This week's journal will be done online. Read and watch the following and then post at least two comments. It is an open ended discussion- as long as your comment is related it will count. Read what others have said and respond to them as well. Remember, first names or obvious nicknames only. I need to know who you are , the rest of the internet doesn't.
The Yellow Pill has many similarities to The Matrix, a 1999 American science fiction-action film. The film shows a future where reality as perceived by most humans is actually a simulated reality created by thinking, or sentient, machines to control the human population, while their bodies' heat and electrical activity are used as an energy source for the machines. Upon learning this, a computer programmer is drawn into a rebellion against the machines, involving other people who have been freed from the "dream world" and into reality.
The film and the story The Yellow Pill contain many references to philosophical and religious ideas such as René Descartes's evil genius, and Plato's the Allegory of the Cave. Click the links* to read a short explanation of each and view the clip below. Then post your comments, questions, confusions, frustrations etc..... I will grade the comments Friday, so you have tonight, Wednesday and Thursday to post.
* Yes, I know the links are to Wikipedia pages. However, I am not researching- I know this content already and was just looking for a simple overview to show you guys.
55 comments:
The cave prisoner would not know that anything existed behind him, so why would he turn around? Wouldn't he simply continue staring at the wall? He would have no experience of senses and doesn't know what to make of them.
Also, the prisoners wouldn't be capable of lingual skills, so they would be limited to primal thoughts. They might think about how scary it is, or back up, etc.
He would be like a baby : not able to walk, talk, or calculate things. He would be thrust into and entirely new world without knowledge or experience.
If you had been living through a "dream world", all of your life, you would think that this was life at its best (or worse) based on what you have being seeing. You would have no reason to challenge your reality because it seems normal to you, and the thought of it being fake would never occur to you.
These sources are showing how our nature is to question reality. It shows, that, either: people created their own reality (Plato’s Allegory of the Cave), a greater being created reality (The evil genius), or machines created reality (The Matrix). (“The Yellow Pill” seems to combine different parts of those ideas.) There is no proof, put out by these sources, that any are correct or incorrect.
“Why am I who I am?”,”What is true?”, and “What is consciousness?” are philosophical questions that are shown by these sources.
Though we cannot shape reality for others, we influence our own views of it. My beliefs are my own beliefs, and yours are your own beliefs. Our beliefs influence how we perceive things in our world.
Is what we have defined, really, defined? We change our definitions all the time.
Each of these example all have different ideas of what our reality is. Therefore, leaving us to question what our actual reality is. In the Matrix it says that, "The matrix is a computer generated dreamworld built to keep us under control in order to change the human being.." When I heard this it made me ask myself if we are not in control in our own world now.
The cave prisoners were trapped in the cave staring at a blank wall with shadows on it. IF they knew that there was a world outside of their cave, did they imagine themselves outside with the rest of the world? Or because that is the only reality they were aware of did they just accept their "home". This part sort of confused me.
From going through all these, it seems that the idea of "reality" is very abstract. Who knows? Our lives right now might be something like Plato's cave...
I agree with Plato's statement that philosiphers are the ones in life who think outside the box. What if life as we know it is really just a dream, and when we die, we are really just waking up from our deep sleep?
I also think that "The Yellow Pill" is relaing to illicit drugs and how they provide an alternative reality for addicts. Maybe, just maybe, "The Yellow Pill" is our only way to escape from this dream world into reality.
I disagree Adam and don't agree with Plato's statement. Everyone thinks outside of the box if we like it not.
I also think death is just forgeting what life you had on earth and starting over again, maybe in a different universe.
And back to the "Yellow Pill" what if there was no such thing as reality? What if we were just living in a illusion and seeing things that were not really there?
If given the chance to take a "yellow pill" I don't think I would take it because everything happens for a reason.
1. If you were living in a different reality, you would think that there is no other way to live and that your own reality is normal. We don't know if our way of life is a normal reality. There could be others that make ours look very strange. In the pill both characters think the other is insane because they are imagining a different reality. Anyone who found out that there entire reality was turned around would be confused.
2. Something that confuses me from The Yellow Pill is that the doctor said he had taken a yellow pill before. If he had taken one than he should have remembered being in space. He also would have known that the pill would bring him back to the space reality.
The yellow pill made me confused as to the fact that in order to be prescribed to people, they would have to have been tested, and if they had been tested, then they would have seent hat he was in a different world. On the other hand, Jerry seems easily manipulated, but also very worldly and stubborn, bring able to piece together the phone numbers.
