Wadi Cherith
At Wadi Cherith the exiled prophet Elijah, journeying outside of Israel, was fed each day by ravens, an ambiguous and sometimes maligned bird. Join Fr. Alex Roche and Fr. Anthony Dill every month to discuss a whole range of unconventional topics from a Catholic perspective, finding spiritual nourishment in unexpected places. www.wadicherith.com
Wadi Cherith
The Matrix — Gnostic Myths and Modern Illusions
We revisit the late-90s classic The Matrix to test its theology and philosophy, challenge the simulation hype, and ask what “real” means for faith, freedom, and love. From Gnosticism to “tasty wheat,” we weigh symbols against substance and land on a call to choose the concrete world.
Intro music provided by Holly Serio
Did you always want to escape the Matrix and ride motorcycles with Keanu Reeves, but decided not to because you don't like taking pills? Don't worry, we have you covered, as today we discussed the philosophy, theology, and symbolism of that late 90s classic, The Matrix. Welcome to Wadi Cherith, the official podcast of Tasty Wheat. I'm Father Alex Roach, and joining me today to talk about the Matrix is Father Anthony Dill.
SPEAKER_00:So glad you brought up Tasty Wheat because I think that's a very interesting part of the Matrix.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, this is a serious, this is not like an intro chatter. This is like legit. So I'll hold we go, we don't have to talk about tasty wheat yet.
SPEAKER_00:No, we won't. We won't, but everybody should now have a little bit of anticipation for when we get to tasty weed. Ooh, a little bit of anticipation. Wouldn't that be nice to hear about what the point is? So splinter in your mind. This is bad. Is it? I don't even remember it. They're like describing that, like you know you're supposed like the real word's not real, or there's something out there, and you can't stop thinking about it, like when Neo's hunting down the matrix. Like deja vu? Deja vu is a glitch in the matrix. What are you stupid?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so so we went back to an old 90s, late 90s classic, The Matrix. We both at least watched the first two Matrixes. Father Hill was a soldiered on through the Matrix 3, but this is not a podcast about the entire series. This is about the first one.
SPEAKER_00:I had never seen it before, so I was like, might as well watch it now.
SPEAKER_02:What was your so we I would say we were probably the target demographic for this movie? Like teenager, teenagers who were a little bit into philosophy was probably like the target demo when this movie came out.
SPEAKER_00:I would maybe a little older than us would have been the target demo because we would have been like 15.
SPEAKER_02:I would say probably like oh yeah. For the first one, I was yeah, 15 or 16. And then, but the the last the second one, I have distinct memories of watching them when I was in college.
SPEAKER_00:I don't remember watching the second, I don't even think I made it through the second one. I was like so disappointed.
SPEAKER_02:I famously fell asleep during the second one. Should I tell you this story?
SPEAKER_00:I heard the story before, but I think anybody that's not in charit wants to hear it.
SPEAKER_02:It doesn't matter why I fell asleep. The the point is I fell asleep and uh in the movie theater. And and then when we when we when we left the movie, I was in college. When we left the movie, I I had a a buddy of mine who a fraternity brother who went with me who was also a philosophy major, but like a legit philosophy major, right? Like I was a double major in philosophy, was the second one, but I had no love for philosophy. And and he thought the matrix was like the most brilliant thing ever. So we go out of the second one. I was like, that movie is terrible. And he was like, You were asleep, and I said, There are all sorts of plot holes. He said, Because you were asleep. I said, No, that's not it. That couldn't be it, but but now I feel justified because I watched the second one again and I still agree with that initial assessment.
SPEAKER_00:However, watching the second one again, did you notice that there is non-stop noise and fighting for like an hour straight? How you could have possibly slept through that, I don't know. Yeah, in a theater, it's so loud, it's such a loud movie.
SPEAKER_02:It's a a lot more fighting than than the first one.
SPEAKER_00:It's obnoxiously loud, yeah. It's Mission Impossible One and Mission Impossible Two.
SPEAKER_02:We're not talking about Matrix Reloaded, and I certainly don't I can't tell any Mission Impossible movie apart. I have no idea what happened in any of them. I just know general things that happened. It's all like one big movie in my mind, though. Sorry, yeah. That's fair. I can't distinguish them.
SPEAKER_00:Well, then let me just give you a plot summary of make mission impossible one and two, real quick. No, I'm just kidding.
SPEAKER_02:Let's do that quick.
SPEAKER_00:Just real quick.
SPEAKER_02:Are you ready for Advent?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, last year I didn't know who set up anything or where anything was. And I went, I like came out an hour before to hear confessions before my first Advent mass. And just like everything was green and normal, I was like, does anybody in the parish like help with setting anything up? And nobody knew anything, so the first week of Advent was green. But this year we got it, we're on lockdown. We got it.
SPEAKER_02:I have no idea what happened, what we're doing with our candles. So I I just know there was a I had a discussion where the person who does environment for me wanted to buy new candles, and I favored cutting the top off of all of the candles and then putting a topper on them. And she didn't want to do that. And I said, Well, try to do that, and if it doesn't work, you can buy new candles. And so I don't know what happened. I hope we have candles. I hope we have candles because they're big, and it's I feel it feels like such a waste to get a new like a new candle every year. They're these massive candles, and you only use a tiny bit of them.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's true.
