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Are we all trapped in The Matrix 25 years later?

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Re: Are we all trapped in The Matrix 25 years later?

#2
> Agent Smith: "Have you ever stood and stared at it, marveled at it’s beauty, it’s genius? Billions of people just living out their lives, oblivious. Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world. Where none suffered. Where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed that we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that as a species, human beings define their reality through misery and suffering. The perfect world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we started thinking for you it really became our civilization which is of course what this is all about. Evolution, Morpheus, evolution. Like the dinosaur. Look out that window. You had your time. The future is our world, Morpheus. The future is our time."

Re: Are we all trapped in The Matrix 25 years later?

#4
One thing I’ve noticed with AI tools is that many people are entirely willing to offload the thinking process to the machine. They don’t use it as a way to enhance their capabilities or come up with new ideas, but just to do the work entirely. It reminds me of this line from Agent Smith:

…which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we started thinking for you it really became our civilization, which is of course what this is all about.

Re: Are we all trapped in The Matrix 25 years later?

#5
I have increasingly thought of this, how our current lives are ever more reminiscent of the matrix, being confined in our isolating community-less suburban “pods”, zombiefied on our phones, with no money or safety net to do much else, passing each day like the last

Re: Are we all trapped in The Matrix 25 years later?

#9

One thing I’ve noticed with AI tools is that many people are entirely willing to offload the thinking process to the machine. They don’t use it as a way to enhance their capabilities or come up with new ideas, but just to do the work entirely. It reminds me of this line from Agent Smith: …which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we start…

I can’t help but be reminded of my employer’s favorite quote from Dune:

> Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.

Re: Are we all trapped in The Matrix 25 years later?

#10
post #9

One thing I’ve noticed with AI tools is that many people are entirely willing to offload the thinking process to the machine. They don’t use it as a way to enhance their capabilities or come up with new ideas, but just to do the work entirely. It reminds me of this line from Agent Smith: …which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we start…

I can’t help but be reminded of my employer’s favorite quote from Dune: > Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.

Or as the old zine In Formation put it, "Every day, computers are making people easier to use." [1]

1: https://twitter.com/davidtemkin/status/1028129852895813632?l...

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