Things that aren't "Real" aren't Meaningfully Different than Things that are Real.
What I mean by this is that we draw a false distinction between that of real and fake. The matrix did exist, as a server in a computer. The matrix's computer existed in the physical world, and by proxy, the matrix itself existed in the physical world. The term "fake" is misleading because everything exists in a sense. Any thought you have exists as neurons in your brain. If we live in a simulation, it would also be the real world, because the simulation exists in the real world.
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As somewhat of a non-traveler these days, for all I know, the entire world outside of my tri-county area may not exist. Of course, I know this to be false. I have friends in other parts of the world, I've traveled to places before, I can track shipments for packages that travel to and fro as well as watch live webcams of places. But for many practical intents and purposes, it's like the world outside our own little spheres of interaction may or may not exist.
I doubt I'll ever step foot in the White House, for example. So, at least for my existence, it's as if the place does not exist, never did, and never will. Yet it does, surely. Might I ask: is Schrodinger's cat involved here in any way? :smile:
Suppose when people say "real" or "fake" they mean something that exists in the manner in which we do, that can either be touched, felt, observed, or otherwise "experienced". There was a thread here about (or touching on) such differences between "existing" and "real". I forget the relevant quote at the moment but something along the lines of "unicorns are imaginary, but exist and are real". I've likely butchered the original quote in my misrememberance but it was something along those lines. Reminds me of the proofs thread where something can be factually false whilst simultaneously being valid and sound. A bit hard to grasp and easily dismissed as nonsensical.
Yo mamma is so fat, her picture weighs 10 pounds.
Welcome.
This is something that get's discussed fairly often here on the forum, generally without consensus, because everyone has a different idea of what "real" means. I am interested in Taoist philosophy. The first verse of the Tao Te Ching, one of the founding texts, says "The Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal name." My understanding of the meaning of those lines is that things don't really become "real" until we name, conceptualize, them. That seems consistent with what you have written. Imaginary things are as real as material things because they are both brought into existence as concepts.
On the forum, getting everyone to agree on the definition of the central ideas of a discussion is often neglected and often impossible. That is the cause of a lot of derailed discussions here. I think we'll probably see that in this discussion.
That made me think of this. It's from Woody Allen's 1966 "What's up Tiger Lily" and is badly edited.
https://clip.cafe/whats-up-tiger-lily-1966/this-shepard-wongs-home/
Circular reasoning & compositional fallacy.
So how do you designate the distinction between a copy / counterfeit and the original? or distinguish a fictional account from a nonfictional account?
Anyway, consider "Meinong's Jungle" ...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meinong%27s_jungle
Quoting T Clark
:lol:
The paper of a fake bill is real, but that doesn't mean that the bill is real. Real money is meaningfully different from fake money.
Quoting Hyper
Everything doesn't exist in the same sense. For example, money is made of social agreements, paper is made of cellulose fibers. They exist in very different senses.
An original work of something is produced in a particular context, a plagiarized version is produced in another context in which the producer has knowledge of the original version. A fake is always different from the original (regardless of practical distinguishability).
Quoting Hyper
All the same, the electric events in a computer are real in one sense, but the simulation in the computer is real in another sense. You conflate the two different senses in which they are real, and get a fallacy of composition.
I dont see that your understanding contradicts mine.
I'm not sure I know how you mean it, or in how many ways. But I think living in the Matrix would be just as real as living in the real world. You are presented with any number of choices every day, ands you choose. Regardless of what system you exist within, you have your sense of right and wrong, likes and dislikes, desires and fears. If you were a sadist in the Matrix, you wouldn't be a saint when you unplugged, or vice versa.
Quoting T ClarkNo. Just different focus.
You're on the way...
Right, appearances (as set against reality) are still [I]really[/I] appearances. Radical skepticism sets in when one supposes that appearances can be completely disconnected from "reality," but this position has to suppose much about the "reality" of the "relationship between reality and appearance," to really get off the ground.
Radical skepticism collapses when it "goes all the way " into positing that there is "only appearance," and no reality. Yet, if there is only appearance, then the dichotomy collapses and appearances [I]are[/I] reality.
But, in the modern context this distinction has become pernicious because instead of the more fundemental "reality versus appearance" distinction we get the "subjective versus objective" distinction, which often comes with a lot of extra baggage, the main one being the idea that we don't every experience anything directly, but rather "experience our experiences." So one doesn't experience an apple, but rather experiences the experience of experiencing an apple. And so who knows what the apple is [I]really[/I] like? We don't even know the apple's appearance, but only our own experience of its experience. This extra regress is how you can start to slide towards appearances having an arbitrary and unknowable relationship with reality.
