»MAX's Mind - The Matrix Revolutions (Winter, 2003)«

The Matrix Revolutions (Winter, 2003):

psikeyhackr wrote:

rottentomatoes.com... Are you saying The Matrix has no significance to the real world? psikeyhackr

Thanks for linking my RT journal.

And I was wondering if you could clarify your question.

I began reading science fiction in 1961. Some stories are pure escapist entertainment. Some stories can tell you things about physics, philosophy, psychology or history. I learned about the concepts of atheism and agnosticism from sci-fi books. The nuns at my grammar school certainly said nothing about them. So I decided I was an agnostic at 12.

So I am wondering if you think The Matrix is just a complex and interesting story with a lot of religious symbolism thrown in or do you think it has something to tell us about life in the real world. And if it has something to say, what?

psikeyhackr

psikeyhackr wrote:

...I am wondering if you think The Matrix is just a complex and interesting story with a lot of religious symbolism thrown in or do you think it has something to tell us about life in the real world. And if it has something to say, what? psikeyhackr

Okay, right.

Well, in answer to your question, yes, I do think that The Matrix has much to say about the state of our world today.

The Matrix is, without a doubt, presented in an aesthetically appealing way, borrowing from sources such as animé, Hong Kong martial arts films, and established cyberpunk works in both literary and cinematic forms, whilst still being able to create a fictional world that is identifiable and unique.

However, within this framework exist a number of issues that are obviously of some importance to the creators of The Matrix. Issues about how the Nietzsche's ideas about the Overman would apply to humans in a given context that is provided metaphorically by the premise of the movies. It also attempts to engage in a more literal debate about mankind and his ever-evolving relationship with his tools. There is also the Baudrillardian concern of one illusory construct within another and the process of 'breaking free' that he outlines in his chapter/essay entitled 'On Nihilism' in his book 'Simulacra & Simulation' (this publication and the relevant chapter made an appearance in the very first Matrix) that refers to the consumer-condition of the (post) modern lifestyle.

It is my view that the Wachowskis, while not adhering to any particular religion or institution of faith are still very much behind the Existentialist thought. They spend the three movies effectively putting Nietzsche and Baudrillard to the test using the character of Neo as their thought-experiment vehicle as he breaks out of one illusory construct after another, rejecting existing forms of purpose in an increasingly cold and indifferent world and - all the while - searches to define his own meaning, which reaches its pinacle in the climax of Revolutions where Neo finally stops the egotistical struggle of attempting to ascend ever-upwards and finally accepts his place within the cosmos, however small that place may be.

That final scene in the crater is, to me, a final affirmation of Kierkegaardian Existentialism. They use Christian images of sacrifice, Buddhist images of Nirvana, and Hindu images of karmic duty in a finalé that doesn't propel the One self over all other selves, but actually seems to support a message of peace, acceptance, tolerance, atONEment with the world and only changing one's self in order to 'ascend'.

"It is not the spoon that bends. It is only yourself."

The Spoonboy reminds Neo of this before he sets out on his journey in Reloaded as a 'messiah' who must find his own path after his predetermined path is gone.

Years ago I looked up the word matrix in my Random House dictionary. I was somewhat surprised when it gave the example: Rome is the matrix for western civilization.

Suppose we regard the culture we live in as a MATRIX. It programs us from childhood to look at reality a certain way, to live and work and die and even kill according to the expectations of that society. It can even teach us to look at reality in illogical ways. My favorite example of that is the business of Europe being a continent. There is no water separating Europe from Asia. Some people regard the idea of Europe being a continent as nonsense just as I do, but I have had arguments with people about this. Mostly to get an idea of how intensely they feel about it since they can't change my mind. But I have talked to a man who seemed emotionally disturbed by the idea of not thinking of Europe as a continent. I have searched the internet about this and found that some children in Europe are taught that North and South America make up a single continent. The cultural matrix is a mind control system.

From the movie:

Quote:

Morpheus: The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around, what do you see? Businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it.

Our parents were programmed by this system and they contribute to our programming. But some people have more radical parents than others. Katherine Hepburn had parents who deviated from the norm and this obviously influenced her. As a film critic you may know more about her than I do. Most of the pseudo-individuals within the cultural matrix do not deviate too far from the norm and the outliers must still figure out how to live among the mundanes. So our schools, churches, corporations and governments are all part of this evolved cultural matrix.