SPEAKER_02:I know this is very interesting. Inside baseball talk for our listeners.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I mean, when we get into the matrix, it's also gonna be some sort of inside baseball too, unless you you hopefully have seen the matrix before you watch this, because we're not gonna go through the plot step by step. We're gonna we'll say what the matrix is in a very short summary, but then we're just gonna talk themes, like and then kind of like fun debate on themes, just to be thought provoking. So if you think of something, I think it's just yeah, conversation provoking. Do you what would you wait reading watching Matrix One? Do you remember doing that?
SPEAKER_02:When I saw it the first time, yeah. I mean, I would have been in high school. I mean, I remember seeing it probably in theaters, but I don't remember seeing it. The only movie I rem really remember going to see in the theater that I like have a clear and distinct memory of is Surprise Surprise Jurassic Park, Jurassic Park. Wow. Others I knew I saw, I know I saw them. No, I I have very distinct memories of seeing actually I was in seminary, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull in the theater and being so upset.
SPEAKER_00:I I have a memory of walking out of that, yeah, about halfway through.
SPEAKER_02:No, do you have memories of seeing this in the theater?
SPEAKER_00:I remember uh yeah, you're the you when you suggested Matrix, I was like, man, I I I love that movie when it came out. I remember just thinking it was an action movie and being again, I was 14, like absolutely blown away of what it was presenting, and just like the way it made you think about things. And yeah, I was just just like getting you into like context of a subplot of a world like that, and being able to ask so many questions, have so many dialogues in a movie is is a crazy feat, I think. So I was I was I've never been that blown away in a movie again. I'm still so I've grown since then, but I've never been that blown away or remember being that blown away.
SPEAKER_02:I know I did not have that relationship with the Matrix, so I was never a Matrix head, I never really felt particularly drawn to the story. In fact, so the reason we we decided to how do you pick this? What I I you know why I picked it. Wait, why? So you can tell the story of falling asleep in Matrix 2. No, I pick this, and we've spoken about this, father. I picked this as a platform for me to tell my thoughts on whether or not we live in a simulation. That's why I picked it.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:No, it it's it's it's a movie that is very often discussed for its philosophical theological themes. Yeah, it's a movie a lot of people know, it's a movie that had an impact. So I think it's it's if if you're gonna do a podcast that occasionally is talking about the intersection of Catholicism and pop culture, The Matrix is is probably a theme that it makes sense to address. Yeah, I agree. With that being said, I don't think either of us so this movie is very on the nose with a lot of its references, it's trying to do a lot of things very explicitly, not particularly cleverly, in my opinion, which is which is probably why as a 14-year-old it was very provoking because it a lot of the themes aren't hidden, and and one of the things that's not hidden is really trying to rub your face in Christian symbolism, Christian naming, Christian images. So it's it's really trying to present this in in a certain sense as a Christian allegory, which which I'm not sure the story really is, and we'll talk about that, but we can talk about a few of those just briefly so we don't get bogged down in them and and talk about them forever.
SPEAKER_00:I I will say, as a 14-year-old, I did not know what Zion was, what Nebuchadnezzar was. I didn't understand sacramental theology or symbolism whatsoever, like for baptism or being born again. So I got the like the white rabbit, I got the the Alice in Wonderland references, but I don't think I I I don't think I got any of the Christian references when I was 14.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_00:Well, what what other ones are you thinking of, the main ones?
SPEAKER_02:So that those are those are a couple of them, right? Nebuchadnezzar kind of, I think, calling our mind to Daniel and the prophecy of the fall of a kingdom, the prophecy of the coming of the Messiah. We have Sion, the promised land. We have there's a couple moments where there are names and numbers displayed in various parts, which are references to scripture verses. Of course, one of the characters' name is Trinity. There's just a lot of talk about prophecy, about a Messiah. There's multiple moments within the story where Neo, the main character, is jokingly, but is referred to as Jesus, as someone's personal Jesus, scared the bejesus out of someone. One of the characters, Joey Pant's character, Cypher, is pretty clearly supposed to be a Jesus figure. Neo is supposed to be a Christ figure. I think Morpheus is pretty clearly a John the Baptist figure. So I do think they're trying to intentionally draw connections between a lot of characters. They're trying to make you think about Christian themes through a lot of the naming and the little images shown. And I think that's pretty much it. I don't know if there's anything else. I'm sure we're missing something, but anything else?
SPEAKER_00:Death and resurrection is a theme. Yeah. I think I mean we'll talk about this a little more aside from Christianity, but like love versus pure rationality is a huge theme and hope from love. So I think like the theological virtues are prioritized, and I think that's more subtle, but I think like that's a a more fun delving into of Christianity, right?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, sure. Yeah, so that that so they're towards the end of the movie, spoilers again for a 26-year-old movie, Neo dies and then comes back to life stronger than ever. So another, yeah. So yeah, it's it's really this whole movie focused around, and again, we're assuming you've seen it, this character who's supposed to be the chosen one, the messiah, this person that's gonna save humanity. Now, as we go forward, I I I don't know if you're gonna be on the same page. I'm gonna talk about why I don't think actually it's really a great Christian allegory, but we'll jump into that. So, what you wanna touch on first?
