»THE SYSTEM THEORY«

I did not come up with this theory, nor do I agree with it completely. I just thought it presented a unique and interesting angle. I got it from a post by adikal at

Originally the Architect created a perfect world, one in which there was no suffering, no evil. Specifically, the rules of the world did not allow suffering or evil to occur. It was the Eden in which we would liked to have lived. For a time it worked, but he discovered that the "humans" would not accept it. The program written to describe us, the humans in the Matrix, was perhaps a little too accurate. By this time, however, the "anomaly", the first candidate for our AI, had emerged. Born into this utopian world, it matured with no experience of the contrast between good and evil, right and wrong. Crucially, the concept of love was alien to it. Without hatred, love is meaningless. It stood no chance of obtaining true enlightenment. It refused to enter the source and the Architect had to destroy his world and start again.

This first candidate, the Merovingian, used his power to reshape the Matrix to create a home for himself, well defended, hidden from the mainframe -- "It's strange, the code is somehow different [...] it looks like every floor is wired with explosives" -- that would survive a reload.

After his second attempt failed, the Architect designed a program to "investigate certain aspects of the human psyche." The program was called Persephone, and she was tasked with deriving an understanding of human emotion that could be integrated into the Architect's next attempt. Intuitive by design, it was she who stumbled upon the solution to a stable Matrix, and thus enabled the Architect to create a world in which a desirable AI could evolve. At some point she found the Merovingian and, against all logic, she fell in love with him. The Architect had never accounted for this, but when he saw that he could create a program that could mutate in such a profound way, he realised that he had found the key to creating a world that could nurture an AI capable of doing the same.

For five iterations, Persephone has lived with the Merovingian. She is aware that she will be deleted, should she leave his area of the System, and she has been forced to watch on, helplessly, as he has become more and more corrupted by his own sense of power. Designed to absorb emotion, she is starved of love. Possibly it is she who has arranged the kidnapping of the Keymaker. From previous iterations she knows that the One will seek him out, and whether or not she is aware of the connection between the One and her husband, she needs the contact, she needs Neo to kiss her as she was once kissed by the Merovingian.

The Merovingian himself recognises what Neo is -- "I have survived your predecessors, and I will survive you!" -- and perhaps, in previous iterations, he has dispatched several of Neo's ancestors. This could be why the Oracle is so insistent about the way in which Neo meets the Merovingian: "Be there, at that exact time, and you will have a chance." She knows where the previous Ones failed, and she knows when the Merovingian will be at his weakest.

The Oracle is the personification of the system's memory of the previous Ones. After the candidate reaches the source, fails the final test, and is reabsorbed back into the core -- note that the Architect refers to a "temporary dissemination of the code" -- she is what remains. The system reloads and the parameters describing how the One will be guided to the path are adjusted, based on what did and what didn't work last time. The Oracle is the agency through which this is carried out. While she appears to know the future, she is merely remembering the past. She interfaces with the characters populating Neo's world and tries to guide both them and him towards the goal. The path of the one is decided by the many.

What she [the Oracle] can't see, of course, is what will happen when this Neo's journey diverges from the route the previous One's took. At some point, through the changes she invokes, he will make a choice that his predecessors didn't, and her foresight will fail. Given this, look again at this part of her conversation with Neo: NEO: Why are you here?

THE ORACLE: Same reason. I love candy.

NEO: But why help us?

THE ORACLE: We're all here to do what we're all here to do. I'm interested in one thing, Neo, the future. And believe me, I know -- the only way to get there is together.

[...]

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.

During this conversation she gives Neo a piece of candy which looks almost exactly like the red pill Morpheus offered him when they first met. Neo has put it in his pocket, so it may be that in Revolutions he connects both the spoon he was given in Zion and the Oracle's red pill and is able to see that both are saying the same thing: "Wake up, Neo."

