain segments of the script , but those slight allusions to real philosophical constructs is a good starting point for professors to base their lessons on.

What better way to get kids into religion than saying "You see, Jesus was the One, much like Neo in the Matrix?"

Re:Geez...

[Planesdragon]

Can't a good, fairly well-written action movie just be a good, fairly well-written action movie?

Yes, but The Matrix isn't just a good, fairly well-written action movie. It's a great, very well-written movie with meaning and action.

This isn't like we're turning The Terminator into a religion--the meanings everyone is finding in The Matrix were put there on purpose.

Not Surprising Though...

[EXTomar]

Lucas is actively rejecting the mystical nature of the original Star Wars. The last two movies barely talk about the theology and the philosophy of The Force. Why is the light side of the force better than the dark side? Why are anything the people in the story doing right or wrong? Instead he concentrated on wall to wall action.

Instead The Matrix appears to actively looks at issues and still includes a lot of action. What is wrong with having humans in the Matrix? Why is having a false reality presented bad no matter how comfortable it is?

At this point I'll watch and think about The Matrix movies far more than Star Wars.

Re:Not Surprising Though...

[letxa2000]

At this point I'll watch and think about The Matrix movies far more than Star Wars.

At this point the only thing I'll think about the Matrix is: "Why did I spend 30 dollars on tickets and snacks to watch it?"

[Very minor spoilers below]...

I know The Matrix has a cult following so I'll probably be modded down, but... I couldn't even remember the first Matrix when we went to see Reloaded last night. After about 20 minutes I more or less remembered the whole setting, etc. First hour or so was pretty boring... seemed like a mix of Planet of the Apes crossed with some drugged out rave (yes, we are free humans and immediately become some degenerate mob dancing like apes underground), Star Wars ("It is our destiny" seemed just ripped out of Return of the Jedi, even the way it was spoken), mixed with Terminator 2 (exploding building that contains important stuff), and some kind of mystical Harry Potter fantasy type of thing (where a character asks a simple question and the other character avoids answering it in a direct fashion but just answers in some psuedo-esoteric, mystical way).

The action in the last half was kind of cool, but no more so than any other action movie. The plot was almost non-existant and I didn't really leave the movie knowing anything particularly new about the "Matrix" and the position of the human race was not particularly different at the end than the beginning... seemed like a useless Harry Potter movie to me... where you just spend a couple hours watching silly mini-stories of 5 to 10 minutes one after another that don't really have anything to do with the real plot of the story.

Oh well... there was nothing else to see at the movies so that's what we saw. The hot dog bun was even a little dry. :)

Re:Not Surprising Though...

[TheRaven64]

On the other hand, the part where The Architect was talking about all of the evil of humanity and the screens behind him kept flashing up pictures of Dubya were kind of cool.

I'm just waiting to the entire film crew to be charged under the Patriot act...

Re:This is going to be instantly moded down

[east coast]

"Just because you're biased against movies doesn't mean that the Matrix isn't "deep.""

Just because someone doesn't think that the matrix is deep doesn't mean they're biased. You're another one of those people who seem to think that only they know what is good and whats not and anyone who likes a different movie/music/book than you somehow lacks something as a human being. That's pretty unfortunate.

"The fact that professional philosiphers can discuss the Matrix with a straight face should be enough to wipe away any prejudice against movies."

Professional philosophers? That's real bright. Beleive me, these people have nothing up on anyone else. The fact that they do this for a living should clue you into something. People who get paid to think of what life might mean... That's pretty rich. And even a used cars salesman are going to tell you that a 1984 Chevy Celebrity will "bring you the ladies" if he's able to make a buck doing it, with a straight face none-the-less.

chill out

[rizawbone]

I'm really tired of people equating the Matrix with christianity. I think it's a disservice to the movie to compare it with a thousand pages of confused hallucinogenic gibberish.

I'm really tired of people, in a flash of teenager-esque omnipotence, dismissing something they don't understand as worthless.

Mod me troll if you want, I'm not christian in any shape or form, but to marginalize a belief system is pretty ignorant. If you think the bible is 'confused' or 'hallucinogenic' (the bible causes hallucinations? wouldn't that make it really powerful and meaningful?), you really should quit your amateur theology now before you stumble upon anything outside western culture.

Oh well there goes my karma...

Worthy of discussion

[cmason32]

It's interesting to me that people hold the Matrix up to such high standards. Regardless of whether you find the philosophy within the Matrix intriguing or dull, one has to recognize that it has indeed caused a lot of discussion - something very few action movies can do.