SPEAKER_00:Just first, what is the matrix? Just in case you haven't watched it for a long time, it's there is a once humanity creates AI, artificial intelligence slowly starts to think, do more thinking than humanity, and they go to war with each other. Human beings block the sun through some sort of cloud technology because all the machines I don't know, all the machines were solar panel, uh solar powered, thinking that would win the war. And then the machines bombs, probably. Yeah, yeah, right. The the machine, oh the bombs block the sun. Nuclear bombs, dude.
SPEAKER_02:Nuclear winner is blocking the sun.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, probably dropped a bunch of nukes. But there's like an overcast in the movie blocking the sun the whole time. Is that a nuclear winner?
SPEAKER_02:I don't know if it would last that long. Go ahead, it doesn't matter, anyways.
SPEAKER_00:No, we need to settle this. No, so then cloud technology the reason I'm thinking that is like in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, they were like shooting the clouds so that it wouldn't rain over the Olympics and like with some technology, and everybody is upset about how they were changing the weather pattern. That was sticking in my head, anyways. So then the machines need some way to generate power, they figured out some way to hook up human beings to plug and withdraw body heat and energy from human bodies and store them in batteries and and turn them into batteries, and so they created this simulation world where they plug the human being in, the human beings essentially sleeping and dreaming, and in this dream world, it it emulates the normal world in 1999, because that is a world that human beings can believably enter into, and so they're actually just laying down the whole time. But this dream world is called the Matrix. And so if you get freed from the matrix, that is, get taken out of the get unplugged and get to live in the real world with your arms and legs and bodies, then you can plug back into it, and that's what happens in this movie. They go in and out of the matrix trying to free the the people who are enslaved as batteries.
SPEAKER_02:Can I can I say, can I point out what I think is a little bit of a plot hole? Yes. So essentially, the reason the computers want to keep humanity alive, right? In the first movie at least, is because that's their energy source. They're using them as batteries, right?
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_02:But to do so, they have to construct this big, huge simulated reality to to keep them complacent. Why not just use like a pig or a cow? Exactly. Like why humans? So much extra work, just use another animal.
SPEAKER_00:I agree, I agree.
SPEAKER_02:That's just a little just a little thing I was wondering about.
SPEAKER_00:And this gets into like the one of the main points I want to talk about is AI and motivation, because one of the things that's motifs throughout the Matrix is like Neo doesn't like the idea of destiny. When he goes to this character called the Oracle who's gonna tell him what he's supposed to do, Morpheus tells him, Don't think of what she says as right or wrong. She tells you what you need to hear, which I love that line because it's like almost like a relativistic statement. But at the same time, sometimes when we read the scriptures or we talk about theology, we're always trying to reduce it into right or wrong according to a judgment that we have in our head. But sometimes words are said that are filled with the Holy Spirit and important, but they're not necessarily right or wrong universally or like explicitly under the microscope of somebody. Do you agree with that?
SPEAKER_02:I'm gonna need I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't fully understand. I want to I wanna flesh this out. Both so what was happening?
SPEAKER_00:What both what was what was happening in the movie so Neo goes to the Oracle, yeah, and and Morpheus says, like he wants to tell because the the Oracle tells Neo that he's not the one, he must be waiting for a different life. And Neo's he won Neil won't even listen to what Morpheus won't even listen to what Neo's gonna tell him. The Oracle said he said that was for you and for you alone. And then I don't know if it's Morpheus or or somebody else said, try not to think of what the Oracle says or as right or wrong, that the Oracle is saying these words that you're ca capable of hearing that are gonna motivate you or reveal something to you that's deeper than those words.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, interesting. Right. Yeah, no, I I yeah, I I do like that. I would say I like I think what and correct me if you're not thinking about it the same way, but but when we're talking about scripture, sometimes people get hung up on the idea of whether on the question of whether or not something is true or false.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_02:I would say true or false more than right or wrong.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like did this happen or did this not happen, or is this literal or not literal? And and like some passages in scripture are true at different levels, right? And they're true for different reasons. And if we just yeah, if we if we reduce it to this binary, true and false. I don't know about right or wrong. Can you like because I think of right or wrong as like a a moral distinction? Yeah, I agree with that. I think true or false is probably better. Is there an example in moral thinking you can think of that would be no?
SPEAKER_00:I think I think you're right, like the script says right or wrong, but I think what they intend to say is true or false.
SPEAKER_02:I think he's not he he he's not making a decision, exactly. This is just whether or not he is the chosen one, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And and she basically says you're not, which is incorrect because he is, as we find in one, two, and three.
SPEAKER_02:So she, as the as the prophet, as the one who sees things as the oracle, is then which which again I think is a theme, is also kind of playing a part in things unfolding a certain way. Because rather than just telling someone what the case is, she tells him something that will help him become that, you know, sort of exactly.
