The Matrix

One of the most popular and acclaimed films of the last few years was The Matrix. This movie's storyline presupposes a world conquered by machines, running on artificial intelligence, which are keeping the human race in an imaginary world, using them as an energy source. With the second and third parts later reaching a huge audience, the Matrix movies portray a very advanced virtual-reality program.

The movies' hero, nicknamed Neo and played by Keanu Reeves, is a computer programmer within this system. He believes himself to be working for a large software firm and living during the last remaining years of the 20th century. But in reality, the year is 2199, and his body is being maintained in a liquid-filled capsule, in which he sees only what he is shown and can experience only what he's made to feel. He "knows" himself to be a software engineer, going to work among all the other people, while in reality, he exists in a totally different environment and a totally different century. In short, he exists in a virtual-reality environment called "the Matrix," believing that he's living an actual life.

The character called Morpheus knows the truth, that Neo lives in an imaginary world—and throughout the film, he tells Neo the reality of things. He reveals, for instance, that so far, everything Neo has seen, heard, smelled, tasted and felt had no physical reality and proves to him that all his experiences were imaginary impressions created in his brain. Later in this chapter, we'll give examples of dialogue from the movie.

Virtual Reality and a World Composed of Electrical Signals

The person in the picture thinks he is skiing, even there is no snow around, because he is being given the impression of skiing through artificial signals. Moreover, even though he knows he is experiencing a virtual environment he still cannot stop himelf feeling in that way.

To put it simply, virtual reality is the projection of computer-generated three-dimensional images that appear to be real with the aid of some devices. This technology, with its diverse range of applications, is known as "virtual reality," "virtual world," or "virtual environment." Its most important feature is that by the use of some purposely constructed devices, it misleads the person experiencing it into believing the experience to be real. In recent years, the word "immersive'' has begun to be used in front of the term "virtual reality," reflecting the way that witnesses are literally immersed in the experience.

The rationale of any virtual reality system is based on our five human senses. For instance, when the user puts on a special glove, devices inside transmit signals to the fingertips. When these signals are relayed to and interpreted by the brain, the user experiences the sensation of touching a silk fabric or ornate vase, complete with all of its surface details—without any such thing actually existing in the environment.

One of virtual reality's foremost applications is in medicine. Michigan University has developed a technology that trains assistant practitioners—in particular, the personnel of emergency wards—to learn their skills in a virtual reality lab, in which environment is created by projecting the details of an operating room onto the floor, walls, and ceiling of a room. The "picture" is completed by projecting an operating table, complete with the patient to be operated on, onto the center of the room. The surgeons-to-be put on their 3-D glasses and begin their "virtual" operation. As the pictures on the next page show, anyone viewing these images cannot distinguish a real operating room from this virtual one.

Technology has revealed that we can experience very realistic perceptions without the external world: People can feel themselves in places they are not, and can feel themselves doing things while they are actually lying inert.

In The Matrix, too, once the movie's two heroes are seated in special armchairs and get their nervous systems connected up to a computer, each one envisions himself in a totally different environment. In one scene, they are seen practicing martial arts; in another; they walk down a crowded street dressed in different clothes. When Neo expresses his disbelief that that these experiences are only computer generated, the simulations are suddenly frozen. He is forced to concede that what he thought to be real was, in fact, only an image.

Technology developed by Michigan University permits the training of doctors and particularly, emergency ward personnel in a virtual operating room. Practitioners wear 3-D glasses and operate on a virtual patient.

Another scene finds Neo stretched out on an old chair, badly dressed in old clothes, with wires attached to his head. But when the software is loaded, he finds himself in a wholly new, simulated environment where his worn clothes are gone, his hair is longer, and he looks altogether different from his real appearance.

From this dialogue, it's evident that Neo is reluctant to admit that his experiences are imaginary, because they are so wholly realistic. Consequently, the following dialogue ensues between him and Morpheus, who is aware of the truth:

The wise Morpheus shows Neo that the world that he thought to be real is actually only a simulation. Every detail of his experiences—including cars, the noises of city traffic, the ocean, skyscrapers, people and everything else—is a computer generated impression in his mind. Notice how Morpheus' words quoted above explain scientifically how images believed to be real are formed by the brain's interpretating the electrical impulses it receives.