There is no doubt that the movie was influenced heavily by religious and philosohpical ideologies. And whether offerred as merely a plot device or something more, it has led to numerous papers, forum discussions, and newspaper articles - all free advertising for the movie.

So it's either the brilliant mix of theology and philosophy into a cutting-edge action movie or a great marketing ploy.

Or both.

Re:Philosophy of the Matrix

[Overly Critical Guy]

If you want an intelligent discussion of philosophy, read a book you lazy fucks.

That statement at the end proved to me that you are simply a trendy counterculturalist who can't stand the fact that some action movies may also have some meaningful references behind them that people enjoy. Because they're popular in our culture, you can't let yourself into these films because you'd feel like a vulnerable conformist, so you must play the part of the snobby philosophist who feels threatened that people are talking about the purposely placed philosophical references in some popular films. "Ugh! It's not a book, it's an action movie! My whole worldview is threatened!"

It's sad in a way that you are so insecure. If you really didn't care about the movies, you wouldn't care about people liking them either.

Everybody knows it's an action movie with people in leather. It's also fun to discuss the intended philosophical meanings and implications behind many of the scenes, philosophical meanings that experts in the field are discussing with a straight face--in BOOKS.

Next.

Those who think Matrix is totally deep...

[danielrm26]

...will be disappointed.

Rather than a high-level and deep Science Fiction story, this series is going to be proven in the end to be a collection of cool concepts all rolled into a great package. That should *not*, however, be confused with deep Science Fiction.

Let me tell you what would be cool. We find out at the end that the entire movie was nothing but a simulation run by humans (or computers perhaps) designed to find/create/improve AI. That would be cool. But what this ending would do is alienate the large majority of viewers, and frankly, I think it's too high-level for the brothers to do. It would fill all the holes and make it rock (to me and other geeks), but it would make the whole thing suck for those who aren't into Sci-Fi heavily.

What they *are* going to do is go along the line of Smith being the Devil (makes a choice, falls from above, tries to take over), and Neo being the Christ and God figures to varying degrees, and they will battle it out. They are *not* in a second Matrix. Neo stopped the sentinels because he is part machine now - he simply gave them commands somehow. He is going to become one with the machine I think, and he is going to be working to unite man and machine again, while Smith tries to tear it all down.

So, what we are left with (if it goes the way I have described) is a series of major plot holes - problems that serious Science Fiction people cannot ignore:

-The human/battery/enerty thing (humans can live for years with a mostly dead brain in real life and support a body just fine - why the elaborate Matrix just to keep the mind going when it is unecessary?) Answer: You can't have the movie otherwise.

-Their take on future prediction (what are they asking us to believe - that there are supernatural powers as well? Is this Fantasy or Sci-Fi?)

-Notice that only the proper amount of force is ever applied in a situation. In the freeway scene, were they trying to kill anyone? How can an agent be stationary relative to Trinity and empty a clip and not hit her once? Why not make everyone in the vicinity into agents and ram the shit out of them? Why not take over an F-14 and rock them with some Hellfire missiles? Answer: Either the whole conflict was fake on purpose, or the whole thing was fake on accident. Either way though, there wasn't really any effort to kill anyone on the freeway otherwise they would have been dead. So the question is just whether that is a planned part of the movie or a stellar fuckup. I think b. You can't generally have good action without these perfect balances of good-guys vs. bad-guys, but in Science Fiction, *SCIENCE* should dictate some things. If a computer was trying to kill them folks on the freeway, and they had the resources that they have demonstrated all through the first and second movies (or *should* have given the situation), they would dead mofos. There wouldn't be these little applications of force here and there when it is convenient - it would be an overwhelming and deadly ammount of "fuck you up" applied with extreme predjudice. That is what a comptuer would do. (ever played SC on the high level AI? Computers know how to add and combine force to kill stuff - the fact that they don't do so in the Matrix requires some explanation)

-Another thing, the speech by the Architech - they have GOT to be kidding. The entire conversation could have taken place in around a fourth of the time. Why use all the big words and draw it out? Answer: To make it seem very deep - hiding from the average viewer the fact that the whole story is full of contradictions. The duped walk away saying, "That was deep." The geeks walk away saying, "What a load of shit."

So, all that being said, the Matrix is still awesome no matter how it turns out. Ideally I'd be completely wrong and the brothers would suprise me and bust out with something totally cool that makes sense. Unfortunately, that isn't likely, but either way, I'll be in Atlanta at an IMAX theater at the first showing.

In short, make no mistake, the Matrix is an AWESOME movie series - just don't make it into something it isn't.

Re:Those who think Matrix is totally deep...

[_xeno_]

(Spoilers, duh)

In the freeway scene, were they trying to kill anyone?