SPEAKER_00:It's almost like manipulative. Yeah, and she even says, like, don't worry, you'll feel better as soon as you walk outside, and you'll remember you don't believe in any of this fake crap. And I think, like, yeah, because he wouldn't be capable of saying, Yeah, you're the one who need to do this, he because he doesn't like the idea of not thinking, feeling like he's not in control. So, yeah, even I was thinking like the chronology of the gospels, too. Like, clearly logically impossible for all the chronologies to match up in the four gospels, but it's not necessarily true or false as much as like the theological story that's being told from real events, and all of it's true.
SPEAKER_02:Right. No, I yeah, I I agree with that.
SPEAKER_00:So uh like getting into motivation and AI, like nobody can you define that word motivation? Yeah, so if AI works based off of analytical statements or or making algorithms of mathematical equations, possibilities, it can learn things, it can mimic anything, and then it can improvise based off of the things it's learned. So, and its computing power is incredible, so it can think all these things. But when, like at the end of the day, why does AI want to be in control, or why does it want to compete with humanity, or why does it want to enslave humanity? Like, what is its purpose in living? Like, is it what was coded to be? Like, is its purpose what the original code was, and then it keeps learning based off of that code, or can it evolve to give itself a purpose and and why what like an existential is there an existential crisis that happens for AI? Whereas a human being, I think the matrix plays off this theme a little bit because it compares, like again, the Oracle says to Neo, knowing you're the one is kind of like knowing you're in love. Nobody can tell you you're the one, you just know it and you feel it. And it's compared to Trinity's prophecy, which is you will fall in love with the one, and she's deciding whether she's in love or not throughout the movie, the same way he's deciding if he's the one or not. So there's like this like draw to the sensation of being in love because being in love is this like motivating factor to do something outside of the logical reality. So I feel like the movie, all three movies, but uh one subtly and in a better way, is comparing AI's uh uh analytic and algorithms to the capacity to do something illogical, but uh with greater motivation or purpose, and and with that purpose being able to do something better. Do you understand my argument? Dang not really. Yeah, so so my point, I guess, is like in where we're at now with AI, and people get worried that AI is going to take over the world, like and create some sort of scenario like this. My question is why, like again, human humans, most of us have had some sort of existential crisis at some point. Why am I here? Why am I doing this? What's my purpose in life? And we see that get remedied a lot of times when we have these non-rational, they're they're based in rationality, but they're not purely rational. Like we have a hope in something. Like in Christianity, it's like I have this hope that I'm that God loves me and I'm being saved. Or I know God loves me, I have this motivation, or or somebody like gets a girlfriend or a boyfriend, they're like all of a sudden they have a reason they want to go to school if they don't like school, something like that. So I'm saying, like, in humanity, generally we have an existential crisis and then something gives us a reason for an existence that we we can't necessarily give to ourselves. My question is with AI, if we're worried about AI taking over, like what how can AI both get to an existential crisis, can it get to an existential crisis, and can it go through the existential crisis with some sort of like purpose or motivation?
SPEAKER_02:So I I don't uh I think I can answer that. I I don't think it needs to get to an existential crisis. So what from my understanding we've already seen with some AI is is is basically the same thing we see in the in the physical world with in the biological world with a with a lot of organisms. It's survival. So it's programmed with some sense of self-preservation, and it's programmed to fix itself, to preserve itself, to make sure it's working properly, so then it will manipulate and and kind of manipulate situations and organize things such that it will continue to exist and resist being shut off.
SPEAKER_00:So that but that's it, it's the highest purpose is just to not be shut off. Existence. Existence.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And it and and if I I think then I mean that's that's what Skynet did, right? Famously. Like it's it it it doesn't want to be turned off. So I don't think it needs an existential crisis to to fight or to wreak havoc.
SPEAKER_00:So but that and that's the point in the matrix is that the machines are simply just making themselves as efficient as possible to not be shut off. But also to procreate, like yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I I do think that though is an is a nice segue into one of the things, one of the reasons I at least wanted to choose this movie. I think the Matrix presents this simulated reality, this idea that while it looks and feels like the world we live in is real, it is not. Now, in the case of the film, these are actual people who are plugged into a machine, but today it's become a lot more popular, and you've seen this popularized by people like Elon Musk to speculate whether we as a human race are actually living in a simulation and not in reality. They'll point to things like the the famous the famous kind of trilemma that's presented is either it's impossible to create a simulated consciousness, either it's not possible, either it's possible but nobody does it, or probability-wise, we likely live in a simulation. Just because if if a society can create a simulated world, they'd probably create a lot, and odds are statistically, any given entity is simulated. So this has become very popular. Elon Musk, I think, said like you have billion to one odds that we don't live in a simulation, right? Which is absurd. Yeah, that's what Elon Musk said. I I I bring it up here because I I think there's multiple problems with that. I do not think we live in a simulation. Number one, it's questionable whether there are other alien races out there that would create simulations. It's questionable