Below are some extracts from our previously published books on the subject:

Everything we perceive is specially recreated for us in our brains. Therefore, when we say, "We are aware of the world around us," we are talking about copied images of colors and shapes, of sounds and smells.

• All the information we have about the world we live in is conveyed to us by our five senses. The world we know consists of what our eye sees, our hand feels, our nose smells, our tongue tastes, and our ears hear. We never think that the "external" world can be other than what our senses present to us, since we've been depending on only those senses since the day we were born. However, modern scientific research in many different fields points to a wholly different understanding, creating serious doubt about our senses and the world we perceive with them. This approach's starting point is the notion that any "external world" is a response created in our brain by electrical signals. You know that the red hue of an apple, the hardness of wood, your mother, father, your family, and everything that you own—your house, your job,—and even the lines of this book, are just electrical signals in your brain. But we can never have direct experience of their originals on the outside. (The Evolution Deceit, 7th edition, p.216)

• When we say that we "see," in fact we are perceiving the effects of impulses reaching our eyes, after they're transformed into electrical signals in our brain. That is, when we say that "we see," we are actually observing electrical signals in our mind. All the images we view in our lives are formed in our center of vision, which takes up only a few cubic centimeters of the brain's volume. Both the book you are now reading and the boundless horizon you see when you gaze out the window fit into this tiny space. (The Evolution Deceit, 7th edition, p.218)

• Everything we see, touch, hear, and perceive as matter—"the world" and "the universe"—is merely an electrical signal in the brain. No human being has ever seen true matter. (The Evolution Deceit, 7th edition, p.222)

• At this point, we encounter another surprising fact: that there are actually no colors, shapes, or voices inside our brain. All that can be detected within brains are electrical signals. This is no philosophical speculation, but simply a scientific description of the functions of our perceptions. (Matter: The Other Name for Illusion, p.18)

• The act of seeing is realized in a progressive way. Photons of light, traveling from the object, pass through the lens at the front of the eye, where they are focused and fall, reversed, on the retina. Here, the impinging light is converted into electrical signals transmitted by neurons to a tiny spot in the back part of the brain, called the center of vision. After a series of processes, this brain center perceives these signals as images. The actual act of seeing takes place in this tiny spot at the rear of the brain in pitch darkness, completely insulated from light. (The Evolution Deceit, 7th edition, pp.217-218)

No matter how realistic our perceptions, they are our minds' interpretations. Someone watching dolphins perform in the sea is, in reality, watching the vivid and colorful three-dimensional images in his brain.

As we have seen, the subject matter of The Matrix conforms to the scientific realities published in our books. As the above quotations and dialogue from the film explain, we always deal only with the images forming in our brains. No matter how realistic our perceptions, they are our minds' interpretations. Therefore, we can never know the originals of the images we see and are part of..

We'll examine the subject in more detail with scenes from the film.

The Impossibility of Distinguishing Between Reality and Imagination

In this scene, Morpheus teaches Neo about reality by using the images on the TV screen to show him that he's living in an imaginary world he considers to be real. The modern world and all its skyscrapers, cars, and details he sees within Matrix; are all images created in his mind for him to experience. At that time, the true state of the world is altogether different: It is a destroyed, decayed planet. But until Neo was told this, he thought he was existing in the real world, without ever questioning its reality of it, having been fooled by it for all those years.

We can never know the originals of the material counterparts of the perceptions we experience.

We can bring this to life with the following example :

Let us first assume that our brain is removed from our bodies and artificially kept alive in a glass dome. Let us also bring in a computer capable of manufacturing all kinds of electrical signals. Then let us artificially manufacture in this computer the electrical signals for such data as the image, sound and smell belonging to a specific environment and record them. Let us connect the computer to the perception centers in your brain via cables and transmit the recorded signals to the brain. For so long as it receives these signals, the brain (or "you," in other words) will see and live the environment to which they respond.

We can send electrical signals responding to your own image from the computer to your brain. For example, when we send the brain the electrical counterparts of sensations such as sight, hearing and touch that you perceive when sitting at a table, the brain will imagine it is a businessman sitting in his office .