My question is that what happened to him that he couldn't see patients for a week, and why didn't he remeber each world. Was this story implying multiple dimenstions, and how could we prove we are really here, really like we think we are. We claim to be the greatest, yet many of us die from viruses, sickness, and animals. We fear sharks, mice, and other big animals. To a shark, they must be the king of the food chain, because no one messes with sharks but each other. If a human kills a shark, then that sharks memories are lost, and its own kind don't think any differently than they are kings of the world. How do we know we aren't like sharks?
I completely agree with Nathan. If you lived a fake life all your "life", you wouldn't know if you were living the real world, for that is what you have experienced, it makes sense, and you have no basis to question that. You do not think life is "bad" or "good" relative to another world, but to others in your world, if that world happens to be complicated enough. As Nathan said, we might all be living in a simulated or manifested reality.
Maybe our dream world is an alternate reality. Everything we've ever known is a dream. Everything we want is the way we see things. However, we must be woken up to see true reality.
Dr. Cedric Elton's dream world is that he is a world famous pyschiatrist. However, when he takes the pill, he claims that he he's "back to normal again." He'd been living in some fantasy, and had to be waken up again. Being a pyschiatrist is what he wants. Its the only world he knows, or wants to know, which makes him think it's the only reality there is. Which is like the cave.
I agree with Carly and Christen. A dream world has no rules becuase it is a dream. How do we know we aren't living in a dreamworld right now and have yet to wake up?
I think in a way this is kinda like " the truman show" that mrs turieo ahowed us in 5th grade
I agree with Carly. What if our dreams are reality and the world we think of is a dream. That is what the concept of The Yellow Pill is. He thinks he knows what is reality but when someone challenges him he is not so sure. Mabye we only need someone crazy enough to challenge what humans think is real and what humans think is fake. That might lead us to the real thing.
In the Cave one they know reality as the shadows on walls. They dont know any better. That could be humans. We might actually have a bland world and there something out there that is fun and exicted that we cant find.
There is no way to prove that our "reality" is real. I could actually be a homeless man with a ZZ Top-esque beard who's just having an elaborate dream. I could be homeless and hallucinating a better life. The people I interact with could be fellow homeless people or people willing (or not willing) to give me money.
I don't think everyone thinks outside the box. Some people just float on and follow the crowd. They think the way people want them to think.
What if the so-called lunatics are right? In every perspective: social political, religious. I think that people should, once a month, question absolutely everything they know. I try to do this and I end up with different viewpoints after I really think about it.
I agree in absolutely every way with Tz...
i agree that this is similar to "The Truman Show". What if the world we live in is being controlled by people of higher society.
Also we could just be part of a computer or video game being controlled by real people.
I agree with christen in saying that everyone does think outside the box to make better of new ideas.
What if life is a fake reality and we dont know what it is?
We could be in a completely different reality now but we think not.
it means that reality as we see it actualy not be reality but simply what we want it to be
also our reality might be right but we dont pay attention to all the details
I think that the yellow pill is a referance to drugs and people taking way to much of them to escape the real reality of life. Jerry seems very happy throughout the entire story and is talking about weird stuff like venusian lizards. What if the yellow pill is just another type of drug and when it is taken it alters what the human mind is seeing. Once Jerry gets put into a straight jacket his mind starts to clear up and he can see things "normal." It is because he is no longer on the drug yello pill and isnt still being effected by the hype of it.
My question is why doesnt Dr. Elton remember what happened to him when he first took the pills. If he took them he should remember seeing the "real reality" that he is on a spaceship and his life of being a psychiatrist is just a "dream."
1. People might think were in another world and some people dont. Other people can be controlling us right now and everything else could just be a dream.In the yellow pill he thinks the other world is just an insane lie type thing, and once he is challenged he rethinks other space place. Maybe if more people were challenged to another demention we would all rethink being in another world or dream place. And maybe one day it would be proven to be true.
2. Heres a question, how would we prove theres another world or were in a dream? Is there really a way you could prove that?
And what happened to the other people who didnt take the yellow pill?
We don't know what the real reality is. All our life could be a dream. I wrote about this in my paper about becoming a girl.
I agree with Abbie.
We don't even have the evidence that we are in "fake" reality so we might as well not worry about it the time will come. Everything happens for a reason.
I think that everyone could see reality completely differently than everyone else. For example, somebody might think that an apple is a small red fruit, while somebody may see an apple as a giant pink hippo, but nobody would know, because everything would see good and normal. I think reality isn't a set thing that everyone is stuck with, but it is what you perceive it to be.