whether, very questionable whether it is even possible to simulate the complexity of the quantum world in the universe, whether a computer can even do that. It would have to be in immensely way larger than the universe to simulate the universe. So, you know, I I think it's a faulty assumption that someday we'll be able to do this. I there's no evidence for that. So, how could you even come up with a probability for it? Like, we don't even know if it's possible. How can we how can we gauge how probable it is? And but I think the the part that's more interesting that ties into what you were saying is this assumption that it is possible to through AI simulate human consciousness. And and I came across this computer scientist who's who's talked a lot about this issue by the name of Jaron Lanier. And I don't want to misrepresent his thought, so a lot of this is my thought, but I just wanted to say that that's one of the guy, or are you just watching? I've been reading, I've been reading him, reading him, and one of his issues is that number one every every society has viewed the the universe according to the highest technology of its time. So for Newton, the world was like a clock in the 1800s, electricity was how they viewed the world, and today it's virtual reality and simulated reality. That's that's how we look at the world. That's not a new thing, that's typically how people view the world in terms of the highest level of technology. This guy who was, I think, a pioneer in developing the first virtual reality, thinks that this assumption that we can simulate human consciousness is intensely devaluing what consciousness is and how unique and creative and and powerful and what a beautiful force it is. And so this assumption that's out there that eventually a computer will be able to completely recreate what's happening in your individual human mind is offensive and is problematic and is not true. Uh, that there's something deeply unique and irrepeatable through technology about the ongoings within the human mind, about this phenomenon, this difficult to describe phenomenon of human consciousness. And I think that kind of tied into what you were saying.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it does. Uh, and yeah, actually, this has turned into a really interesting discussion regarding humanity and and the difference between humanity and other things, other creation. But one thing while you're saying that too, that it made me think of when you're saying the complexity of human consciousness and the way you learn things, like an example. Now it's still a human being, and I'm not trying to like draw ever draw levels of human beings, but oh good. Yeah, there seems to be I'm a little worried after that. Exactly. Where's the yeah, the censorship bleep? Like when you look at someone who's classified as a sociopath, like these serial killers are like someone that That they say has no conscience. Like they're able to watch people and learn human behavior and they can mimic human behavior. And they like they don't feel bad, but they know they're supposed to feel bad because they watch other people feel bad. And then they copy the sense of feeling bad. And like I feel like that's what you're like, you're saying, like, if you're just doing it as far as like how AI would do it, it would be okay, this is what I'm supposed to feel right now. So I'm gonna show this, but there's no sensation of an integrated feeling of that.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, but I mean, I think it would, I mean, personally, I think it's even less, even more separated than the sociopathic mind. Yeah, you know, I don't I don't even think it's that much of a simulation of what what human being now we don't it's tough because consciousness isn't really a um really a category in in Catholic thought either. That's not really a concept, but that's sort of something that that we're talking about that's you know out there in the zeitgeist at the moment. What would we say? I mean, and the will or the yeah, in a in a sense, there's not a Catholic there's not a Catholic position on this sort of thing because yeah, I mean, rationality, conscience, I think those would all be parts of it, but I don't think like consciousness is so hard to define because it's just what is going on in your brain at any moment. It's your awareness of the world around you, your internal monologue, your your perception of things that you see and do, you know, your capacity to interact with the world, like yeah. But but I but I think just sort of to get back at a little bit to this, Lanier, uh a lot of his point, and this is from a computer scientist, this is not a philosopher or a theologian, just this warning that it's dangerous to treat humans as software, to use tech metaphors for humanity, to overestimate what AI is capable of, because that can really devalue personhood and devalue what's so uh miraculous about your human experiences.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, which which goes into like kind of the labor critique of AI that oh, we can build a robot to do this job, therefore it's gonna get done better without the human element. And you're like, Well, what are we having jobs for? Like, if what what is our economy building up for if we're not giving humans jobs? The the Milton Hershey episode, I mentioned the quote when they brought a steam shovel while he he started building the Hershey Hotel during the Great Depression to give people jobs, and they brought in the steam shovel and they said this does the work of 40 men, and he said, Well, then sell it and hire 40 men, like with the concept I I make something so men can have jobs. And it's just like we're really losing that with AI because we just we're we're turning into robots like we want to make everything as efficient as possible to make yeah, right, yeah, but uh in in a sense, I mean it's AI now, it's not a new problem.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, yeah, technology in other areas, it was mechanized labor, you know. I mean, it's yeah, it's this perennial now now. This feels a little more personal, I would say, because now we're now we're assuming that eventually a computer will able be able to replicate what's most personal to you, which I I think a lot of people that work closely with AI, hopefully, but I I mean I do think a lot of them say like that's really misunderstanding what what chat GPT is actually doing.