No, they weren't trying to kill anyone. Just put a good show of doing so, to manipulate the Zion people into attempting to gain access to the Source.

Don't forget what the Architect told Neo - he was the sixth One to be born. They basically now know that their Matrix is imperfect and a One will always continue to be created. Hence, they created a system that utilizes that to their advantage to maintain control.

This system involves accepting a 1% group of humans that go off to form Zion. Once this "resistance" group is born, they must be allowed to fight a battle against the Agents of the system, who are there both to provide an enemy but also to ensure that they never truely succeed. (After all, why can people be unplugged from the Matrix at all? Why not just immediately Agent-ize them? (Why dump them in a pool, alive, and ready to be picked up?) Because a canidate to be freed is already know to the Machines, and they are more useful outside the system than within.)

The Machines knew that they could not kill the Keymaker - his task was not complete yet. So they needed to put up a good fight so that the One could sweep in and save the day. But the fight had to be winable by the One. It's possible that the Agents themselves do not know this, and that they are just further tools of the Architect and whoever he serves.

The Machines are more than capable of whiping out Zion. They are more than capable of destroying the hovercraft and avoiding the EMP. (Hence the bomb being used to destroy the craft in this movie - it keeps the Sentinels outside of EMP range, while forcing the ship to either dodge or EMP prematurely and then be destroyed by the surviving Sentinels while it's dead in the water. It makes sense that they were always capable of this, and always capable of destroying Zion. They were only waiting until the One reappeared, so they could restart the process.)

I don't think you're giving the Wachowski's enough credit. While I do agree that this will not be the greatest or deepest work ever created, I think they deserve credit for bringing a relatively deep and complex plot to the screen. If there's enough action, I think people will be willing to watch, even if the don't understand the deeper meanings.

Re:Matrix

[alext]

Thank you for this important contribution. Many of us would have previously been unaware that all Arab states were totalitarian, or indeed that Arab states and Muslim states were synonymous. And regarding the universal intolerance of other religions, one dreads to think what might have happened if it had become known that Iraq's former Deputy Prime Minister was actually a Christian!

Heaven forbid that we should descend to the level of making sweeping remarks about cultures we know little about! And is it too much to ask that Slashdot not limit the plaudits we can confer on such incisive comments to merely 'insightful'? Surely a new category of 'revelatory' is justified, nay, demanded, for postings such as these?

Re:This is going to be instantly moded down

[mikedaisey]

I can't tell if he's biased against movies, but I agree that the Matrix isn't particularly deep--it's a good excuse to put Anime action on the screen, wear cool clothes and whip out Philosophy 101 phrases.

Professors are discussing it because it is popular, not because it has brought any new insights to anyone--the same folks discuss the meaning of Star Wars and The Force when that broke big.

Movies are a tremendous medium, and I very much enjoyed the first Matrix movie, but at the end of the day I think it is much more a well-executed plot device and setting than anything that shines real light on our reality.

That's fine with me...so far as I'm concerned, i wish RELOADED had stayed further away from bad, stagey speeches and stuck with action and mystery.

Re:For anyone doubting the deeper meaning of the f

[Overly Critical Guy]

I'm sure some of it is on the money, but that doesn't obviate the larger problems--we don't care about the people in a real way, the writing is super clunky, the acting is pretty poor... ...but to the guy at Mofo, it's all because the "unenlightened" don't realize the subtle brilliance.

Okay, so your problems aren't the philosophy, but instead the movie's presentation. I thought your argument was about the philosophical underpinnings? Turns out you just don't like the movie period. It all makes sense now.

Like I said, there are people who just hate to like popular films. Some website points out the obvious philosophical references in the movie, and now you mock him for ignoring the "larger problems," of which you never mentioned or seemed to have a problem with in the first place. I love misinformed bias because it is so easy to point out.

Next.

Re:Geez...

[CharlesEGrant]

I will go see almost any piece of junk that Hollywood puts out. However, I was very pleasantly suprized when I saw "The Matrix". I had expected something like "Tron", but when Neo took the red pill and was delivered into the "real world". I thought "Holy cow, the writers must have read Stanislaw Lem's "The Futurological Congresses!". So I went for the eye candy buy stayed for the homages to Lem and Gibson.

IMHO the Matrix movies are not serious discussions of the nature of reality and free will. That would be too didactic. However, I think that the movies use the existance of those philisophical questions to acheive the suspension of disbelief needed for good story telling. That is why I put the Matrix movies a cut above most action movies which depend on unexplained, unmovtivated, miraculous events so they can get to the chase scene as quickly as possible (the above mentioned Tron being a heinous example).