So this brings up Morpheus and his ship Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar was a king of Babylon who had a dream interpretted by Daniel. In the dream was a statue with a head of gold, sholders and arms of silver, belly and thighs of bronze, legs of iron and feet of iron and clay. Each material represents a different kingdom and traveing down the statue is moving through time. At this point I want to focus on the bronze midsection. The belly AND the thighs are bronze. The statue splits in two at the legs. The Roman Empire split in two, an east and a west. Cultural evidence of this split exists to this day. The Roman Catholic Church in the west and the Eastern Orthodox in the east. The word Czar comes form Caesar. Kaiser comes from Caesar. The Romans said "Hail Caesar", Germans said "Heil Hitler", and Americans say "Hail to the Chief." The Roman matrix is now spread around the planet. The dream ended with the destruction of the statue. Morpheus' name is the Greek God of dreams captaining a ship named after a famous dreamer. When the Neb is destroyed Morpheus says:

Quote:

I have dreamed a dream, but now that dream is gone from me.

Neo and Trinity switch to the Logos. The Neb was Old Testament. Logos is New Testament. Our world is at somewhat of a crossroad with global warming, peak oil, 6.5 BILLION people. Technology brought us to this point as indicated in Neo's conversation on the engineering level in Zion.

Quote:

Councillor Harmann: Down here, sometimes I think about all those people still plugged into the Matrix and when I look at these machines I... I can't help thinking that in a way... we are plugged into them. Neo: But we control these machines; they don't control us. Councillor Harmann: Of course not. How could they? The idea is pure nonsense. But... it does make one wonder... just... what is control? Neo: If we wanted, we could shut these machines down. Councillor Harmann: [Of] course. That's it. You hit it. That's control, isn't it? If we wanted we could smash them to bits. Although, if we did, we'd have to consider what would happen to our lights, our heat, our air... Neo: So we need machines and they need us, is that your point, Councilor? Councillor Harmann: No. No point. Old men like me don't bother with making points. There's no point. Neo: Is that why there are no young men on the council? Councillor Harmann: Good point.

The Matrix is going to have to undergo some adjustments in the next few decades.

Damn, this is getting too long and I haven't gotten to economics yet. Later.

Psikeyhackr

Brilliant observation, psikey. Creating such symbolism and subtext in a story would seem quite the challenge, but them Wachowskis sure make it seem like cake. I marvel at their application of knowledge and research.

Quote:

Creating such symbolism and subtext in a story would seem quite the challenge, but them Wachowskis sure make it seem like cake. I marvel at their application of knowledge and research.

Wait til you see their next movie.

Max, why do you believe the W's are using such an amalgam of source material and derivatives? Because they actually see a connection in all the works mentioned (and more) or to reach as many as possible?

Quote:

Suppose we regard the culture we live in as a MATRIX. It programs us from childhodd to look at reality a certain way, to live and work and die and even kill according to the expectations of that society. It can even teach us to look at reality in illogical ways.

That view of continents is indeed on of the more bizarre memes. lol.

Another example of illogical thinking that the "MATRIX" starts from childhood is the use of weapons as toys for boys. Swords, machine guns, tanks, and every weapon that has been devised to date can be found in some toy shop somewhere. Where did someone get the idea that war is fun? But it comes out of the TV, music, and such. But we all can get a grasp of why this meme exists if we give it some thought.

Quote:

But the personality that finally emerges is largely formed by the environment in which a man happens to find himself during his development, by the structure of the society in which he grows up, by the tradition of that society, and by its appraisal of particular types of behavior. The abstract concept "society" means to the individual human being the sum total of his direct and indirect relations to his contemporaries and to all the people of earlier generations. The individual is able to think, feel, strive, and work by himself; but he depends so much upon society -- in his physical, intellectual, and emotional existence -- that it is impossible to think of him, or to understand him, outside the framework of society. It is "society" which provides man with food, clothing, a home, the tools of work, language, the forms of thought, and most of the content of thought; his life is made possible through the labor and the accomplishments of the many millions past and present who are all hidden behind the small word "society."

Your explanation of the Matrix Trilogy was great and cleared up a lot of things for me.

But a few questions still remains in my mind. Who exactlly is Saiti? Why exactlly does Saiti have the power to conjer up rainbows and sunshines? And when the Oracle responds to Saiti when she said "Will we ever see Neo again?" and the Oracle says "I suspect so" does that mean Neo is still alive or will just be reincarnated again?

Plz respond. Thanks.

psikeyhackr wrote:

Years ago I looked up the word matrix in my Random House dictionary. I was somewhat surprised when it gave the example: Rome is the matrix for western civilization.