This imaginary world will continue for so long as the stimuli from the computer keep coming. The brain will never realize it consists solely of an image. Because all that is needed for a world to form inside the brain is for the appropriate centers in the brain to be stimulated. The stimuli may come from an artificial source, a recording device, for example, or a different source of perception. (The Evolution Deceit, 7th edition, p.225)

If Our Perceptions Seem Realistic, That Doesn't Prove that We Have Direct Experience of the World on the Outside

We'll never know the existence of our perceptions' material equivalents, because we live all our lives inside our brains. Present technologies like simulators are in fact important evidence that enable this to be better understood, as pointed out earlier. When Neo enters a simulated environment for training purposes, he finds it totally realistic, to the extent that he believes he's breathing that environment's air, and that his success in the fight depends on the strength of his muscles. In reality, his body is stretched out on the chair and connected to the computer.

Technologies similar to those seen in the film can now give people the impression that they're existing in a completely different environment. In this case, they'll respond as if what they see, hear or do was utterly real. It's possible to project stereo images onto the floor, walls and ceiling of a room-sized cube. Entering the cube, people wearing stereo glasses can walk around and see themselves at the edge of a waterfall, on a mountain summit, in the middle of the ocean, on board a ship, or in other different environments. The headsets worn create the illusion of depth and space, and the images thus created are proportionate and life-sized. Special devices worn like gloves recreate the sensation of touch. Anyone using these devices can touch objects in the virtual environment and even move them around. These environments' sounds are also very realistic, because they can be produced from different directions and distances. Some applications can display the same virtual environment to different people around the world. With this technology, for instance, three people on three different continents can see themselves together on a speedboat or discussing issues in a meeting.

These examples show that in order to see ourselves in a certain environment, it is not essential to know what the original of the world is really like. No matter what the source of all the sensations, images, tastes and smells we perceive, it is impossible for us to identify that source. In all cases, we live in our minds and will never be able to reach the original of matter on the outside.

Don't be Deceived by a Picture's Quality or Wealth of Detail

In one scene, Neo is introduced to the virtual world of the Matrix in a simulated environment. Everything looks perfectly realistic. Neo sees people walking down the street and waiting for the traffic lights; when the lights turn green, they cross the road. He even feels the knock to his body when someone walks into him.

At a moment when Neo is looking around, taking it all in, Morpheus says: "freeze it" and at once the image of their environment freezes as it was. The people frozen as they were, the fountain's water is frozen in time, the bird hangs in the air on the very spot. Only Neo and Morpheus continue their conversation in an otherwise frozen image. Neo is stunned but he begins to realize that everything around him is part of the imaginary world he lives in, that it has no actual reality.

It's impossible to prove that human life does not occur in a way similar to what we see in the film. No matter how realistic all the details of one's environment, they are experienced only in one's mind. People can never directly experience the originals of these events, places and persons outside them .. Some of our explanations on this question are given below:

• On a three-dimensional, high quality screen, an individual watches a film being projected. Since he is almost attached to this screen, he cannot succeed in detaching himself from it, so that he may grasp the situation he is in. (Eternity has Already Begun, p.101)

• …Human being watches only the world of perceptions in his brain. No one can ever come across the true original of anything. Furthermore, it's enough for everyone to perceive the copy. For example, someone who wanders around a garden with colorful flowers is not seeing the original, actual garden, but the copy of it in his brain. But this copy of the garden is so realistic that everyone receives some pleasure from it, as if the garden were real. To date, billions of people have imagined that everything they see in the garden is the original … (Matter: The Other Name for Illusion, p.50)

• At every moment, Allah creates the universe with its numberless details, perfect and without defect. Moreover, this Creation is so flawless that the billions who have lived on the Earth up until now have never understood that the universe and everything they see is an illusion, and that they have no connection with the reality of matter. (Matter: The Other Name for Illusion, p.94)

• Some people think a fast-moving bus on the highway—or an accident caused by that bus—are striking proofs of that they're dealing with the physical existence of matter, because the image they're dealing with is seen and felt as deceivingly real. For instance, the surrounding images, the perspective and depth of the highway; the perfection of their colors, shapes and shadows; the vividness of sound, smell and hardness; and the complete logic within that image can fool some people. Because of this vividness, some forget they can never experience the original of matter. Yet no matter how complete and flawless they may be, that doesn't alter the fact that they are still perceptions in the mind. (Matter : The Other Name for Illusion, p.180)