But Cypher is the only one who agrees with you. He wants to be rewritten to forget about the real world (and also his betrayal). You're really opting for the blue pill, are you not? One must choose before they know the difference between the Matrix and the real world, and that is why Cypher needs his rewrite.
Quoting Patterner
Maybe. The Matrix is a simulation, so it really depends on how accurate the simulation is. But I don't know why anyone would want to live in a simulation.
The Matrix is shot through with religious imagery, and implicit in much religious imagery is the idea that a new level of agency is itself awakened with conversion or enlightenment or whatnot. So it's not generally true that one's agency or capacity is equal in both worlds. In fact there is supposed to be a radical difference in all sorts of ways.
Quoting LeontiskosHe and I diverge at that point.
Quoting LeontiskosThe others don't need a rewrite. They go back and forth, themselves in either setting. And their decisions are real in either setting.
Quoting LeontiskosThat's likely. I suspect human consciousness/mind is the way it is because of the environment inn which it came to be. Consciousness/mind that came to be in an entirely different environment would be entirely different. And I doubt consciousness/mind of one environment could go back-and-forth between entirely different environments, and remain the same. It possibly could not go back-and-forth at all.
Cypher, presumably, thought there was no possibility of surviving other than the path he chose. But he could not live with the guilt of that choice, so wanted to be rewritten. That's incomprehensible to me. Being rewritten, giving up your consciousness/mind/self, is as good as death. The last moments before being rewritten couldn't feel any different than the last moments before the blade of the guillotine hits. In my opinion, better to go out fighting. The last moments of consciousness would be of defiance, pride, and the love of your friends, rather than cowardice, guilt, and self-inflicted isolation.
The fact that they refuse a rewrite and Cypher desires it just shows that the experience of the one who takes a blue pill is different from the experience of the one who takes the red pill (even within the Matrix). And yet you seem to say that there is no difference.
Quoting Patterner
Yes, perhaps.
Quoting Patterner
No, I don't think so. Cypher would want his rewrite whether or not the betrayal had occurred. In fact if you follow the plot, the betrayal is the cost of the rewrite, and thus the desire for the rewrite is prior. But "rewrite" may be the wrong word altogether. He just wants to forget that the real world exists. He just wants to rewrite history, such that he took a blue instead of red pill. Forgetting something is presumably not death.
It is rude to start a discussion and then not actively participate.
Sure, both exist as paper, but only one of them exists as money. A distinction between fake and real paper would be meaningless, but the distinction between fake and real money is meaningful.
The only reason people use it as money is because people think it is money. People thinking that it is useful is the only reason it is actually useful. I am not saying that everything has the same use, I am saying that since both exist as concepts, they both exist.
Of course everything exists. No problem with that. Problem is your claim that fake is also real just because it exists in the real world. That is a leap of reasoning gone over the barrier of common sense.
Fake exists as fake, and real exists as real. Let's not confused about that.
This argument just comes down to our definition of real. This definition of real is that anything that exists is real. Both fake and real are real because they exist.
You said:
Quoting Patterner
Who agrees with you?
Not Morpheus, Trinity, Neo, etc. Not Cypher. He thinks the Matrix is better than the real world, but not "just as real." Not the people who choose the blue pill - they have no way to compare the Matrix to the real world. And presumably no one at all who takes a red pill would say that the Matrix is just as real as living in the real world.
So what basis do you have to say that it is just as real?
By [I]just as real[/I], I mean that, although the impulses reaching the brain do not originate in physical objects, the experiences of them are just as real. Cypher certainly agrees with me. He [I]knows[/I] there is no physical steak at the other end of the impulses hitting his brain. But the origin of the impulses isn't important. What's important is the experience. As you say, he actually prefers, and chooses, the experiences he gets from the impulses that simulate physical things to the experiences he gets from impulses originating in physical things.
99% of the Architect's test subjects also agree that the experience of the impulses is more important than their origin.
Picard lived decades of life inn a simulated environment in 23 minutes, and his experiences remained very important to him when he was out of the simulation.
Captain Pike chose the telepathically simulated life offered to him on Talos IV over the life his physical circumstances offered.