The Matrix And The Plato's Story Have The Same Plot. But They have Differenes To The Yellow Pill. The Yellow pill Deals with Spaceship Science fiction and Plato'S Cave deals with people trapped in a Dream World Cave And The Matrix Plot Deals with a Machines Controled Dream World Earth In The Matrix Movies.
There is no way of telling if we are living in a dream world or the real world. Even if we do live in a dream world it does not make a difference because what we do and experience is real to us and most of us assume that we live in the real world. It does make a differance in the Allegory of the Cave because the prisinors are denied what the world has to offer. Humans are born with curiosity. I believe that they thought there was more than just the cave.
I agree with Brooks completely. Also, I disagree with those of you who say that everybody thinks outside the box. If we dont know how much stuff the metaphorical box covers, how can we think outside it?
Nathan is correct on saying that we cant think outside the box. It is crazy to think that all of our live could be someones little video game. It's very frustrating to think that all of human civilization hasn't been done by us, but done by someone else behind a computer screen. There is also the question one emotions. If were, just computer people, can we have emotions?
I think the whole dream world thing has a possibility of being true but probably isn't. But there's no way of proving either side, the only thing in favor of it not being a dream world is the lack of evidence for it being a dream. Other than that there's no way to really know.
Also the part where people could be controlling us right doesn't make sense. If someone is controlling us then how come we can control other things like robots? And how come we can make our own choices or is somebody or something else doing that for us. The only thing that would be hard is to have everyone in the world being controlled all the time and that doesn't explain how people in the world right now have different ideas about the same topic if we are all being controlled.
I agree with Jonny. They both deal with the future. It is basically technology and changing appearances. The Yellow Pill is dealing with mostly with the pill that can change someone into the future. The Matrix is dealing with technology, but if we are the Matrix, can we actually have the technology to the next one?
I think that all of these stories have basically similar concepts. The Matrix's cocept is that other people, a higher society, is controlling our world now, and that everything we have been living in is completely fake. The Yellow Pill's main point is that we may never actually know what reality truly is.
Also if our worlds really are dream worlds everyone would be living in something different. And everyone would see different things. I do not think we are living in a "dream world".
Lastly, is beofe taking the yellow pill the real reality or afterwards? Because it seems it's afterwards, so the majority of people would not be seeing the real reality.
They both deal with changing. The Yellow Pill can explain why our appearances. The Matrix can explain how our technology is getting better.
I agree with Jonny. Its hard to believe that we would be controlled by a video game or something and our reality isn't real. If you go back to the beginning of the first civilization ever, does that mean the people controlling us now have controlled them too? This would mean that their technology would have to have been as advanced as it is now and as we know, it takes time to develop highyly advanced technology that control people.
i agree with carly...to a point. Our technology has been getting more advanced, which means that the people controlling us (if there was people controlling us)would've made their technology more advanced. Also, they could've updated technology and we might never know because they could've frozen our minds or something. Therefore, we must accept that our lives may very well be a computer simulation, being controlled by a technologically superior species.
1) I think that if there was a dream world we could never really tell if there is on because we dont have the right technology needed to be able to prove this right or not.
2) If there really is a dream world what would happen to all the people who dont take the yellow pill would they die or be in there own dream world or be in reality?
1) I would also agree with Carly because no one can know for sure if what we are living in is real or not.
2) I also think that the Matrix is partly explaining what could possibly happen in the future with advancing technology.
I have the same question as Ian. Why did Dr. Elton not visit the other reality the fist time he took the yellow pill? I believe that the reality in which Dr. Elton is a psychiatrist is the real one. He convinced himself that he was living in the fake reality. When he took a yellow pill his brain 'overpowered' the drug which caused him to hallucinate the spaceship.
Sorry - technical difficulties. The comment above is mine.
1) If there really was a dream world, wouldn't everyone have there own idea of what was going on? In The Yellow Pill, Dr. Elton had his world, and Jerry had his. If they were both in dream worlds, I dont understand how they got into each others world. If everyone has their own idea, or dream world, then how do other people go into their worlds?
2)Carly said that if we were being controlled by another civilization then their technology would have to be as advanced as when humans first started as it is now. I think if something or someone else controlled us, then their technology would be growing as ours is. When we first started out we didnt have that much technology,and that would mean they didnt have enough technology to give it to us,but as theirs grew so does ours.