Yes, indeed. Any infrastructure confined within tableaus is a 'matrix' of some description.

You've spent some time sharing your findings and meditations on the concept of matrices, and the various sociological forms it has taken over the years, as well as the ways in which they have remained fundamentally unchanged.

It is said that what the body creates is as much an expression of DNA as the body itself. These control systems are really just us. In the same way that you have ant colonies in which every ant seems to be aware of their place within the society, so do we seem to have this inherent, intuitive, socially-encouraged idea of what is 'right' and what is 'wrong' and how we should live our lives. Of course, unlike ants, we are capable of manipulating our environment to much greater lengths and are capable of rebellion on both an individual and a social scale that allows for 'revolution' and 'rebirth' in this cyclical system.

But the question is "how do we deal with this?". The first Matrix movie is the one that lays down the foundation of the premise itself: we are under control and feel as though we must subvert authority. The second Matrix movie starts with the Hamann exchange that you quoted: it starts to question the nature of the control system and how we relate to it. The final Matrix films concludes the thought process: ultimate acceptance through humility that we are all part of something much bigger than ourselves and should live a life of duty and sacrifice to our fellow human beings based on the only thing that stays with us throughout our lives; principles (which are - as Smith validly points out - their own self-constructed matrices, but whatever happens, some 'matrix' will always be there because we are destined to function in a world of rules and laws that we can never transcend and so shoudl find peace by accepting them and simply functioning within them). For me, this 'bringing back down to earth' is visually represented by Neo crashing down precisely where he had took off as a newborn messiah, determined to rebel. Quite an arc if ever I've seen one

psikeyhackr wrote:

Damn, this is getting too long and I haven't gotten to economics yet. Later. Psikeyhackr

Don't worry about the length. There's no such thing as a Matrix discussion that's "too long"

----

intell wrote:

Max, why do you believe the W's are using such an amalgam of source material and derivatives? Because they actually see a connection in all the works mentioned (and more) or to reach as many as possible?

I don't really know and - to be quite honest - I don't really care. All I know is that the Brothers seem to have had a huge exposure throughout their lives to a myriad of different artistic/expressionistic schools and have put so much of what obviously appeals to them in their movie...and it rocks big time. If the Brothers had simply written the script and submitted it to Warner Brothers, I think that you would have seen a very different film. But the fact that the Brothers insisted on directing it in their way meant that the entire movie was laden with references, homages and tributes that just ended up being incredibly cool. On the philosophical side, yeah, they used a whole host of different philosophers, and yeah, I think that they managed to connect them up and juxtapose them pretty well.

intell wrote:

That view of continents is indeed on of the more bizarre memes. lol.

Well, continenet, country, whatever...these are just man-made borders on an infinite earth. That's one of our limitations, unfortunately. We can't see the universe as a spectrum and are destined to be slaves to the need of quantifying the world we see. Hence science. Hence philosophy.

Intell wrote:

Another example of illogical thinking that the "MATRIX" starts from childhood is the use of weapons as toys for boys. Swords, machine guns, tanks, and every weapon that has been devised to date can be found in some toy shop somewhere. Where did someone get the idea that war is fun? But it comes out of the TV, music, and such. But we all can get a grasp of why this meme exists if we give it some thought.

Well, it's not like the Matrix movies play it down

zman wrote:

But a few questions still remains in my mind. Who exactlly is Saiti? Why exactlly does Saiti have the power to conjer up rainbows and sunshines? And when the Oracle responds to Saiti when she said "Will we ever see Neo again?" and the Oracle says "I suspect so" does that mean Neo is still alive or will just be reincarnated again?

Okay, let's have a look:

Q. - Who exactly is Sati?

A. - Sati is a program. She was created (programmed) by two programs in the machine mainframe who fell in love and wanted to express what they felt. They created a new program that had 'a bit of both of them' inside of her, just like a human child. Of course, programs created with no purpose are not accepted within the machine society. It's not as though love is one of the founding tennets of their thinking. As such, Sati is targetted for termination, and in order to save their daughter, they were willing to make a deal with the Devil (the Merovingian). The deal was that they would give the Merovingian the termination code of the Oracle's shell in exchange for their daughter's safe passage into the Matrix where she would reside as an exile (the last exile, as it would happen) under the Oracle's protection. The Oracle willingly gives her termination code to Rama-Kandra to give to the Merovingian. Why? Because she believes that she will shape both the world of the humans and that of the machines. Specifically how this will happen is never detailed, but it would seem that the only program ever created with no puropose other than love would have huge long-term implications in the machine society (let's not forget that theirs is its own society with rebellion and dissent, much like our own, which is one of the reasons the story of the trilogy is so rich). As such, it is easy to see how this would affect the future relationship between men and machines.

