Abhishek SHARMA 12C2

11 April 2007

TOK
How does the movie Matrix address the question: What do humans expect from society?

Definitions of a society from the Websters Dictionary: A highly structured system of human organization for large scale community living that normally furnishes protection, continuity, security, and a national identity for its members. A closely integrated group of social organisms of the same species held together by mutual dependence and exhibiting division of labour.

We human beings are indeed a species that rely very heavily upon social networks. Being mammals, our life begins already by being surrounded by our mother, if not more members of the family. This fact has remained unchanged since the early beginnings of our species. Unlike most other animals, we need to be taken care of for a considerably longer number of years before being able to survive on our own. Plenty of animals begin their lives out of an egg, and are, from day one, left to fend for themselves successfully. Once a child grows up, if left alone for a long time he would eventually go mad. It is essential for humans to be constantly surrounded by other members of the same species and work together to be protected and subsist. It is in the human nature to be curious, to search for knowledge and answers. This primitive habit, still present, has changed our daily routines from the cavemen era, which involved mainly eating/hunting and sleeping, to more complex activities such as rituals, games and sport.

This necessity to be together and the search for a purpose in life founded the beginnings of what we call today our society. There are many advantages of living in a community, one of which is security. Basic logic tells us, that the bigger our population is, the better are defences will be against whatever danger that might arise. Our ancient ancestors understood this, and started to form clans (or tribes) which would give its members some form of personal identity, within the group, depending on the responsibilities that would be allocated. When it comes to authority, there are two kinds of people: the leaders and the followers. Clearly the leaders would impose onto others their own rules of living. And living in a group meant division of labour, where inequalities are not too far behind. Different duties were given to different people, sometimes depending on their physical capacities. As a consequence, appeared the caste systems where the same tasks were carried on from generation to generation, keeping the family at the same level in the social pyramid. From the above discussions, we can deduce that humans have certain expectations from society including: 1) Security 2) Identity, and 3) more importantly, a Purpose in life. Through the movie Matrix, we can see that it portrays society in the form of a virtual world very similar to our actual one, in which people are held together by mutual dependence. Making our society fictional and creating a real world where its people are disconnected from it, is a very powerful way of observing our society from an external point of view. In the matrixs society, every action and thoughts of a person are constantly scanned by programs, called Agents. Agents are present to provide the ideal conditions in which the so called perfect world can take place. This world is based on a certain amount of rules which include world physics (gravity, etc). But these very rules can be bent or sometimes broken, although only by people such as Morpheus, Trinity, or Neo who are disconnected from this society. This might show us that the capabilities of humans who are still connected are not able to flourish at their fullest in a society and that a compromise must be made to be able to live together.

The movie Matrix shows what the meaning and purpose of a society is, in an extreme way, yet which is not too far from the truth: We are not always aware of what our governments are up to. We know that secret services are employed by them, but not what their objectives are. This is a direct parallel to the use of Agents in the virtual world who can secretly appear or disappear from one location to the next at any point in time. Morpheus explains to Neo that the matrix is a set of rules that can be bent and sometimes completely broken. These rules have a more physical aspect in the movie (defying gravity, supernatural strength), but we can relate to these rules in our own world as well, in the form of laws and authority (the police, etc). Not every law has to be respected. A certain number of them can be bent or broken as well. People in our society can sometimes get away with theft or even murder. These laws are not absolute, but are there to restrict chaos as far as possible.

The free humans in the movie, on the other hand, want independence from these programs and machines, so as to take control of their lives by themselves. Personally, I think that the world human beings dream of, namely the perfect world, can never exist due to one basic reason: The world consists of approximately 6.5 billion people and in this whole population there is not a single pair who are exactly identical. Even if a society would consist completely of clones, no two clones would be able to stand at the same place at the same time, consequently they would not see the world in the same way (Figs.1a and 1b). Their perspectives are thus different and the knowledge they acquire would also be different.

Fig. 1a
This is an image of a 3D puzzle scene viewed directly from the front. The viewer sees the four pieces joined together.

If the people who form a society are different and diverse from each other, physically and mentally, there will definitely be inequalities in opinions and lifestyles. An agreement on the perfect way of life would therefore never be achieved. A similar idea can be seen through the differences in Morpheus and Cyphers values in life. Cypher is ready to betray his own group (or clan) to obtain happiness and prosperity through a virtual world. Whereas Morpheus is ready to die for his own people so that they can see the real world for themselves and be free from the

Fig. 1b
This is the identical scene from the previous image but viewed from a side angle. The viewer sees that the puzzle pieces are actually not connected and far apart from each other. 3

matrix and its rules. This inequality in opinion results in a series of fights and consequently the death of more than five members of the same group. In the same way, in our world, wars and conflicts will inevitably burst persistently in a persons lifetime, in a paradoxical attempt to reach a state of prosperity. This idea is also present in the movie when Agent Smith says: I believe that as a species, human beings define their reality through misery and suffering. I believe that prosperity in a society cannot subsist, but we can nevertheless get very close to it. We can limit conflicts and wars by using laws. In other words, we have to place certain rules that will govern each and everyones lives in order to try achieving a level of prosperity. Ironically, that was what the matrix built to do in the first place.

Number of words : 1237

Bibliography :
Websters Dictionary : for definitions of a society 3D Studio Max : for making figures 1a and 1b Adobe Photoshop : for making the Vicious circle diagram en.wikiquote.org : quotes from the matrix www.flmnh.ufl.edu : photo of the crocodile egg animals.timduru.org : photo of polar bears