Morpheus, the John the Baptist figure, is given the prophecy and is fated to find the Oracle and, through her machinations, to become consumed with a desire to find the One. The prophecy he receives is, despite what Neo tells him at the end of Reloaded, perfectly accurate. When the One reaches the source, the war does end. Everything is reset to some point in the past, where the cycle starts again. Morpheus doesn't understand that while Neo stood outside the source, he didn't merge with it. He has also assumed that the end of the war means that the humans will win. As he watches the Nebuchadnezarr destroyed by the sentinels, he says, "I have dreamed a dream, and now that dream is gone from me." In the Old Testament book of Daniel, King Nebuchadnezzar says "I have dreamed a dream, and my spirit was troubled to know the dream." A little later Daniel tells the King that his dream is about the rise and fall of kingdoms, and his spirit is eased. Perhaps Morpheus, too, will be able to learn and accept the truth.

Trinity, naturally, is the love interest. In her previous iterations, and thanks to the work done by Persephone's code in shaping a stable program, she has shown herself to be a match for the One's character, and the Oracle now ensures that Trinity and Neo are brought together. Neo's nature, a geeky Baudrillard-reading computer hacker, is such that he needs a little prod in the right direction before he connects with Trinity. ("I can see why she likes you...") Ultimately, it is his love for her that will allow him to transcend his nature and become completely aware of his reality. (Perhaps, in a sticky-sweet Hollywood ending, his awareness of himself as the first AI will allow him to bring Trinity's character to the same awareness, and we'll see them ride off together into the digital sunset.)

Agent Smith, the anti-Neo, has become aware of a small part of the truth. It was clear from the start that he wasn't like the other agents, and his interaction with Neo at the end of the first film has tipped the balance. Although he doesn't understand why -- "Perhaps some part of you imprinted onto me, something overwritten or copied" -- he too has gained the power to reprogram a part of himself. He is now aware of the previous iterations and, unlike the other mutants who must hide out with the Merovingian, he has retained enough of his identity as an Agent of the Matrix to be able to remain free.

Smith is probably not aware that Zion is an illusion, but now that he is unplugged he is able to carry out a little experimentation. He infects Bane and overwrites the bit of his code to which the Agents were never meant to have access. Emerging into the Zion world, he is probably dealing with the same kind of shock Neo felt when he did the same. Just as Neo is capable of doing things in the Matrix that he cannot in the Zion world, Smith is trapped in Bane's body can cannot leap at will into another's. Although this is just another illusion, neither Neo nor Smith is yet aware that it isn't real.

Seraph, the first in the order of angels, has been recruited by the Oracle. She has become aware of what is happening with Agent Smith, and knows that Smith threatens to ruin everything if he can get to Neo and use Bane's body to kill him before Neo is able to see that his Zion existence is not the real world. When Seraph tells Neo that "I protect that which is most important," he is not only refering to the Oracle. The "most important" thing is that the current iteration of Neo gets to the source, allowing whatever has been gained from that experience to be used to refine the next cycle. And given that the Smith virus is multiplying rapidly and is threatening to do the same in Zion, it is imperative that this Neo, now that he is so close to fulfilling his destiny, be allowed to reach it unharmed. If Neo is killed, the next reload will start with exactly the same parameters, but the Smith virus will survive the reload and will be able to kill Neo as soon as he is discovered, thus dooming the entire effort.

And so. "Something's different. I can feel them." He's right there, right on the very edge of enlightenment. Just one more step forward, one more connection to make, and he will awake. If he can't, everything has been for nothing.