Q. - Why exactlly does Saiti have the power to conjer up rainbows and sunshines?

A. - Why? Your guess is as good as mine. The only thing we know for certain is that Sati can control the weather (probably how Smith was able to make the lightning storm after absorbing her). This is how her parents programmed her.

Q. - And when the Oracle responds to Saiti when she said "Will we ever see Neo again?" and the Oracle says "I suspect so" does that mean Neo is still alive or will just be reincarnated again?

A. - Ah, well, that's the promise of resurrection, isn't it? Neo is obviously dead, at least in terms of his physical body. The Oracle seems to be hinting that Neo's metaphysical presence is still there somewhere.

psikeyhackr wrote:

Quote: But the personality that finally emerges is largely formed by the environment in which a man happens to find himself during his development, by the structure of the society in which he grows up, by the tradition of that society, and by its appraisal of particular types of behavior. The abstract concept "society" means to the individual human being the sum total of his direct and indirect relations to his contemporaries and to all the people of earlier generations. The individual is able to think, feel, strive, and work by himself; but he depends so much upon society -- in his physical, intellectual, and emotional existence -- that it is impossible to think of him, or to understand him, outside the framework of society. It is "society" which provides man with food, clothing, a home, the tools of work, language, the forms of thought, and most of the content of thought; his life is made possible through the labor and the accomplishments of the many millions past and present who are all hidden behind the small word "society." huppi.com... Einstein knew there was no escaping The Matrix. psikeyhackr

Indeed, although he seems to accept its necessity. We are, after all, social creatures. But that still doesn't mean that we're not capable of thinking outside the box and taking leaps to cause revolution in that system (Reloaded, Revolutions) for everyone's betterment.

MAX wrote:

Well, continenet, country, whatever...these are just man-made borders on an infinite earth. That's one of our limitations, unfortunately. We can't see the universe as a spectrum and are destined to be slaves to the need of quantifying the world we see. Hence science. Hence philosophy.

Well, I totally disagree here. Mountains are commonly borders between countries like the Pyrenees between France and Spain. Mountains create difficult barriers which result in different cultures evolving on each side so it was easy for different nationalities to form. But continents are not about differences in socialpsychology they are major geological phenomenon involving land/water divides. I had an argument with some nitwits on another board who claimed the Ural Mountains caused a continental divide between Europe and Asia. So I said India should be a separate continent then because of the Himalayan Mountains. They said no because the Himalayas run east and west.

These people have been programmed to think a certain way by ther cultural matrix and will come up with idiotic IRrationalizations to justfy their thinking.

MAX wrote:

But the question is "how do we deal with this?". The first Matrix movie is the one that lays down the foundation of the premise itself: we are under control and feel as though we must subvert authority.

I was having this discussion on the now defunct Dead Economists Society website. I was there because I have been arguing since 1999 that the economics profession is full of crap for ignoring depreciation of durable consumer goods. One of the funny things about The Matrix is Neo making $2000 in one evening presumably selling some kind of hacker software and the next day being bitched out by his boss for being late for work. Now presumably he is a programmer at this company. Why couldn't he program at home? Why does he need to wear a suit? Why does he need to be in this little cubicle to code? It should be the number of lines of good code that matte to the company.

I used to work for IBM. I had to wear a suit. They announced that the night shift no longer had to wear suits because they thought it would be safer traveling in certain parts of the city without a suit. I immediately volunteered for the night shift. It also payed 10% more but I had to buy a car. The coputers did not care that I was not wearing a suit.

We are all caught in an economic matrix. We must be good little coppertops with our minds and bodies plugged into the power plant. But this depreciation which economists ignore is a hidden part of the illusion that traps us. I have covered this elsewhere.

psikeyhackr wrote:

Mountains are commonly borders between countries like the Pyrenees between France and Spain. Mountains create difficult barriers which result in different cultures evolving on each side so it was easy for different nationalities to form. But continents are not about differences in socialpsychology they are major geological phenomenon involving land/water divides. I had an argument with some nitwits on another board who claimed the Ural Mountains caused a continental divide between Europe and Asia. So I said India should be a separate continent then because of the Himalayan Mountains. They said no because the Himalayas run east and west.

Mm...good point. On the side note of India, it is considered a sub-continent.