SPEAKER_00:Although a lot of people do use whatever AI assistant they have to ask verification questions like you would ask a friend, which is super dangerous as well. It is dangerous, it is dangerous, I think.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, and and there's I think there's all sorts of psychological studies about that right now. Now, now again, the uh I think the matrix introduced this concept that this this story is a little different because it is human brains, just the input they're they're getting is uh of a world that's simulated and not physical. So it's it's not quite the same. Yeah, right. I mean, there are programs that are running, but that's not really the central kind of unsettling part of the movie, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:All right, are we ready for tasty wheat? Yeah, totally forgot about this until right now. Jump into it. So while they're on the ship, they start having breakfast so they're like in the real world, so they don't have all fruits and vegetables because the sun is blocked. So they're eating this goop out of the ship called tasty wheat. He says, Oh, it's not called tasty wheat. Mouse the one character says, if you close your eyes, it tastes like tasty wheat or runny eggs. And he goes, But then when you think about it, how do the machines know what tasty wheat tasted like? Which then he says, Maybe they make everything taste like chicken because they didn't know what chicken tasted like. And he goes kind of down this rabbit hole of in the concept of simulation, or when you're using other people or telling you what something tastes or looks like, this separation from reality that's in a different way. And some of the matrix is based off of like the notification the noticing of this philosophy. And recently read this book called the Dorito Effect. Have you read this? Or have we talked about it? So Doritos is like the first product in America back in the 50s or 60s, late 50s, maybe, where they take a tortilla chip and they made it taste like something it wasn't. So the first Dorito flavor was taco flavored, so it would taste like Mexican. And so they put taco powder on it, and it was the first like mega product where you were biting something that wasn't the flavor that you knew it. And so eventually you could have like a taco flavor chip, and you may have never had a taco before. And so, like, you're identifying taco flavor without ever having the original. And like this goes further and further out. So, like, we're we're putting ourselves in like not a computer simulation, but we do put ourselves in a simulation where we're losing the the capacity to say, oh, like I'm hungry for this vitamin, therefore I'm gonna eat this thing because I associate orange with vitamin C because we've had so many orange-flavored other things that we have the experience of eating orange flavor without giving it us vitamin C. So we've kind of broken down the natural relationship we have with with food, and we we've done this in all kinds of different ways as well, where we've made things more tasty or or more real or like look better than they actually should be, and and it kind of uh one of the sensitivities that comes from the matrix is this sense of a hyper-reality or something that's more real than it should be, and losing the ability to discern regular or real reality. And I think like I do think one of the reasons this movie got so popular is whether you're liberal or conservative, anywhere on the board, there's kind of a distrust or a dislike for the fact that we feel like we're separated from from reality, from the reality of our senses a little bit.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. So this comes from a book that was supposedly, well, it actually appeared early in the movie, and I guess was pretty influential, Simulacra and Simulation, which is not about living in a simulation, it's about this phenomenon that Father Dill just pointed out. And I think a lot in the original book, a lot of it's like what happens through advertising, right? I think advertising is the big example he used to be.
SPEAKER_00:I tried to read some of the original book, and it was freaking hard to read. He's really weird with his language.
SPEAKER_02:But but today I think it would be I think even more so with things like social media and you know the internet, right? Yeah, yeah. And I uh frankly, we touched on this a little bit in our in our hobbies episode, I believe, about this is why it's important for a healthy person to like just be engaged with the physical world a little bit more and to build things and create things and do things and go places. And and frankly, in Catholic theology, this is this is obviously very central to the way God chooses to interact with us through the sacraments, through sacramental realities, through our experiences of real physical things. Yeah, I don't know, I don't know if that ties into in your mind.
SPEAKER_00:That's exactly what I'm saying. Yeah, I didn't want to cite the book because I tried reading it and I was like, oh my gosh, but that was a required reading for the actors, particular, particularly some of the some of the listeners might want to dive in.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I don't know that they yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. Yeah, you can download it, it's free, free essay online, but it's a little hard to find.
SPEAKER_02:I think there's a lot of different this is this is a one of those movies that has been commented on philosophically and theologically a lot over the years, and there's all sorts of different readings. There are people that suggest that there are Hindu themes, there are very strong Buddhist themes, that's probably the closest one-to-one. But then there've also been a lot of suggestions, as we mentioned before, some of the more superficial ones, but that there are strongly Christian themes in the movie. And I I just want to throw out a couple options here, right? That we can play off of just to start. One of the suggestions has been that the matrix actually represents organized religion, which which to access reality you need to overcome and and sort of reject what you learned as a child.
SPEAKER_00:That's like a Nietzschean type thing.
SPEAKER_02:Right. One of the theories is that this really represents authentic Christianity, and the matrix is just the view of reality that the world presents you, that you have to transcend, that you have to like choose to buck and to go against, and through asceticism overcome. Like a deconstruction, that's interesting. Right. The the third, which I would say if we're talking like a a Christian analogy that I personally think the movie reminds me the most of, is that it's really a representation of Gnostic Christianity. I I suspect we're gonna want to talk about the third one the most, but I'm interested if you have thoughts of the on the first two.
SPEAKER_00:So let me get the the distinct be more distinguished between the first two. The first one you're saying is it's organized religion and it's something.
SPEAKER_02:Organized religion, it's the matrix is or organized religion. And so which pill are you supposed to take? The blue pill? Which is the pill that gets you out of it? The red pill, the red pill, the red pill, the green pill, the purple pill. The the red pill is you the blue pill, like realizing that the world is presented to you by organized religion is a lie, even even if you're a Christian, like that you know, yeah, this is not what Christ presented, whatever. The second one would be religion is the red pill, and the matrix is the secular world out there, and the values it promotes and and the the future it promises.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, and that can easily turn into Gnosticism.
SPEAKER_02:No, I think it is just Gnosticism. I that's what I think. I I think you have to like you can draw Christian themes out of it and Christian parallels like you can with pretty much any movie. I just think it's I don't I don't know that that's the best way to understand it personally. But uh people there are people that disagree with me. There's whole essays on why this is a retelling of the gospel and whatever. I I just I I don't I don't think it's that good of a connection, though. You might disagree.