How many people play online games like Second Life and Sims, and would play them all the time if they could? How many people would pay such games if they were extreme VR, knowing they are entering a Matrix?
In all of these cases, the person faces options, makes choices, has values, has joy, has regrets, and everything else.
When you are using the definition of real as existing, you must supply what is real after the real.
For example, "Socrates was a real person." This sounds right.
It sounds ambiguous, contradictory and illogical to say, Socrates was real, or fake is real.
What you're saying seems to vacillate between the circular statement "concepts exist as concepts", and the compositional fallacy "since concepts exist, then also what the concepts are about exist in a sense."
Yet things exist more or less regardless of concepts. For paper to exist, it is neither necessary nor sufficient to have a concept about paper. The existence of money does not depend on a concept about it but on the actual agreements and events on markets.
When we think or talk about things that don't exist, such as 'square circles' or 'nothingness', it is not the case that the things exist in a sense. What exists is our thinking and talking about them.
Well, it's open to read what you say: that paper and money exist as concepts, and that the target of those concepts also exist as a concept, and that they have physical presence as neurons in our brains.
But why limit the physical presence of concepts to neurons in the brain? Evidently money and paper have physical presence as market events and cellulose fibers. Talk of everything as concepts adds nothing but a veneer of old and crusty philosophical sounding jargon.
Which is to say that Cypher thinks that The Matrix is more real than the real world, no? If your measurement is experience, and Cypher thinks The Matrix provides the superior experience, then Cypher thinks The Matrix is more real. That is why I said he disagrees with you (although I took you to be saying that the reality of each is equal, which may be different from what you were saying).
The experiences are equally real. To you.
I suppose the machines have some concern for humanity, since they originally make the simulation a paradise, but there is always the chance they evolve past that sentiment. Similarly, they could just find a non-convoluted source of power, and just decide to cull the whole human population.
The unreality of the "perfect simulation" of the Matrix comes to the fore when you consider that the person in the Matrix is essentially powerless [I]because[/I] they are trapped in the illusion. It robs them of, if not all agency, then at least important aspects. Moreover, it robs humanity as a collective corporate body of agency and the ability to pursue its own freedom. What historical progress can be made if history gets reset every 20 years or so?
I feel like there are lots of ways for the metaphor to break down, but an important aspect of it is the way in which the humans of the Matrix are powerless, like an ant colony with a vindictive child's foot perched just above it, or livestock in a feedlot.
Of course, we can assume beneficent machines, and this alleviates the problem, but it would seem to resolve the problem precisely because truly beneficit machines would try to empower their subjects until they could work together to resolve the whole energy issue through some better solution.
Cypher knew what the real world was, that the Matrix was a simulation, and he chose the simulation over the real world. I don't know how you can disagree with any of that.
I don't disagree with any of that. (Maybe "false simulation" is redundant?)
I still don't know how you disagree with Wyatt I said.
And if you object to a discussion about Cypher because he is not the protagonist, you shouldn't have brought him up.
Quoting Count Timothy von IcarusI don't think it was concern. I think they did that because they needed the people to stay blissfully plugged in. They didn't expect paradise to be a problem that people would want to wake up from. The Soviet gulag would be a horror, but I wonder if people would have rejected it as much as they did the paradise. not just because of the old idea that people want conflict, but because it might distract them from noticing something wasn't right. maybe paradise gives you too much free time, and all the nagging little things get more of your attention.
Quoting Count Timothy von IcarusYeah, just leave billions of humans to starve to death and decompose in the pods.
Quoting Count Timothy von IcarusIt certainly robs them of some important things. Still, they could act as they chose within the confines of the system. And most didn't ever have the feeling that it was unreal, as Neo did. Which is why 99% accepted it when given the choice.
But that's why I brought him up. "You are beginning to look a lot like Cypher here." "Cypher is teh best!" :razz:
If the whole premise of The Matrix is that red pills are better than blue pills, then it's odd to argue from The Matrix that blue pills are the same as red pills.
Cypher wasn't the villain because he wanted to become a blue. Becoming a blue isn't objectively wrong. It's his preference. He was the villain because he betrayed and killed others in order to become a blue.
And Cypher is not the only one. Again, Architect tells Neo that 99% of test subjects chose the Matrix if given the choice.
Also, at the end of Revolutions, Oracle and Architect meet. This is from their conversation:
Oracle: What about the others?