I think life is what it is. We are born on one day and we die on another. Everything in between is controlled by us, parents, teachers, government, etc. This idea that someone behind the scene controls us is crazy. Drew B
I disagree with Drew. even today,video games like "The Sims" deal with computer simulated humans. If we aren't technologically mature yet, in the future, our lives could be computer simulated like "The Sims." Even now, couldn't life as we know it be some sort of computer game for a technologically mature species?
Sigh, doing this argument online makes it so much harder. You literally need to be online 24/7 in order to retaliate to what others say...
If we were really controlled by a greater species we would be a lot more perfect. How do you explain all the mistakes made throughout the history of mankind?
1) Like Anonymous said why didnt dr cedric see what jerry belived to be the reality the first time he had the yellow pill? i think that because jerry was trying to make him think that when he had a yellow pill he would be in this other reality he was brainwashed once he did have the yellow pill and jerry knew it would happen and that may be why he said that crazy story so then the police would see that if the dr believed him he wouldnt be in as much trouble.
2) if the fact that we are being controlled by another civilization as tests then their technology has to be really advanced and it would be hard to do knowing how advanced our technology has become in a short amount of time. Also as our technology advances theirs would have to to but at a quicker speed.
1.In the "yellow pill" I think that everyone does have a dream world and a reality world, but no one can really tell the difference between them because everyone sees things in their on way.
2.I dont get it when in the "yellow pill" how Dr.Cedric Elton didn't know what Jerry was talking about when he said that Dr.Elton was Garcastle when he did take the "yellow pill before"?
Our world, is explained to be or could be, made by a species before humans who are able to electronically make our world and make us seem like it is real. Our dreams could be the real world because what we think is the real world is easier and could just be our dream world.
What if you have a good dream? Would that dream be a reality? Or is it just nightmares that could be reality?
I agree with Ian, I think that the yellow pill symoblizes drugs and how some people turn to drugs to escape from this world or their problems.
Like the people in the cave, what if right now we are prisoners adn we just don't know it? If we knew we were prisoners maybe we wouldnt act the same. We might be depressed or confused, but since we do not know for a fact that we are prisoners we act normal.
i think that the matrix could possibly be real. people think that this is reality and there is nothing else to it. those prisoners in the cave didnt know wat prisoners are or that they were prisoners. it is the only reality that they knew, or did they imagine themselves in the real world.
This goes back to us. for all we know we could be in a shadow world or an illusion where we are just seeing things that arent really there, like Christen said. our life seems completely normal to us and people would never think that they were in a "dream world" because right now this is all we know.
1. I agree with Nikki. I think that everyone would have their own idea of their "dream world" so they would all be different which wouldn't make sense.
2. I also agree with Kacey because the prisoners only know that reality and nothing else so they think that it must be the only reality. That could be happening with us. Until this i never really thought about what we call reality not being the true reality. A lot of people will go through their whole lives without even knowing the idea of this not being the real reality exists.
1. I agree with Alyssa too. Because if everyone had a dream owrld than you would be able to control it. No one else would becaus eit would be your brain making all the decisions for how things happened and worked..ect. I do not believe that some people that are so imperior to us are controlling our world like its some computer game. Like Sims. They can not possibly be controlling our every thought. There would have to be billions of very smart people to do that..and are there that many? Theycan not control all of these peoples lives through out the world. And if they are why do they make some of thsoe innocent peoples lifes bad?
2. For those prisoners..they are hung like prisoners in that room. They know no other life. They think thats how everything is..They can only imagine what its like behind them..becaus ethey are being dangled and can only look straight ahead or to the left or right either way, they dont know whats behind them. They have to us their imaginary worldto decide what its like beyond that room. Or even whats behind them.
I agree with Ian's comment saying that the Yellow Pill is indeed a reference to taking drugs as a way to escape. Also, how when taking drugs such as marijuana or anything else, it makes you high and you are in a world of your own, seeing things you've never seen before and clearly, you're in your own little world. Since Jerry took the pill, he saw things in his own little perspective which may have been real or may not have been like the lizards and the ropes tied around him.. When "Gar" took the pill, he saw the same. What he wanted to see, and as he did when he was Cedric, was not reality, but just a dream.
A question of mine was, why didn't the same situation happen to Cedric Elton the first time he took the yellow pill? Like, the changes weren't as drastic and it just made me think and wonder why the same thing didn't happen. Or did it?
we could be living in a dream world right now and there is no way we would know it unless our creators or overseers showed themselves to us. if we are living in a dream world there is also nothing we can do about it so we should just continue on with life as we know it. we shouldn't even worry or think about if we are in a dream world because if we were to find out we are we would become stressed out about the reason for our very existence
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