When you look at 'borders' as physical boundaries, sure, I can see that. But if you're dividing North and South America and are dividing the African land mass into separate countries...surely these would be considered man-made borders?

Also, I find it fascinating that, despite our physical separation for most of our history, many of the different cultures of man have a surprising amount in common.

psikeyhackr wrote:

I was having this discussion on the now defunct Dead Economists Society website. I was there because I have been arguing since 1999 that the economics profession is full of crap for ignoring depreciation of durable consumer goods. One of the funny things about The Matrix is Neo making $2000 in one evening presumably selling some kind of hacker software and the next day being bitched out by his boss for being late for work. Now presumably he is a programmer at this company. Why couldn't he program at home? Why does he need to wear a suit? Why does he need to be in this little cubicle to code? It should be the number of lines of good code that matte to the company. I used to work for IBM. I had to wear a suit. They announced that the night shift no longer had to wear suits because they thought it would be safer traveling in certain parts of the city without a suit. I immediately volunteered for the night shift. It also payed 10% more but I had to buy a car. The coputers did not care that I was not wearing a suit. We are all caught in an economic matrix. We must be good little coppertops with our minds and bodies plugged into the power plant. But this depreciation which economists ignore is a hidden part of the illusion that traps us. I have covered this elsewhere.

Interesting points.

The idea of wearing suits...it is part of this 'cultural Matrix', true. I remember how we had to wear uniforms in high school. I actually rather enjoyed it! We got to wear tan (hey, no-one said the colour was funky!) blazers with a shirt, tie and trousers. Then, in Sixth Form (i.e. pre-University at the same school) we got to wear blue...which was obviously a welcome change!

Personally, I liked it, because I knew that I'd slip into my joggers and T-shirt when I got home, it I actually felt slightly empowered and authoritative in that uniform. One of the results, no doubt, of being conditioned by the system.

But even this system has been made by us, and I do think that ordered infrastructure, whilst potentially frustrating for the individual, is necessary for the group. Kinda like what Neo's boss tells him

psikeyhackr wrote:

So I try to use the cyberntic matrix to awaken coppertops to hidden aspects of the techno-economic matrix. This occasionally results in argument with nitwits on economics boards who I presume have a vested interest in the current system. Like Morpheus said: Quote: The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around, what do you see? Businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it. I am saying American consumers have lost TEN TRILLION DOLLARS in depreciation of automobiles since World War II that the economics profession doesn't talk about. So the rabbit hole is pretty deep

Wow. That I did not know...

psikeyhackr wrote:

Of course the coppertops need armaments: Your Money or Your Life by Joe Dominguez. simpleliving.net... psikeyhackr

Mm... ...maybe you need to 'do a Neo' and revlutionise the system into something that isn't so inefficient and 'evil' within this 'economic Matrix'...

You've shed a lot of light there, psikeyhackr. I'll definitely be reading more.

I have been looking for statistics on the number of cars in the United States. I thought it would be rather easy but no such luck. This is information from 5 different sites and is not quite consistent and I have a big gap in US data from 1929 to 2003.I have found a graph and have used it with MS Paint to make some fair estimates.

I began hearing there were 200,000,000 cars in the US about 4 years ago. If each of those cars lost $1,500 in depreciation each year that would come to $300,000,000,000 for the entire country. I had been assuming 1/6th as much depreciation in 1945 because that made for easy calculation and didn't seem unreasonable. So for 1945 to 2005 this gave the equation:

60 * $50,000,000,000 + 1/2 * 60 * $250,000,000,000 = 10.5 Trillion Dollars

This doesn't count interest on car loans and insurance.

I was assuming something like 33,000,000 cars in 1945 but the estimate from the graph makes it about 27,000,000. That was right after the war and they had stopped auto manufacturing but it jumped to 41,000,000 by 1950. Getting really accurate figures for depreciation would be a bit of a nightmare dealing with different price ranges of cars and compensating for inflation but it would still come to such a large number economists should have a difficult time explainig why the ignore it.

I have emailed 2500 economists about this since christmas. Only 14 responses so far.About 5 of them say I have a point with a little hemming and hawing mixed in.


year....US....World

1900....8,000....4,192 built in US
1904....22,000
1905*....77,000
1905*....78,000
1908....Model T introduced
1910*....460,000
1910*....500,000
1914....1,700,000
1915....2,330,000
1917....4,800,000
1918....5,550,000
1923....13,000,000
1926*....22,000,000
1928*....21,000,000
1929*....25,700,000
1929*....26,500,000
===== World =====
1968....169,994,128
1970....200,000,000
1985....375,000,000
1990*....<< 500,000,000
1996*....485,954,000
1997*....600,000,000
2001....450,000,000
====== US ======
2003....204,000,000...107,000,000 households 1.9 cars

max... wrote:

It is this love for Trinity that causes Neo to break the cycle at the end of Reloaded when he chooses the 'wrong' door. And why does he do that? The 'functional love' that is Trinity!

