Are we all trapped in The Matrix 25 years later? • Hacker News Board

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

#51

Post by staticman2 » Tue, Mar 26, 2024, 4:52 PM UTC

autoexec wrote: post #32

ctchocula wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don't use the metaphor literally because it doesn't make sense from a 2nd Law of Thermodynamics perspective. If the Matrix was created by AGI for thr sake of producing energy, it would make no sense at all to keep humans around in pods, because it costs them more energy to keep a human alive than what they get out of the human. The movie producers realized the problem in later movies and added some mumbojumbo…

> The movie producers realized the problem in later movies and added some mumbojumbo that they were keeping humans around for their neural networks, but that still requires the viewer to take it on faith. I suppose it could just be a myth, but I always thought that was the original premise and it was hollywood execs who insisted on making the matrix about batteries on the assumption that audiences wouldn't understand…

"I suppose it could just be a myth, but I always thought that was the original premise and it was hollywood execs who insisted on making the matrix about batteries on the assumption that audiences wouldn't understand the concept of neural networks"

It's a myth. It was always batteries in the script, but when Neil Gaiman was hired to do a Matrix short story he added lines about using the humans as a neural network because he thought the battery thing was stupid. I've seen this well documented online so you should be able to find it if you try.

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

#52

Post by staticman2 » Tue, Mar 26, 2024, 5:06 PM UTC

kromem wrote: post #18

I always find it so interesting when people are eagerly ready to adopt The Matrix as metaphor for whatever they don't like, but are often vehemently against entertaining it as a literal concept. 25 years ago I thought "that's neat" for a clever film twist. Much like the Sixth Sense. But then a few years later I read Nick Bostrom's op-ed in the NYT, and started considering the notion seriously. In the time since The M…

"but are often vehemently against entertaining it as a literal concept."

If the reality you see isn't real, why would you assume computers are? It doesn't seem like a very philosophically sound position.

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

#53

Post by kromem » Wed, Mar 27, 2024, 5:24 AM UTC

ctchocula wrote: post #26

kromem wrote: post #18

I always find it so interesting when people are eagerly ready to adopt The Matrix as metaphor for whatever they don't like, but are often vehemently against entertaining it as a literal concept. 25 years ago I thought "that's neat" for a clever film twist. Much like the Sixth Sense. But then a few years later I read Nick Bostrom's op-ed in the NYT, and started considering the notion seriously. In the time since The M…

People don't use the metaphor literally because it doesn't make sense from a 2nd Law of Thermodynamics perspective. If the Matrix was created by AGI for thr sake of producing energy, it would make no sense at all to keep humans around in pods, because it costs them more energy to keep a human alive than what they get out of the human. The movie producers realized the problem in later movies and added some mumbojumbo…

You may have missed this part of my comment:

> it strikes me that the most preposterous concept in The Matrix was not the nature of its reality, but the notion that there were any bodies in pods somewhere to exit into.