The Matrix - Finding Reality in The Matrix
Uploaded by jenayoaks on Feb 24, 2001
Movies are wonderful things; they can inspire, spark debate, and even make you believe in what you are seeing. Virtual Reality is a creation of a highly interactive computer-based multimedia environment in which the user becomes a participant with the computer in a "virtually real" world. Movies and virtual reality can do the same thing: make you believe what is presented to you. Although there are several movies which use virtual reality in the plot, such as The Lawnmower Man, and Hackers, the one most prevalent to me is The Matrix. Although this movie contains many aspects of virtual reality, it stands out in my mind so much because it suggests that the world in which we live, is a virtual one. The Matrix has many different aspects of virtual reality and they are incorporated throughout the movie.
Virtual reality is involved in this movie in one major way: it suggests that our world is merely a virtual reality program that was created in order to “control” humans and keep them from the “real world,” which has been taken over by artificial intelligence who harvest humans for power. The main character in the movie is Gary Anderson, affectionately known to the hacker-world as Neo. He is contacted by people who have escaped the Matrix, and through a series of adventures, joins them. At one point in the movie, Neo goes to a psychic to find out if he is the one person who can save the rest of us from the Matrix. While waiting to see the psychic, Neo encounters a boy, there for the same reason, bending spoons without touching them. He watches and asks how he does it. The boy responds in a typical virtual reality response, “concentrate not on the spoon itself, but that there is no spoon.” That is how virtual reality works: you can interact with everything in the virtual world, but it’s not really there.
Everytime Neo enters the Matrix, a plug is inserted into the back of his head and he is hooked up to machines. Virtual Reality also uses such equipment. Granted, it is not as drastic as having a probe thrust into the back of your head, but there is special equipment needed such as helmets, gloves, and eyephones. The glove is made of thin Lycra and is fitted with sensors that monitor finger flexion, extension, hand position and orientation. It is...