The Truman Show

This movie is surprisingly similar to the matrix film but maybe it's because both are based off the same idea from Plato's allegory. But at the end of the movie Truman finally is free from his fake life and gets to go out into the real world and experience it. If I was in his position I would have probably done the same thing too.

If I had a choice to live in a place with "nothing to fear" and going out into a world with me knowing very little about it, It would have to depend on the situation. If i was in a world where there was nothnig to fear but people were watching me 24/7 then i'd rather go into that other one i have no idea about. Because I would rather not be watched forever until i turn old and die and i would suspect that the outside world would be much better since there are people out there after all. If it was something like the matrix then I would rather stay int he matrix. Christof says that we accept the environment that is given to us and therefore we wouldn't know whether to leave or not since we've become so accustomed to where we grew up in. The matrix world is more sophisticated and much more very real, no one in there is an actor or some one who is "in on it" other than the unplugged humans and the machines. Maybe it's also because the matrix world is so much alike to the world we live in, and that's probably why i would choose it over the real world.

We Live With Choices

It's not easy to make decisions sometimes but it's the choices you make that determine the rest of your life. It's all about the decisions we make that

We live our lives on the choices we make and that is free will. But when it leads to an inevitable event, that is fate. But the discussion between Fate and free will is always going to be a big issue. Free will and fate never seem to go together.

Or do they?

I believe that the lives we live are based on free will. There is no such thing as fate. What is free will? Free will is making the choices that you want to make without anyone else's say in it. Basically a control-free choice, a decision that you can make without being stopped. Fate is when you don't have to do anything and it's going to happen.

Now, lets talk about fate. You've probably heard by now all those fictional stories about people who have gotten "prophecies" or the "telling of their future". These stories make it look like that fate is one giant unstoppable force that is unescapable but the book says otherwise. The book says that the oracle(like many many other stories before) tell people their future and it eventually comes true. But that is only because she shapes the future (and doesn't predict it) to those who hear it and they BELIEVE it will come true. The book also mentions Alexander the Great who hunted down the oracle to see his own fortune and she told him that he is invincible. He becomes a great conqueror later on and why? Because he believed it so.

Now lets move onto free will (I have a lot to say but i'll keep it short). In the movie Neo consults with the Oracle and she tells him that he isn't The One. But later he turns out that he is because he believed it so. He made the choice to become the One despite the oracle's "fortune telling". So he had the freedom to be whatever he wanted. He didn't have to be the one but he did anyways. And I guess if he didn't then the oracle would be right...

It's these choices we make that will affect many things. If you've ever watched The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, it shows a great example of choice and fate and free will altogether. There is this one scene in the movie that shows a string of events and choices that lead to one final event of where a taxi driver ends up running over one of the characters and ending her dance career. Benjamin in the story says that if one of these choices in the string of events ended differently, she would still be dancing.

We're all connected is what most metaphysicists say and I believe what they say about it is true. Whatever choices we make can lead to good and bad occurences. And we might not know it. So we have the freedom to choose what we want to do and become but the side effects of them are things we can't exactly control.

Choice is free will and the outcome is fate.

Metaphysics

When I first read this part of the book, I had totally no idea what they were talking about. Metaphysics and a metaphysics are apparently two different subjects.

What?

And I got completely lost when they said you need to know metaphysics to develop a metaphysics. Well the book starts off by explaining this in a manner where it seems like they want your brain to simply explode. But I took that risk and found out that they are in fact explaining that in order to know a metaphysics you need to start with metaphysics with no “a” in front of it. We can call “a” metaphysics truth and metaphysics understanding truth.

They book starts off by explaining the differences between the sciences and metaphysics and it eventually comes to a point where it mentions something called ontological statuses of real and unreal. Then they mentions sources. The book says that we know the source of things such as electrical impulses or where cars are made or where and how babies are made but what we do not know is the main source. Basically where did it all begin? It’s kind of like that chicken or the egg question except where did either come from?

Ontology is the study of existence (dictionary.com). The book explains that there is a distinct difference between the matrix and the real world because the real world has sources that are different from the matrix. In the matrix, everything is pretty much a program and in the real world the sources are real. But the main source we don’t know exactly but there is one is what the book suggests. I think in the real world from the matrix it’s the architect and he is mentioned at some point in the movie.

Blog 3: Reality?

"What is real?" is what Morpheus asks when he starts explaining the Matrix to Neo. "real" is thrown around in the movie a lot. The word "real" like Cypher says is just another 4 letter word. It's a word used to describe what we believe we see as reality. And that comes to our problem with another word "believe". When we believe what we think is real, we do not exactly know it's real. Which is a big problem because, how will we know what is and what isn't reality?

What if we are in the Matrix? Real?

The book "The Matrix And Philosophy" says that anything real as well as valuable can only be real if it isn't in the matrix. And another argument suggests that what is real is anything that gives a very pleasurable experience. The first argument is really hard to find out what exactly is real unless we know there is an actual "Matrix" but the second one we can identify with quite easily. But in my opinion the second one does not make sense. Although the experience can be in fact pleasurable, such as eating some delicious cake. You can say you know the cakes tastes good but that's because you know what a fake simulated cake tastes like in a fake reality that you know you believe is real. Basically the cake is a lie. The first argument is much more agreeable because of the fact that if you get disconnected from the Matrix then it's got to be all real.

