I still don't understand "The Matrix"

[Chukchi Husky]

Some believe that the power generation thing was just a side dish, and the Machines have some other reason for keeping us arround. Like guilt, or compassion.

The world was a mess after the war too.

 

[Sidhe]

Some believe that the power generation thing was just a side dish, and the Machines have some other reason for keeping us arround. Like guilt, or compassion. We did some terrible things to them in the past, they put us in our place, but they wouldn't quite go all the way with it. As Smith says right back in the original, the first Matrix was built as a paradise, but people didn't fit into it. Not the sort of move you'd start with on a people you unquestionably hate.

That's not very logical, it makes sense that to keep your humans alive and functioning as long as possible you need to keep them happy, they may well with a limited understanding of figured perfection was the best way to do this.

It's fairly clear that the war or at least the original one was an attempt to anihilate mankind and vise a versa. It's a week point in the film. I also agree the philosophy isn't exactly profound too. It's interesting enough I guess. But it's a side line to the plot really. Throw in a few seemingly deep messages to add the aaaaaahhhhhh factor, it's all part of show biz. Watch enjoy, it's not going to affect you on a profound philosophical level, even knowing exactly what the script writers were thinking. It's at heart an action movie with a nicely developed idea. Not an allegory of man machine interaction. Reminds me of all the deep philosophical crap they read into 2001 most people have stopped short of philosophicaly analysing it though, probably because it doesn't and isn't meant to have that much depth. Which is what I mean by coffee table philosophy. Read Camus, Shopenhaur or Wiggtenstein if you want to be philosophicaly challenged.

 

[Heretic_Cata]

I always found the concept that humans were used to generate
the electricity to power the machines as a weak point in the plot

Now if human brain waves had been used to generate
random numbers for logic machines - maybe.

Here's some stuff from the book "Taking the red pill, Sience, phylosophy and religion in the Matrix" by Glenn Yeffeth (it's a colecion of essays writen by different ppl that say different opinoins about the ideas in the first part of the movie).

About the energy produced by humans.
Rough translation by yours truly
"Technicaly speaking, it is nonsense; it violates the fundamental law of energy conservation (i hope i translated this one well) ... The fact that Morpheus didn't quite understand is emphasized by the mentioning (in the same discourse) of the fact that the machines discovered a new form of nuclear fusion. No doubt that this is the real source of energy that the machines use. But then what are the humans doing in the energy plant ? Controled nuclear fusion is a subtle and complex process that require constant monitorization and (?). OTOH, the human brain is an excelent alternative computer. It is highly probable that the machines were chanelling the unexploited part of the human brain to control the fusion reactions."

That's this guy's opinion...

 

[Sidhe]

I don't see how, human brains are ridiculously complicated, using something that complicated, even if you could begin to understand it on any sort of real level, being a machine - which I seriously doubt - is just not practical; nuclear reactions have nice little physical laws that can be used to control them anyway, at a fundemental level they are fairly unpredictable, but as a whole, harnessable. The machine has obviously a very naive understanding of human consciousness as evidenced by it's earlier failed attempts at trying to keep them alive. In all likelyhood, the writers had to have a premise to keep humans alive and so they made something that on a superficial level would fly. It's a film not a scientific paper though, sometimes I think people forget that, particularly that bloke.

 

[Chukchi Husky]

It's fairly clear that the war or at least the original one was an attempt to anihilate mankind and vise a versa. It's a week point in the film.

Have you seen The Second Renaissance?

 

[Sidhe]

No what's that?

 

[Chukchi Husky]

It's an anime that's part of the Animatrix. It explains what happened before the Matrix movies.

http://www.intothematrix.com/

 

[Yuri2356]

That's not very logical, it makes sense that to keep your humans alive and functioning as long as possible you need to keep them happy, they may well with a limited understanding of figured perfection was the best way to do this.

Listen to Smith's rant when he has Morpheus captive, and ask yourself again if the Matrix Machines are all that rational. Wether is happened before the war as part of their evolution, or after the fact as a byproduct of frustration with the surviving humans, there has been some fundamental change in the way that these computers think about things. Methinks they're a few lines short of a process.