Architect: What others?
Oracle: The ones that want out.
Architect: Obviously, they will be freed.
Obviously, not all want out. Those who do are not 'better' than those who chose to stay plugged in. Neo didn't sacrifice himself to end the Matrix. The bargain was that, if he beat Smith, the machines would let everyone choose. Choosing to stay doesn't make one a villain.
Choosing to be in the Matrix is not evil. The evil is not giving people a choice. The huge majority do not know they are in pods, living in a simulation, for the benefit of the machines. That's what had to change. That's the point of the movies. We're supposed to think beyond the initial revelation that we get 20 minutes into the first movie.
Morpheus was not evil. He [I]has[/I] a blue pill. He didn't have to have one. They didn't have to create one, and he never had to offer it. But he gives them a choice. He explains the situation as best he can, and let's them decide. How many took the blue? Should Morpheus not have permitted it? Neo might have chosen blue, and Morpheus would have lost The One. He could have slipped a red into Neo's food at any point. But he took the chance. He gave Neo the choice.
Then we learn Cypher wants to go back in. Again, he wasn't evil for wanting to go back in. He was evil for betraying and murdering those who wanted to give everyone a choice.
Then we learn that nearly 99% off all test subjects accepted the program as long as they were given a choice.
And it all ends with the Architect's assurance that those who want out will be set free.
The many who chose the Matrix over the real world are not evil for not choosing the real world. The problem is those who do not think everyone should be allowed to choose.
Well, that's sort of the crux then, being in a simulation is only good if the people running the simulation want what is good for you. It's Plato's Cave redux. Sort of like how we might think having access to the Star Trek holodecks might be disastrous for personal development if people are given free access to them from childhood on, but that they also could be a powerful tool for education, therapy, etc., if used correctly. Or, at the extreme end we could imagine an AI that rules over humanity with the heuristic "goodness is the maximization of pleasure," which in turn keeps people as mental infants lying in a "feel good" coma.
I have thought about this before in the context of Nozick's "experience machine." If the machine is built with classical principles of the "good life" in mind, then it will essentially be a rigorous training program in the virtues that will encourage you to leave the machine when you're ready.
Certainly not Smith's, he is not a fan of humanity lol. I seem to recall that there was a "faction" for humans' rights in the later movies though, which would suggest some conflicted beneficence. I don't really recall the later movies very well; I didn't think they really measured up.
It would be interesting if Cypher was portrayed more sympathetically. I think he could be, but he isn't. He goes back and wants to be rich, they show him being lured by his appetites, he's sort of a creep, he's vindictive and cruel at the end, and by the time he gets shot with the lightning gun we're supposed to cheer.
I think it would be hard to portray him completely sympathetically though because, having made his choice, he is now burdened with knowledge and responsible for giving others the same choice. We might be more sympathetic towards him, but the inability to bear the hardships needed to offer others freedom isn't a virtue.
I recall the Thirtieth Floor and Dark City having similar vibes, but I really don't remember them well except that I thought Dark City was really good.
Yet you grant them physical presence as neurons in the brain. Whence the reluctance to grant the concepts physical presence as money and paper?
The assumption that money and paper are concepts, and that the target of those concepts is also a concept, is circular. Under a circular assumption it is, indeed, futile to prove that things are anything other than concepts. But that's just because of the circularity in the assumption.
To me, this suggests the distinction between "true" and "false."
That leads into a discussion of objective and subjective truth.
I think the "real" incorporates both objective and subjective truth.
I know my mother loves me. This is my subjective truth, it is real.
We need to understand the difference between structure and function.
The neurons are the structure. "Thought" - i.e. your mind - is the function.
It's electro-stimulation of the neurons that causes thought.
Now, is it real? Pretty real to me. Is that not all that matters?
No, it's really not. I mean, sure, coercion is evil, but it's not at all the point of the movie. You seem like a liberal or libertarian who has tried to co-opt The Matrix for your own ideology. The Matrix has its limits, but it's much deeper than liberalism. The point in none of the movies is, "Let's give everyone a choice, and once they all have a choice then our goal will have been met." This is explicit in the fourth movie when attempts are made over and over again to get someone to accept a red pill.
Liberalism does not even approach Plato's Cave, and The Matrix is resonant with Plato's Cave.
:rofl: Ok then!
All fake things are real but not all real things are fake. That certainly suggests some sort of "meaningful" difference, does it not?
:up: