Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Blogging around
I commented on Anna Busch's post about progress and Future. In it she talked about how we live in a bubble of ignorance and how she hopes that one day our society can escape this bubble.
My comment to her:
Anna,
I really liked your post, but I think I'm going to have to disagree with you on somethings. I don't think that we will ever be able to live in a society devoid of ignorance, it's just too engrained in our lives. And at this point, it seems, that sometimes ignorance is the only way to go, but I wouldn't say that it is ALWAYS a bad thing. Sometimes subconscious ignorance is the only thing that keeps people going and I don't really have any issue with that, however conscious ignorance, now that I do have a problem with. I think that if you are willingly and knowingly denying something, then that's not okay, and that's where our society runs into an issue. How do we find the balance between conscious and subconscious ignorance? In order to reach the progress that you were talking about, I think that we as a global population must define this balance and then use it to our advantage to better our world. Great post though, I really liked your insights.
I commented on Jordan's blog about her Jane Eyre Mash up. She talked about challenging the status quo and how it related to our english curriculum so far this year.
My comment to her:
Jordan,
Your post made me think back on the books we have read this year and it made me realize how much they all have to do with challenging the status quo. "Orlando" challenges it by dressing as a man when she was a woman and writing, even though the spirit of her age made her hands shake to try and stop her from doing it. In "King Lear", Lear's daughters Goneril and Regan are rude and malicious towards their father, as they try to overthrow him and take his thrown. "Heart of Darkness" isn't so much about defying the status quo as it is about understanding it, the main character Marlow is thrown into Africa and forced to see the injustice of the status quo, but he also has to realize that there isn't much he can do about it. Lastly, "Jane Eyre" is all about her becoming a strong independent woman who chooses to be herself, instead of being like everyone else. It is a story of choices and how continuously Jane's choices, while they may be unpopular, are her choices and no one else's. Thank you for writing this post, it really made me think about how connected theses books are, I guess I had never really thought about them from this perspective before.
Monday, May 6, 2013
Dialectics: Simulation and Reality
The biggest concept in The Matrix, is the idea of simulation versus reality. In the matrix everything is simulated, and it is up to those who have escaped the system to discover and preserve reality. This brings up several questions. A small sampling being: What is reality? And Which is better simulation or reality?
In one of the most pivotal scenes of the movie, Cypher has to make the choice between remaining outside of the matrix with the rest of his shipmates on the Nebuchadnezzar or returning to the matrix with no knowledge of his time beyond it's grasp. He chooses to go back to the matrix and accept it's totalitarian control. While I don't agree with Cypher's choice, I understand why he made it. Earlier in the movie Neo is asked if he believes in fate and says no because he doesn't like the idea of not being in control of his life. I too don't believe in fate, but I like the idea of it. Fate is sort of like a cop-out, it's an excuse for not doing well. If something in your life goes wrong you can just blame it on fate, say it was out of your hands, and I think that's what Cypher wants. He doesn't want to have to make the tough decisions anymore, he just wants to be ignorant. He doesn't want to be in control anymore, and I sympathise with him. It's hard to know that your mistakes are all of your own doing. Sometimes it's nice to just push the blame off on someone or something else, not all the time, but sometimes.
As our society continues to develop and grow technologically, it is possible that we will be faced with a choice similar to Cypher's. Eventually, we may have to choose between simulation and reality.I think that there are many people out there who, when given this choice will choose simulation, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. To put it simply, life's rough. It's hard and exhausting and a lot of the time it just feels like more than you can handle. Therefor, it makes sense that people who have been overworked, and probably under-appreciated, would choose to enter a world that they knew would give them some relief. It would be like an instant weight being lifted off their shoulders However, other people seem to thrive on life's struggles. It propels them to do better and better, and so for them a world of simulation would be like torture.
The most important thing to take away from this is that both life styles are completely valid. Just because someone chooses to live blissfully unaware, does not mean that they are a lesser person it just means that they have a different opinion. And really it's no one's place to judge how someone chooses to live because life is so subjective. It's completely up to you to decide your own path, regardless of what someone else thinks... or doesn't think, I guess. You get to decide for yourself what your reality will be.
So, which would you choose, the blue or the red?
In one of the most pivotal scenes of the movie, Cypher has to make the choice between remaining outside of the matrix with the rest of his shipmates on the Nebuchadnezzar or returning to the matrix with no knowledge of his time beyond it's grasp. He chooses to go back to the matrix and accept it's totalitarian control. While I don't agree with Cypher's choice, I understand why he made it. Earlier in the movie Neo is asked if he believes in fate and says no because he doesn't like the idea of not being in control of his life. I too don't believe in fate, but I like the idea of it. Fate is sort of like a cop-out, it's an excuse for not doing well. If something in your life goes wrong you can just blame it on fate, say it was out of your hands, and I think that's what Cypher wants. He doesn't want to have to make the tough decisions anymore, he just wants to be ignorant. He doesn't want to be in control anymore, and I sympathise with him. It's hard to know that your mistakes are all of your own doing. Sometimes it's nice to just push the blame off on someone or something else, not all the time, but sometimes.
As our society continues to develop and grow technologically, it is possible that we will be faced with a choice similar to Cypher's. Eventually, we may have to choose between simulation and reality.I think that there are many people out there who, when given this choice will choose simulation, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. To put it simply, life's rough. It's hard and exhausting and a lot of the time it just feels like more than you can handle. Therefor, it makes sense that people who have been overworked, and probably under-appreciated, would choose to enter a world that they knew would give them some relief. It would be like an instant weight being lifted off their shoulders However, other people seem to thrive on life's struggles. It propels them to do better and better, and so for them a world of simulation would be like torture.
The most important thing to take away from this is that both life styles are completely valid. Just because someone chooses to live blissfully unaware, does not mean that they are a lesser person it just means that they have a different opinion. And really it's no one's place to judge how someone chooses to live because life is so subjective. It's completely up to you to decide your own path, regardless of what someone else thinks... or doesn't think, I guess. You get to decide for yourself what your reality will be.
So, which would you choose, the blue or the red?
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