With the discovery of Fusion under their belts, the Machines would have little to worry about wth regards to power, not to mention that they could dig down and use Geothermal the way the Zonites do. The Human-power plant is more trouble than it's worth, but for some reason we're still kept arround. I think that it's because now, after the fact, they've looked back and seen that they became exactly what they faught against and want to eventualy set things right. We're just being kept on ice in our warm, fuzzy dream world until they can repair the damage done to Earth.

 

[El_Machinae]

I believe that a logical reason to keep the humans around was to provide a source of intuition for the machines. Maybe they did not have intuition or creativity, and allowed scenarios in the Matrix to provide hints

 

[FriendlyFire]

And yes, pretty much NONE of that is made explicit in the actual movie, you have to reason it out. Partly it's that the directors WANTED to leave things implicit. Partly, yes, it's poor writing the third movie was really unsatisfactory - not in plot - but in execution.

So true lack of diagloue, in depth charactor development and exploration of deep themes

 

[BasketCase]

When I go to the movies, I don't want those. I want car chases, gunfights, explosions, and boobs.

 

[bathsheba666]

What do you get if you multiply 6 by 9?

I always knew there was something fundamentally wrong.

 

[Sidhe]

Listen to Smith's rant when he has Morpheus captive, and ask yourself again if the Matrix Machines are all that rational. Wether is happened before the war as part of their evolution, or after the fact as a byproduct of frustration with the surviving humans, there has been some fundamental change in the way that these computers think about things. Methinks they're a few lines short of a process.

With the discovery of Fusion under their belts, the Machines would have little to worry about wth regards to power, not to mention that they could dig down and use Geothermal the way the Zonites do. The Human-power plant is more trouble than it's worth, but for some reason we're still kept arround. I think that it's because now, after the fact, they've looked back and seen that they became exactly what they faught against and want to eventualy set things right. We're just being kept on ice in our warm, fuzzy dream world until they can repair the damage done to Earth.

I disagree humanity is a disease and it is a parasite there simply is no real reason to keep us around unless you consider something else; more trouble than it's worth; they stand to gain more by our anihilation than by our continued existence and this is there problem, this is what they realise. But they have a system that cannot survive without us it's a catch-22, they got us in this situation and now they can't get out of it. Thus the circular events of the Matrix and it's pre matrix. Originaly our demise was a viable situation pre holocaust, but keeping us alive and simply for the pre nuclear and geothermic energy source they needed to keep running(I tuly believe the BTU thing is meant as literal not a wierd mechanical adoption of human sensibilities, they simply didn't have them when the decision was made, they were looking at mutually assured destruction without a source of energy(no sun of course and without the technology to develope an energy source quickly enough they needed a stop gap measure) so they made a critical choice. And they are paying for it now. Now that they have our input in the system they can't escape it, to kill us is no longer viable, our thought processes are a vital part of the make up of the machine. OOPS!

I believe that a logical reason to keep the humans around was to provide a source of intuition for the machines. Maybe they did not have intuition or creativity, and allowed scenarios in the Matrix to provide hints

That's what happened but only after the catch-22. Kill humans and you die, keep them alive and they war on you. How to best fight an enemy in the conditions mentioned above. Keep your friends close, your enemies closer.

personally I believe the writers never thought this deep, the plot was on it's own viable, but hey still interesting, what does a natural progression of my ideas lead to?

The whole film trilogy.

 

[Gilder]

I seem to be among the few to understand the movies, and enjoy it for it's action, and deeper meanings

 

[Pontiuth Pilate]

...inside the Matrix, the special effects are done in that electronic green... later we start seeing yellow instead of green (the first time, I think, was when Neo first met Seraph). When Neo loses his sight and begins seeing the world through his growing powers, he sees the world in yellow.

Green is "the" Matrix--what if Yellow is another Matrix that contains the green one? Another "level" of reality, controlled by some higher-dimensional Architecht?

I noticed that all the scenes in the Matrix are green-tinted not just the code. And Zion and all scenes taking place in the real world are very blue-tinted.

Green code is how Neo sees a program that only exists within the Matrix (a program that doesn't "really" exist in other words). Yellow code is how he perceives a program or machine that is physical and real. For example Agent Smith is green, but the version of him that hacked Bane is seen as yellow when Neo kills him. Seraph is yellow because he interfaces directly with the mainframe (the Source) which means he must be more than a mere program like the Oracle (who is green). When Neo goes to the Machine City, everything is yellow. I think that accounts for all the yellow code in the movies?