The allegory of the cave suggests that "real" is what we come to believe as "real" like the people trapped in the cave. Like us they were raised only knowing the environment around them and they have come to believe that this is their reality and all that they will ever know. So if we are like those people ion the cave then the only thing we know is real is what we see hear and feel smell and taste around us. Unless one of us were taken outside of the cave or unplugged then we would see the actual truth for ourselves.

The book and the allegory both say that in order to truly know the real reality, it has to be with our senses. With our eyes and ears and our touch. the book explains the senses while the allegory says; what if we didn't like the real world like Cypher did and would rather go back, but since we know the truth wouldn't it drive us crazy? What if the truth and the actually reality sucked like the matrix? Then the fake reality would seem like a better place to go back to but on the other hand we know its all fake and theirs no point in going back. Unless we could forget it all then it would be an impossible situation.

So to conclude my blog, what if this reality we live in is actually the best one we've got? Would it be really worth it to risk it all and find out the truth(good or bad)? Anything "real" is what we've come to believe as real but once you discover the question "Is it actually real?" then you start to recognize the idea that what you believe to be real doesn't mean it actually is.

When you start saying a certain word it starts to stop making sense. A good example is the use of the word "real" in my blog. Once that happens it just becomes a word, then 4 letters, then symbols and then its just some weird pattern of lines put together. Words can't exactly explain what is and what isn't and explaination sometimes doesn't get you completely convinced. So the best way would be with your eyes and ears. Now someone with a whole lot of philosophy in his head wearing sunglasses has to come to you offering a red or blue pill offering the truth. Since that's pretty much the only way you can find out the actual "real"

Blog 2: The Matrix and How it's Related

The matrix is a dream world or an alternate reality world that we live in, and whose to say that we don't? Everything we breathe, eat, smell, and feel could be some computer program designed to make us feel like its all real.

The movie does a good job in presenting a lot of philisophical ideas, especially those from Socrates. One thing I really like about the movie is how Neo tells Morpheus that he doesn't like the idea of fate and says that he doesn't believe in the idea of not being in control of your life. Later on in the movie The Oracle tells him the bad news that he isn't "The One" Morpheus was expecting. But when he gets shot to death by an agent, he comes back to life and realizes that he is in fact The One proving the Oracle wrong.

On a nother note I think that Neo chose not to die in The Matrix, showing how he took control of his life by coming back to life. He ends with a speech about how everyone else should be free and know the truth.

Spoilers beyond this point!!!!

I can relate this idea to another movie called "Wanted". It's a crazy movie to relate to since people went to watch it for the action, I'm sure. But the movie is about a man by the name of Wesly Gibson who works at a corporate building which he hates. He doesn't know he has this inhumane ability to move incredibly fast and become practically superhuman but that later changes when he meets an Assassin named Fox and other assassins later on who pretty much frees him from his boring old repetitive life.

He becomes a killing machine by the end of the movie, and in the movie there is a lot of ideas of "fate" being tossed around and its what the Fraternity(the big assassin organization) lives by. But Wesley realizes that it's all just a bigger lie and makes the choice to destroy the Fraternity and everyone involved in it. That action sequence is probably my favorite.

In the end of the movie he says a speech about how he has taken his life back and how he has control of it and ends it with a "So what the **** have you done recently?" A kind of messed up way to make people realize the truth he sees.

Another good example is Fight Club, which is about a guy who can be related to Neo. The movie starts off with him and his usual lifestyle which looks boring. But then meets a man named Tyler Durden and from that point on, Tyler changes his life. They start an underground thing called "fight Club" so that people can just fight eachother for the hell of it and the group starts getting bigger and bigger. It eventually turns into and organization where many different people are involved including law enforcing citizens. The organization wants to "free" everyone. But eventually the man"wakes up" and realizes that he himself is Tyler Durden, the man who has created this huge organization and that the other man he's been seeing was a false representation of himself.

Kind of like the matrix when you hack in you see yourself as how you want to see yourself. Tyler was seeing the self that he wanted to see and wanted to be and in the end it turns out he was. He also frees people from their world and they joined the fight club which is like the real world in the matrix and all of them set out to destroy the corporations that these people worked under. Which is like where in the real world the people are freed from the matrix and sent out to fight the machines (like the agents).

Blog 1

If I were to be in Socrates' cave, I think that I would be one of those who are still inside the cave but instead made the choice to turn around, take a look at the fire, take off the chains and turn back around to watch the shadows again.

What I'm trying to say is that I've touched upon the subject of what all the great philosphers think about but I wouldn't really want to walk outside since I'm very comfortable with how I am living. I would have to agree with Cypher when he says "ignorance is bliss". Walking out into the light would be a huge dramatic change and realizing the fact that I've been liveing a lie my whole life and all the experiences and luxuries experienced were just fake would be a really devastating truth.

But why take off the chains? The reason for that would be that I might change my mind someday and actually walk out into the light. And maybe someday the question will bother me like an annoying itch and I would have to just run out of the cave. I've already discovered the fire behind me so it would be a thought in the back of my head, but for now I'm perfectly fine staring at my own shadow on the cave wall.