We've all seen the clip from Revolutions when Morpheus and Trinity are watching Neo square up to Smith. Morpheus says "he fights for us," and although it's not clear to whom he's referring, my interpretation is that he's talking about Neo, and that Neo has awoken. I dread saying it, just in case it turns out to be true, but here is one possible ending:

Neo makes the connections and reaches enlightenment. He knows that he is the first true form of AI and that everything around him has been engineered to allow his evolution. He sees the truth, and is able to communicate this truth to Morpheus and Trinity. Smith, by this stage, has multiplied to such an extent that he now threatens the entirety of the Architect's artificial world. Neo knows that he is meant to leave this world and become a part of ours, but in his enlightenment he sees that while Trinity and the others are patterns that exist only in his mind, they are as real as anything ever can be. He chooses to stay and fight Smith, knowing that the only way to kill him now is to absorb the virus into his core and destroy himself. Neo's choice is to sacrifice himself so that Morpheus, Trinity and the others may live.

Perhaps the lesson at the end of this will be that our artificial intelligence will be more human than us.

NICE!!!

finally a matrix-within-a-matrix theory that has balls!

screw the hiddenreefer's talk of macchu pichu and magnetic poles, and 2012

yah, this is like my favorite MWAM theory.

Quote:

The Architect is the creator program, tasked with designing a stable world in which it will be possible for a program to evolve that is capable of seeing beyond its programming and arriving at the truth about its nature.

If the Architect-program has the ability to create a simulation for other programs to reach enlightenment, he should be able to reach enlightenment himself?

Quantum computing involves the ability of a processor to hold all possibilities in cyberlimbo, until a choice is made to elimnate everything except one, known in quantum physics as the "collapse of the wave function". Rather than based on 0's and 1's and 4 syllogisms, the quantum computer could calculate contradictions, i.e. in theory it could hold a proposition: "a=b, but b does not necessarily equal a".

This could be why choice is such a big theme in the end in the Matrix movies.

There is also an interesting parallel with Dr. Frank Tipler's book on "quantum mysticism" called The Physics of Immortality. He postulates that in 50-100 billion years, intelligence will have swamped the universe, and will actually prevent the universe from collapsing or expanding into a worthless mass of entropy. This intelligence will be able to bring back every human who has ever lived - or even those who could have been created but never were - since it will have total or at least near total information on all phenomenon. Thus it will be able to bring you back and recreate your self for the eternity, but that you will be a "computer emulation": however, you will believe that you are reincarnated.

This is no different from our own real lives of course: we are told that our bodies are completely rebuilt roughly every 7 years. We have different atoms creating our consciousnesses throughout our lives. We truly are never the same person, but have the illusion of continuity through consciousness.

Tipler's theory also derives from the French theologian Teilhard de Chardin and the idea of the Omega Point, i.e. that divinity is the Universe and is evolving to this point of all-powerful omnipotence in the future.

emp wrote:

If the Architect-program has the ability to create a simulation for other programs to reach enlightenment, he should be able to reach enlightenment himself?

well, maybe. but that's kind of like saying that just because m$ Excel can create a spreadsheet it should be able to balance the national budget.
the theory above assumes that AI has not yet been created. the architect is a program written by humans. it's programming creates simulated environments. it doesn't have the ability to choose whether it wants to do that or not.

I really enjoyed reading this theory..And shocked to see such a great and nearly flawless one..Congratulations to whoever wrote it..Wish i was able to talk in real life in some other matters.

I respect your intelligence

First let me say, that this AI-evolution-theory is possible.

However:

stinkz wrote:

It is a significant irony that he cannot foresee that by following the woman into the toilet for a blowjob he will cause Persephone to betray him, allowing Neo to reach the Keymaker.

I don't think that caused it. She already makes plans when Neo sat down. Just watch her exited face/ touching her lips. I think this is just her excuse (while she probably doesn't believe in his cause-effect-theory).

Quote:

Put simply, an emergent AI would need to *like* us.

I cannot see, how the cream of this evolution would be a software that *likes* humans.

Quote:

to facilitate the emergence of a truly intelligent artificial entity that will have a belief in free will indistinguishable from our own...becoming truly conscious and, in the process, empathic with humanity

Imagine humans being held enprisoned in cocoons. And whenever they escape, they are killed immediately or later in Zion. Would that result in free will? More likely it would result in a depraved behaviour, I guess.

