WEEK 6 PHILO REFLECTION 1
Week 6 PhiloReflection
Both the Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and The Matrix depict thepossibility of the existence of an alternate reality. In the Allegoryof the Cave, the trapped men are barred from seeing beyond the walls.In the Matrix, the pills are the differences between the reality andthe illusion. From the two works, I have learnt that one`s senses areunreliable as sources of knowledge. Besides, after Neo’s expulsionfrom the Matrix, Morpheus advises him that depending on the sensoryperceptions: smell, taste, and sight could be misleading as thesesenses are the result of one’s brain interpreting the electricalsignals. I can relate this to Descartes’ arguments that knowledgegained through the senses is subject to doubt (Stanford Encyclopediaof Philosophy, 2014). Futhermore, Plato in Phaedo says that thevisible is mortal, always changing, and unintelligible(Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2015).
I think the role of the problem of appearance and reality in the twoworks is to show how complicated both the illusory and the realworlds are. For instance, how does Morpheus know that he is living inthe real world and not another form of a matrix? The ethicalimplications of the two works are that there is a need for one tochallenge the status quo in the search for reality. For instance,Morpheus in The Matrix understands that the Matrix’s world is anillusion after escaping from it(Wachowski & Wachowski, 1999). The Matrix depictsthe need to challenge every truth that one holds, for instance, onthe existence of God. Studying the aspect of knowledge and reality asdepicted in the Matrix and the Allegory of the Cave has changed myview of knowledge. Now, I consider genuine knowledge as unattainable.
Reference
InternetEncyclopedia of Philosophy. (2015). “Plato: Phaedo.” Accessed onhttp://www.iep.utm.edu/phaedo/
Plato. “TheAllegory of the Cave.”https://web.stanford.edu/class/ihum40/cave.pdf
StanfordEncyclopedia of Philosophy. (2014). “Descartes’ Epistemology.”http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-epistemology/
Wachowski,A., & Wachowski, L. (1999). The matrix [film]. USA:Warner Brothers Pictures.