Preview

Free Will In The Matrix

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1423 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Free Will In The Matrix
Within The Matrix, Free will and fate work together to maintain the delicate balance between the Matrix and the real world, fate being what is instilled in the humans stuck inside the Matrix, and free will for those who get out. In the Matrix, the computer generated world in which humans "live", it appears that fate is the driving force of the simulation. This is due to the fact that the computer system is prewritten, predesigned, and already programed for each individual. However, free will begins to take place in the minds of the individuals who begin to escape. Contrary to the others, Neo is one of the few to possess free will. While many inside the Matrix appear to have merely fate to direct them, he has free will and knows that there …show more content…
The Matrix is set up as a game, the Earth and it's environment acts as the basic program, and the people are the players. The players do not get to make any free will decisions, rather they are ruled by fate. Fate is prewritten for the players by the machines who took over the world so long ago. In the Matrix everything is a virtual reality and nothing can be trusted as one is not ever in control of their life until they escape the game. Neo, when questioned by Morpheus whether he believes in fate responds "'No'...'Because I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my life.'" This is part of the reason Neo is the One, he knows from the beginning that he wants to be in control of his decisions and outcome. This differentiates Neo from the rest of the brainwashed people, because he wants there to be opportunity that he has choices to make. It seems that Morpheus is attempting to force fate, as he truly believes that Neo is the One and encourages Neo, Trinity, and all the other crew among the Nebuchadnezzar to believe this too. However, Neo is not the One when he meets Morpheus, and he is not the One until he understands that there is nothing controlling him. Neo has all the free will in the world once he realizes that there are no rules, that everything is a code, and that "there is no spoon". Because Neo is able to open his mind and just let go of all his preconceived notions he shows that he possesses free
Continue Reading
View Writing Issues

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The Matrix Hero's Journey
    • 930 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The Matrix Hero's Journey

    The Matrix is a movie written and directed by the Wachowski brothers. The story of the film revolves around Thomas A. Anderson (Keanu Reeves) who is a computer programmer by day and a hacker named "Neo" by night. He has spent all of his life intuiting that there might be something else. His doubt is reaffirmed with a message received on his computer: "Matrix owns you." Thus, Neo begins the desperate search for a person he has only heard of: another hacker named Morpheus. Morpheus is someone who…

    • 930 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    The Matrix: The Allegory Of The Cave
    • 585 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The Matrix: The Allegory Of The Cave

    Both Neo and Prisoner were deceived into believing in a falsehood: that they lived in the real world. In the Matrix, Neo lived most of his life without knowing he was a prisoner of the machines. When he escaped, he realized that he lived his life in a virtual world that felt indistinguishable from the real world. In the Allegory of the Cave, the Prisoner thought that…

    • 585 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    A Clockwork Orange Free Will Analysis
    • 1074 Words
    • 5 Pages

    A Clockwork Orange Free Will Analysis

    In the novel A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess, the main character and narrator Alex undergoes a series of trials as he strives to figure out life. He starts out as a young delinquent who does whatever he pleases whenever he does. There is no one controlling him or enforcing rules upon him. He has complete and udder freedom over his own life, and it affects others in a negative way. His crimes catch up to him one day, and he is charged with murder and thrown in prison. While in prison, Alex must obey rules and regulations set by the prison guards, especially when he undergoes Ludovico’s Technique, a cognitive therapy technique to sensitize Alex to crime and violence. By this therapy technique, Alex is completely deprived of his free will. After he is released from prison, his lack of freedom drives Alex so far as to try to commit suicide. After his near fatal fall Alex’s want, and free will to do violent acts returns and he reverts back to his original ways. By the end of the story he has committed heinous crimes but eventually becomes a good person. Throughout the novel, free will and free choice are the main controversies. Free will can be described as “the doctrine that the conduct of human beings expresses personal choice and is not simply determined by physical or divine force” (“Free will”). Alex goes through periods of having total free will and having no free…

    • 1074 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Powerful Essays

    A Matter of Perception Phil 201
    • 1825 Words
    • 8 Pages

    A Matter of Perception Phil 201

    Plato in his famous cave allegory makes wonderful connection to the perceptions of reality and illusions. In Plato’s allegory he talks about prisoners who from childhood were bound to a wall and only capable of seeing shadows cast on a wall of puppets representing humans and animals. “Then in every way such prisoners would deem reality to be nothing else than the shadows of the artificial objects.”(Plato) In The Matrix Neo is very similar to the prisoner that is in the cave who both eventually finds the truth about the real world. Just as the prisoner, Neo has been living in a cave called the Matrix. This Matrix, like the illusions from the shadows of the puppets in the cave, leaves its prisoners completely ignorant to the fact that the world as they know it is not real.…