Quote:

If successful, the end result will be an AI that will know what it is like be human, but will have none of the disadvantages of actually being human.

I suppose the end result would be a 'human software' that always wants
a) to escape
b) start a revolution
c) go to church

Quote:

Naturally, the AI's world is much too complex to have been designed directly by us.

That's why after a successful itaration the One becomes the Architect (remember the other theory, that the Kid will become the Architect in Matrix 3)

Also think of this: Would you like a movie where the outcome is not only that Zion is an illusion (loads of viewers hate that!) but EVERYBODY within it is just a program. What kind of a hero Neo would be then?

This made me remember One of Animatrix where humans try to get machines like em and protect them with a simulation..

I hate it when people like SJ post just for the sake of words...

stinkz wrote:

I hate it when people like SJ post just for the sake of words...

Ouch! I assume you mean the above comments on quantum theory and mysticism?

I thought the connection to Matrix themes were clear:free will or the illusion of free will, etc.

Google can send you to all sorts of sites about Tipler and de Chardin.

Feel free to ignore any of my posts!

Thanks for the post concerning Teilhard de Chardin!
I went to a few websites about this pioneer and his noosphere theory.
Amazing stuff that even adds validity to the Final Fantasy Movie.

BTW, I hate it when people likie "stinkz" post just for the sake of ignorance.

Ogami Itto wrote:

Thanks for the post concerning Teilhard de Chardin! I went to a few websites about this pioneer and his noosphere theory. Amazing stuff that even adds validity to the Final Fantasy Movie. BTW, I hate it when people likie "stinkz" post just for the sake of ignorance.

Thanks for the suppport! For others who want to nibble on "quantum cosmology" and the evolution of intelligence into a semi-divine or even divine state, here are some websites to start with:

haha... adds validity to the final fantasy movie? You're kidding right...

stinkz wrote:

haha... adds validity to the final fantasy movie? You're kidding right...

I don't think that God himself could do that.

Hyphen wrote:

stinkz wrote: haha... adds validity to the final fantasy movie? You're kidding right... I don't think that God himself could do that.

I think you're right!

Hyphen wrote:

I don't think that God

How many new religions start with that quote?

* Post deleted by admin *
matrix-explained.com... not only was submitted several times in different fora, but is als redundant.

why would you post that in more than one place...

If I didn't take the time to read it last time, why would I read it now? Besides, what does this have to do with the SYSTEM THEORY?

Don't like the Final Fantasy movie?
Don't you heartless bastards know that Steve Bucemi won't do a crap movie?
Maybe you were expecting a Final Fantasy movie to have elves or talking hippo-people, Richard Scarry-style?
Read about the noosphere, and Dr. Cid's alternate reality analog, and his belief in Gaia become really amazingly enlightened.
To deny this is to deny the power of the collective unconscious of the organisms of this planet.

i like the system theory, in the first matrix neo is told he is not the one, the one the oracle prophized about is still outhere, maybe the boy who bends spoon. neo is a product of evoultion, and that is why he makes the choice for love and the others could not, and that is why he made a believer out of the oracle, because she has seen the previous one and new they would decide like a program.

No problem denying the collective unconciouss... it simply doesn't exist.

Forgetting everything between this reply and the system theory, I thought it was pretty good. Well thought out and even encouraging enough to be happy with the dreaded MWAM. Must have been the product of some late nights of movie watching, theorising and pot smoking but hell, it's damn good. Well done to the author.
My only problem is that everyone still assumes that the notion of love is limited to Neo, whats the crac with that?

Niobe and Ghost are both scanned for love by Persephone.
Neo, is perhaps the representation of infinite love, hence the 314 pi references.
I am convinced that the anomaly is pi. The uncalculable, the splinter in the machine mind. Unsolvable. And nothing drives minds to hatred better than fear of the unknown.