Hmm okay.

Now what caused Trin to be there at the "apropos" time so that choosing one door would really lead "to her"?

intell wrote:

max... wrote: It is this love for Trinity that causes Neo to break the cycle at the end of Reloaded when he chooses the 'wrong' door. And why does he do that? The 'functional love' that is Trinity! Hmm okay. Now what caused Trin to be there at the "apropos" time so that choosing one door would really lead "to her"?

This brings up the issue of FATE in The Matrix and to what extent it is an allegory for the REAL WORLD and how you think the REAL WORLD works. Since the Bible says God rested on the 7th day did the 6th ONE have to be the LAST ONE?

Remember when Morpheus said:

Quote:

What happened, happened, and couldn't have happened any other way,

What if free will is both more free and less free than we think? This involves the concept of reincarnation. What if within an individual life you are less free than you think, but since you have multiple lives with decisions to make in each life including possibly who to have for parents the variables are considerable.

psikeyhackr

Quote:

Since the Bible says God rested on the 7th day did the 6th ONE have to be the LAST ONE?

Well maybe. Because the seventh anomaly is blessed, eh? And allowed to rest instead of fighting.

Quote:

What if free will is both more free and less free than we think? This involves the concept of reincarnation. What if within an individual life you are less free than you think, but since you have multiple lives with decisions to make in each life including possibly who to have for parents the variables are considerable.

That is...if reincarnation is true. And having infinite choices available may make a person feel really free. I just want the one I want to be available

Quote:

This brings up the issue of FATE in The Matrix and to what extent it is an allegory for the REAL WORLD and how you think the REAL WORLD works.

Now we're talking! Now what some think of as Fate maybe just a higher will making choices as well. Vis-a-vis Providence.

But reality doesn't care.

Western culture conditions people to adopt the heaven/hell paradigm of metaphysical reality. The people who reject that paradigm usually trash all metaphysical concepts so reincarnation tends to get rejected out of hand in this society. The mention of reincarnation was one of the things that rather surprised me about the movie from the beginning.

If people can get past the cultural bias then reincarnation is not ncessarily any more or less ridiculous than heaven and hell.

Is Providence just another word for God?

psikey

Εxcellent posts MAX+psikeyhackr+intell.

Quote:

What if free will is both more free and less free than we think? This involves the concept of reincarnation. What if within an individual life you are less free than you think, but since you have multiple lives with decisions to make in each life including possibly who to have for parents the variables are considerable.

Interesting idea. Raises questions though : In each life we are a different consciousness with no memory of what we did in the previous lives. So we cant say "i really AM free cause i can now choose differently from what i chose in my previous life", can we? Also, how do possibly choose your parents through reincarnation ?

Quote:

So we cant say "i really AM free cause i can now choose differently from what i chose in my previous life", can we? Also, how do possibly choose your parents through reincarnation ?

I attended a Catholic grammar school and high school, but I decided I was an agnostic at 12 and thought this Christianity stuff was really stupid and concentrated on science. I encountered the idea of reincarnation somewhere along the line and just tossed it off as another dumb religious idea.

My sophomore year in college where I was trying to get an electrical engineering degree a freshman joined our fraternity who said his family lived in a haunted house. I learned this from another blabber mouth freshman and it took me two weeks to get this kid to tell me the story himself. He said his entire family had seen objects move around by themselves. They were sitting at the dinner table and a broom moved from one corner of the room to another. He said he had seen windows open and close by themselves. At the time I still regarded myself as an agnostic but found the idea of unusual phenomenon interesting, so I thought the probabality was 99% that he was either lying or deluded, but if that 1% chance of truth was the case then this was real important.

A few years later after I had dropped out someone loaned me the book The Ultimate Frontier. It provides a more complete gestalt of a metaphysical paradigm than any other book I have encountered. That doesn't necessarily mean it is true, but it provided a framework for further research. So by the time The Matrix came out I was inclined to suspect the real system that we live in works on reincarnation.

Here is a case of science getting into the act and I have posted this before. I keep it bookmarked.

Reincarnation, too, points further into another direction.