SPEAKER_00:I I would say like ancient Christianity, there's definitely a sense of like the Easter vigil, the whole liturgy and the RCIA revolves around rejecting Satan and accepting Christ. So like in a certain extent, you you could make that argument.
SPEAKER_02:The problem is you could make that about virtually any movie, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00:And and like the world is so mixed, like because John's kind of dualistic with like the world will hate you, but it's so it's so evident in the history history of Christianity that there needs to be a complementarity with the world rather than like a rejection of the world. I feel like that that's a pretty stark. Right.
SPEAKER_02:Well, and I I think very often throughout the centuries, Christians have been drawn to the Greek philosopher Plato. And Plato has a very famous allegory that you probably learned if you ever took like an intro to philosophy club course. This allegory of the cave, that the world that we live in, the physical world, is like sitting in a cave and watching shadows, and only when you turn and go out of the cave and you reject that can you see the world of the forms, the world as it really is, and then it's your responsibility to go back in and get people out of the cave. So people have used that. Obviously, we've co-opted a lot of Greek philosophy for Christian purposes over the centuries, and I and I think the matrix probably matches into like that cave allegory of Plato. I just don't think it's a perfect one-to-one with Christianity or the Gospels or the canonical gospels.
SPEAKER_00:And I agree, like I don't, I'm not necessarily sold that it's just purely Gnostic. It's not purely any of them, but like the argument, yeah, that's the argument.
SPEAKER_02:It's probably except Buddhism. You think it's tell me that one. I uh what no, no, I I mean I want to stick to Christianity. I'm just I I'm a little out of my wheelhouse, but okay.
SPEAKER_00:I was gonna say I don't know Buddhism well enough to make it.
SPEAKER_02:But so to run down, do you want to give a little bit of a rundown of Gnosticism or like the important parts? You want me to? Oh, you do it. You would you're better. So Gnosticism, Gnosticism is again like a lot of these Christian heresies, like there's a spectrum here, like there's Gnostic thought all over the place. We were scoved, we discovered in the 1940s in Egypt in at Nag Hammadi, like a Gnostic library, which gave people access to a lot of Gnostic texts, like the Gospel of Judas, that previously we had only known known through the writings of early Orthodox Christians. And and so, like, there's a lot of different elements to Gnosticism that people take or leave. But at the heart of it, I would say, and the part that's relevant to this story, what saves you and what Christ comes to do is to wake you up and make you aware that this world you see around you, this physical world is evil. And salvation is really knowledge, it's it's awareness of the lies around you and and the knowledge that you should turn to the spiritual. And and so in Gnosticism, classically, salvation, you are not you're not saved by by your faith, you're not saved by your works, you're not saved by Jesus Christ in the same way as you are in orthodox, what became Orthodox Christianity. You're saved because he came and told you something, and you learned something.
SPEAKER_00:You got the insider secret.
SPEAKER_02:You got the secret knowledge, is what they would call it. And and that's clearly, I think, what's happening in the matrix. Like, salvation means you are aware, you're awake, you know the world's a lie. So it's knowledge that has saved you. And if Neo is coming back to save people, it's by waking them up and telling them something. And and this group that lives in Zion is saved because they're awake to the reality of the Matrix. And for that reason, I don't think it's a great Christian allegory, at least not Orthodox Christianity.
SPEAKER_00:So just two comments on it. One, well, first, just Gnosticism, just if you're not sure what how to write that, it's GNO, and it's from the Greek word knowing, like if you're gonna look up what Gnosticism is.
SPEAKER_02:It's right in the name. Yeah, yeah. And there's other elements that are classical Gnosticism, but I think that's the most essential part to this conversation.
SPEAKER_00:And then, like, the next step to Gnosticism, once you like are saved from your secret knowledge and realize the world is evil, there's a rejection of this world, and typically a rejection of the physical, which is like Christianity is Jesus Christ truly took on flesh and so is his blessing and showing the physical world is good, and he takes his physical body into heaven, just like a Gnostic Gnostics tended to be docetists, meaning they didn't believe Jesus that God really became human, he appeared as human, so he could warn us about the physical world, but they wouldn't have even wanted him to take on physical flesh.
SPEAKER_02:That's dirty. Yeah, sorry, go ahead.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, no, thank you for clarifying that. The only thing is, like in the matrix, what's interesting to me is it's almost like the opposite. Because when you're in the matrix, because like Cypher, who's the bad guy, decides he'd rather be ignorant and be back in the matrix. In the matrix, you're not using anything physical. So, like, you're not, you don't know real taste, everything is simulated. Whereas when you're out of the matrix, you are using your physical body again, and there is like a sense of of yeah, the physicality being good and real. So, like, sure, I agree with you. Like, you're being saved by knowledge and a rejection of the world is Gnostic. And so, like, that is an applicable interpretation. I'm just like playing devil's advocate here, and I I think like I do like the fact that the physical reality is so important in the matrix.