As for whether it's a second matrix, perhaps but the simpler explanation for why Neo can "see" gold code is the same reason for why he could hack the Sentinels - he has a wireless connection ability now, he doesn't need the skull jack.

 

[Abaddon]

pah, beyond the first they sucked anyway...

 

[MorpheusPrince]

I think the true meaning of the movie is that there is no limit on what the human mind can accomplish. The mind opens unique doorways that open to a higher plane of thinking and the truth is really just a word meant for the incompetence and ignorant.

 

[tombeef]

When I go to the movies, I don't want those. I want car chases, gunfights, explosions, and boobs.

You can get all of that in The Matrix: Reloaded. Along with bad writing and a slow start. And the coolest car chase scene ever.

Or you could just watch the first one over and over, which is one of the coolest movies ever. The other 2 are downhill from there.

 

[ChrTh]

Ok, a couple things to augment the discussion:

Humans: The Machines were designed with a purpose: to serve man. Even though they rebelled, even though they enslaved man, that purpose still exists. If every human was destroyed, the machines would essentially have no reason to go on. This is what the architect is referring to when he says "we're prepared for a lower level of existence" (paraphrased) ... the machines wouldn't commit suicide, but what could they really do outside of "exist"?

Smith/Oracle: The Oracle says she can't see past a decision she doesn't understand; therefore, she is incapable of seeing what will happen after she allows Smith to absorb her into Meta-Smith. However, once she has been absorbed into Smith, she is no longer restricted: she can see the rest of the movie. She sees that Neo will sacrifice himself to Smith and end the war. That's why Smith laughs -- and why the other Smiths are confused. The knowledge that Neo "wins" is not available to the Meta-Smith; all they see is his defeat.

Neo and the Sentinels: The Matrix is tied into the power system of the machines (because the humans inside of it are combined with a source of fusion blah blah blah). Neo can control/change the Matrix. Therefore, he can control the source of the machines' power. However, his control is not absolute (hence going above the clouds), and it's a great tax of his will.

The End (Smith/Neo): When Neo destroys Smith at the end of the first movie, he is actually splitting himself into two: Neo and Smith. As long as the two are separate, Neo can't fulfill the prophecy--he can't reach the source by himself. When Neo sacrifices himself to Smith at the end, Neo/Smith is now in contact with the source, and the prophecy is fulfilled.

Now, to go deeper, we need to go to Mobil station at the beginning of the third film. If you are versed in Hindu mythology, the Mobil station scene actually tells you what's going to happen. Rama-Chandra (the 7th incarnation) stands in front of Neo (the 6th incarnation -- remember what the architect says about their being 5 predecessors) with his daughter (Sati) between them. Sati means "sacrifice". Therefore, for Neo to become Rama-Chandra, he must sacrifice himself. Interestingly enough, in the mythology, the 6th incarnation does meet the 7th. When Morpheus is talking to Link, Link asks if they have Neo. Morpheus says "Don't you see him?" and Link responds "I saw something, but I didn't know what it was". This is Neo already transformed into the 7th incarnation, yet still not realized until he sacrifices himself.

Any other questions? I've got answers to most of them

 

[Turner]

Actually, the Oracle never said that she couldn't see pass the decisions that she couldn't understand.

The Oracle: Do you see her die?
Neo: No.
The Oracle: You have the sight now, Neo. You are looking at the world without time.
Neo: Then why can't I see what happens to her?
The Oracle: We can never see past the choices we don't understand.
Neo: Are you saying I have to choose whether Trinity lives or dies?
The Oracle: No, you've already made the choice. Now you have to understand it.
Neo: No. I can't do that. I won't.
The Oracle: Well, you have to.
Neo: Why?
The Oracle: Because you're the One.

Neo couldn't see past his decision to save Trinity or let her die.

Now, she does say we. But the way I understood the third movie was that she understood why she had to be 'assimlated' by Smith, and she knew that ultimately Neo would have to sacrifice himself in order to kill Smith as well. I've only seen it twice tho, and it's been a long time since I've seen it.