    • 1825 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Allegory In The Movie The Matrix
    • 1325 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Allegory In The Movie The Matrix

    In this movie, we are introduced to a world in which machines had imprisoned man into a virtual world called “the matrix”. There the main protagonist “Neo” founds himself living in this world in questioning whether is real or not, and manages to scape with the help of a group of survivors from the real world. Yet the real world was not what he expected, earth was devastated by a long war between man and machines, and what is left of humanity lives in an underground city were the sewers of the old world use to be. We can consider the Matrix to be the cave, and the shadows projected by the fire, it also presents two possible outcomes from finding true knowledge. In the allegory, Plato believes that if an individual manages to escape from the cave it could end up in two ways. The first way indicates that if a man manages to escape the cave, he would be overwhelmed by the light, and the actual shapes of the shadows he saw, “Don’t you think he would be puzzled, and believe what he saw before was truer than what was shown to him?”(Plato pg2) indicating that the individual who got out would have trouble believing the things from outside the cave would be real. In the movie Neo faces the same problem when he is liberated from the matrix believing that the real world was actually a dream. The second way this could end up is if the individual finds himself to overwhelm by the real world to the point that…

    • 1325 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    The Allegory Of The Cave Analysis
    • 674 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The Allegory Of The Cave Analysis

    In The Matrix, Morpheus and his team find in the matrix Neo and help him escape the agents to safety. Morpheus gives Neo a choice, come with him into the real world or live in ignorance. The choice is simplified into blue pill and a red pill. “You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.” Neo chose to…

    • 674 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Allegory Of The Cave Analysis
    • 754 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Allegory Of The Cave Analysis

    In “The Allegory of the Cave,” one prisoner wanted his friends to know so bad what the outside world looked like, but could not get it across to them. In order to believe it, they needed to see it for themselves. The Matrix fell into the same category. Morpheus and Trinity knew the Neo was the one, but could not tell him. They wanted him to know to be able to defeat the Matrix. Neo had to believe it himself in order to be the one and use his powers. Unlike “The Allegory of the Cave,” In The Matrix, Neo ended up being able to use his powers. He believed that he was the one in the end, but the prisoners in “The Allegory of the Cave” never found out what the outside world felt like, and ignored his friend’s…

    • 754 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Powerful Essays

    The Matrix Movie Analysis
    • 1775 Words
    • 8 Pages

    The Matrix Movie Analysis

    Socrates then goes on to the second part of the allegory, where a single prisoner is freed and finds out what was making the shadows on the wall, but has no reference point to understand this new information as all he knows are the shadows. This is difficult period of accustomization that Neo also underwent after being unplugged as he tried to become adjusted to the way things truly were. Upon choosing the red pill, Morpheous and his team underwent a process to extract Neo from the Matrix. When he “woke up” he awoke in the harsh reality that machines were creating the shadows, creating the Matrix and everything that he previously perceived. Upon being brought aboard Nebudchadnezzar (Morpheous' ship), Neo was devestated that everything he previously knew was false but, like the prisoner would have to do once he was freed from the cave, would eventually overcome the idea of there being nothing but the Matrix and learn to embrace his new reality. This is best summed up by: "Most people, including ourselves, live in a world of relative ignorance. We are even comfortable with that ignorance, because it is all we know. When we first start facing truth, the process may be frightening, and many people run back to their old lives. But if you continue to seek truth, you will eventually be able to handle it better. In fact, you want more! It's true that many people around you now may think you are weird or even a danger to society, but you don't care. Once you've tasted the truth, you won't ever want to go back to being ignorant" –…

    • 1775 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    Free Will In The Odyssey
    • 1664 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Free Will In The Odyssey

    What is the nature of free will? Are gods or humans responsible for what happens?…

    • 1664 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Wyrd in Beowulf
    • 816 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Wyrd in Beowulf

    With the idea of wyrd being that the events one chooses for themselves affect their future choices and therefore their future altogether, it is obvious that free will is a big part of wyrd. Yes, maybe wyrd has put you under the circumstances that it wants you to be in, but how you handle those circumstances is entirely up to you; this is where free will comes into play. It is analogous to the idea that aspects of intelligence are…