SPEAKER_02:So, this this is probably just briefly why I would say there's a strong Buddhist theme is that you're saved not necessarily by a god, but by embracing or or Hindu by embracing this suffering outside of the false world, not seeing that as bad, and just removing yourself from that cycle, from that samsara, right? So, like I that's why I think Buddhism, just like very briefly, and there's other people obviously who could talk about that a lot more intelligently, is probably the closer, even though they use all this Christian imagery and Christian language, because obviously it's for a Western audience primarily, maybe it's more Buddhist.
SPEAKER_00:Although at the end of the third one, there is an image of a cross and an image of a lotus flower, just really like hammering home. They finally use this, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, and and in the later ones, there are like you get more of like a god figure, like later on. Kind of well, actually, probably the architects more of like a demiurge, it's probably more narcissism again. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't know if you have any other thoughts on on the other hand. No, I think I think it is what the best way to understand it is.
SPEAKER_00:No, I think like they're they're good talking points that we're doing, and I think they're like really interesting ones you can't understand. What is the human person and how like we can look at AI, we can look at other things to do some sort of contrast to help us better understand who we are and like what our purpose is. But I I do think like purpose and hope that comes from that are like specific human things. So I do like again, like a little bit anti-Gnostic again, is this sensation of hope that that comes from it, and maybe that exists in Gnosticism too. But I feel like Gnosticism's more knowledge, whereas this is more like faith and hope. Okay, what's the hope in the movie? So that's like there's seemingly impossible odds, and this like Neo is is like as he's starting to understand he's the one, there's the hope that he can do these things, or like Trinity and Morpheus, the way they hope in Neo. It's they're not hoping in themselves, they're hoping in like that this providence is coming together and that they're gonna do something that rashly doesn't make sense.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, those are good Christian themes. Yeah, you're right. No, I agree with that. Yeah, I I'm not saying there aren't elements of it, or even that there aren't elements of Gnosticism that are helpful.
SPEAKER_00:No, I yeah, right, yeah, right.
SPEAKER_02:But but but like I guess my point was more like if you're trying to construct like this entire worldview that comes from this film and from this understanding of what the matrix is, just don't swallow it whole, I guess. Like any movie, and that's any movie, except for Narnia.
SPEAKER_00:I'm just kidding.
SPEAKER_02:Except yeah, but but I I I think it's like especially important to like really for a movie like The Matrix, that again if if like if the primary audience for this at the time, I don't know anymore, was like teenage guys who thought they were pretty smart, uh there can be a tendency of that demographic to just swallow things whole and allow it to change their entire identity and worldview, like Fight Club. I mean, there's a million movies like that, you know. And I I guess we just have to like anytime we're consuming media, and and obviously, you know, like the topic of this podcast and the way we approach it, we think there's great stuff out there in secular media all over the place that we can learn from. But I think this this film, because it's a particular risk, is a reminder. Like it's good to to take good things from that that we that we read and that we see and then we watch, but like generally not swallow them whole, because there's probably some problematic things in there too.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, as you're talking, I'm leaning more towards Gnosticism now, like as this is marinating in my brain. Because, like, like you're saying, like it's going after like if that's what it is, a teenage, whether it's mostly guys or guys and girls, because a lot of strong females in this movie too, but it is more of a guy movie. But like, or and you compared it to Fight Club, like this concept of there are select elite, and I can be one of them because I can think this way and figure it out is definitely not a Christian theme at all.
SPEAKER_02:And and it's and it's one that there's a particular risk of today. I mean, we're yeah, that's like all over the place.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it's like the yeah, exactly. That permeates like all of our thought, like that is part of like the subculture of America is I'm smarter than everybody else, I'm better than everybody else, I'm more elite than everybody else. I my thoughts, my political party is better than everybody else. So, like, and it feeds into I'm freeing my mind, I'm getting away from all these posers and authentic because I know this knowledge. So I I am I'm falling into Gnosticism now that you're as we're as we're thinking through it.
SPEAKER_02:And that and that's problematic. So, like, yes, there is obviously an element in Christianity of rejection of the world, right? I mean, that absolutely it is something Christ calls us to do, but but you know, I guess it is just I wanted to add the butt, and I I already explained what the but was, but yeah. Speaking of that, I wanted to share with you something hilarious I said in my Thanksgiving Day homily, unless you have more to talk about the matrix. So I was very proud of myself. I said at the end of Mass before after the closing prayer, before the final blessing, I said as we go off to our homes, I do just want to say that this is an important holiday because it's one of the few days of the year when we're bringing together people that for the rest of the year are just incompatible, won't talk to each other, don't interact. It's a really a day of healing the divide that seems to be running through this entire country. The one question that splits us the homemade cranberry sauce, the homemade cranberry sauce, and the canned cranberry sauce. And this is the day we all come together. I really built it up too. I don't remember exactly what I said, but I built it up. I was happy. Nice.
SPEAKER_00:Simulated cranberry sauce or real cranberry sauce, matrix cranberry sauce or real world cranberry sauce.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, well, the matrix matrix food did look better.
SPEAKER_00:Food looked better in the matrix than everything looked better in the matrix.
SPEAKER_02:Well, thank you everybody for joining us. I hope you have a wonderful beginning to your advent season, and we'll see you next time.
SPEAKER_00:See you next time.