    • 816 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Free Will In The Odyssey
    • 499 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Free Will In The Odyssey

    Destiny, it’s the belief that a hidden power controls one’s future. People throughout history have been fascinated by this and it shows in the stories and heroes that have been created. One example of this is Odysseus from the Odyssey, who was created to face the fear that gods controlled mortals lives. Another example is Barry Allen aka the Flash from the current TV show the Flash. He faced destiny mainly in the third season with the idea of if future events are set in stone. The Flash has struggles with human fears in the same way that Odysseus shows how the Greeks struggled with free will.…

    • 499 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Romeo and Juliet Freewill vs. Fate
    • 765 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Romeo and Juliet Freewill vs. Fate

    Are our lives controlled by fate following one path, or prompted by freewill giving us the constant chance to change our outcome?…

    • 765 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Illusion of free will
    • 457 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Illusion of free will

    In our society, free will is something that is ingrained in our set of beliefs that every citizen of the world should possess. We generally believe that we possess free will because of the choices we make on a day-to-day basis that is generally not forced upon by any direct outside force like in a totalitarian society out of a science-fiction story: the decision of whether or not to go to school in the morning, or finishing an essay at the last minute or allowing the grade to drop for an extra day are excellent examples of my view of free will. In Paul Halbach’s “The Illusion of Free Will”, he systematically attempts to debunk the debate between the combating theories of free will and hard determinism. He conveys his argument by stating that determinism and free will are incompatible with one another: one cannot exist if the other is true. If he can thoroughly prove that determinism is true, then free will would be deemed incapable with the human condition which we must accept. Holbach breaks down his strategy into two parts, the first of which he explains how the thought process and decision making of human beings are complex, yet mechanical, which boils down to the fight of competing desires. Lastly, he attacks different views on actions people would normally view as explanations of free will.…

    • 457 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Paper
    • 477 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Paper

    The following essay which were I am comparing and contrasting the differences and similarities of the movie The Matrix and Plato’s and Descartes articles. The similarities that all three has is they are all asking is the world we live in is it real or is it a figment of our imagination and someone is playing a mean joke on us. They also talk about our minds being controlled by someone or something outside of us, much more like an outer body experience. The Matrix is not real and focuses more on the mind and how the mind is being manipulated and Pluto is talking about the senses and how the senses can be manipulated and can confuse us and put doubts in our mind. In the Matrix, Mr. Anderson who is better known by the name Neo, works for a software corporation but at night he is a computer hacker. All articles discuss some type of reflections and different meaning about life and how we view it. The Matrix was a computer with programming simulation of the world that was experienced by virtual lives by being an individual player. They saw what it felt like to be born, growing up, getting a job, getting old, and dying. Mr. Anderson aka “Neo” couldn’t accept “The Matrix”, he had all types of mixed emotions and then thought that his life was a lie.…

    • 477 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Matrix Paper
    • 565 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Matrix Paper

    The Matrix directly relates to Plato's Allegory of the Cave. In both works, discovering the truth about reality is the major concept. In the cave, men are chained up and all they know is shadows of puppets that are displayed before them, illuminated by a fire that blazes in the distance. These shadows that the men see on the wall are all they know; this is reality to them. Much like in The Matrix how the people that are in the "Matrix" are unaware of that they are living in a world that doesn't actually expose the people to reality. What they know of in the matrix is reality to them. The shadows on the wall and the matrix both cover up the true reality that exists outside of the people's comfort zone. Neo and Plato's released prisoner go through similar realizations. Both Neo and the released prisoner are chained down (literally and metaphorically) from understanding the truth behind reality. The released prisoner is tied in a way that he cannot move and his head always faces in the direction of the wall. He finds out the truth behind the shadow's that he has known as reality. He soon figures out the real creatures that merely cast their shadows before him. In comparison, Neo is tied down to a massive wall where machines control the lives of the people in the matrix. Neo also realizes the truth when he takes the red pill, which allows him to escape from the Matrix and into the real world, therefore living the truth of reality, even though it is more difficult than life inside the Matrix. Neither the released prisoner nor Neo realize they are prisoners until they are introduced to the truth of reality. The prison of the Matrix is described by Morphius when he says to Neo, "It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth." Both Neo and the prisoner can be seen as heroes because they want to help the people who are still blinded by their false conception of reality. Neo is successful in fulfilling his prophecy of becoming "The…

    • 565 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More

Related Topics