Laws of Physics are Interpretations of Our Perception

Morpheus tries many methods to help Neo understand the reality of matter and provides much evidence in support. Previously, we saw that as part of Neo's training, the image in a copy of the Matrix was suddenly frozen, thus making it evident to Neo that everything appearing real is in fact, a virtual reality. Neo's education continues with the following conversation:

In this conversation, Morpheus advises Neo not to think with the laws of physics always in mind. In the Matrix system, the "agents" are security officers who can control everything by using people's virtual bodies. But because this system is only a virtual world displayed to people's minds, Neo can achieve "the impossible."

In subsequent scenes of the film, characters demonstrate supernatural powers when they have to. Although they experience them in a perfectly realistic manner, in reality these experiences are created in their brains, by the computer. Neo believes himself to be living through these nerve-racking situations, whereas in reality he remains stretched out on his chair.

Morpheus, on the other hand—to use the expression from the film—wants to "free Neo's mind" by rescuing it from all the conditioning it's been subjected to throughout his life. To achieve this, both characters get connected to a jumping program. Morpheus leaps from skyscraper to skyscraper, bridging vast distances between them almost as if he could fly. He says that if Neo frees his mind (rids himself of prejudices), he can do the same. But even though he knows that he's inside a computer program, Neo can't manage to escape what he knows in his mind about the laws of physics. He takes his unreal environment so seriously that he's afraid of falling when he jumps.

In the following sequence, Neo is seen falling onto the concrete floor because when trying to jump from one building to another, he could not overcome his doubts and fears.

Despite the film's obvious science fiction elements, the messages it contains are truly thought-provoking. For example, anyone who realizes matter and space are imaginary, discovers another secret that other people don't know: Cause-and-effect reality does not occur because of matter's physical attributes or as a result of people's relationship with one another. Since we only have experience of perceptions of matter, the matter in our minds can't have any physical effect. Each physical cause is created separately. For instance, a thrown stone, does not break the glass. The perception of the stone being thrown, and the perception of the glass breaking, are each created separately. What makes a ship float is its buoyancy, and what keeps a bird in the air is aerodynamics, but both are created as perceptions. In reality, therefore, all such "powers" belong to Allah, Who creates them.

Neo, having learned this reality, realizes that while actually stretched out on a chair and connected to the computer, he can move outside the laws of physics upon entering the virtual world of the Matrix. As shown in the accompanying stills from the film, he finds himself ducking and moving at such incredible speed as to evade the bullets fired at him. Furthermore, everything is so realistic that when he opens his eyes on the chair, he is still in a state of great agitation. This is an important demonstration that for a person to experience a certain environment, it's not necessary for it to exist in external reality.

We have written about this subject in our books dealing with the nature of matter, explaining that the laws of physics are formed in the mind, in the following way:

We Cannot Go Beyond the Images in Our Brains

Since we've been using our five senses since the day we were born, we may never have thought that the "external" world could be different from what our senses show us.

Human knowledge is formed by the sensory perceptions we acquire through what we see with our eyes, what hear with our ears, and feel with our hands. In other words, each man lives in his "personal world." Thousands of times, we have met with millions of details like the stars in the firmament, the Earth we walk on, the billions who populate the world, every living creature in our environment, the furniture in our homes, house, the chair you are sitting on right now and the book you hold in our hand. But all of these are perceptions of your own personal world. No human being has ever been able to step outside the world he's experiencing. Whatever a man does, he cannot alter the fact that his entire life, even his body too, are perceptions and that he cannot deal with their originals.

The frames from the film shown opposite show Morpheus explaining to Neo what the Matrix is. During their dialogue, Morpheus compares this system to a screen that prevents Neo from seeing:

Until Neo is awakened and rescued from the capsule he was in, he remains unaware of the imaginary world that's been imposed on him. Every aspect of his life was part of this system; and feedback from all those around him suggested that this life was reality. For this reason, it takes Neo a while to become persuaded and comprehend that his life, which he thought real until then, was really a dream.

Today, the same is true for some of those who are made aware of the true nature of matter. People who believe in matter's absolute existence are positive that they are dealing with "real things" in the external world and dismiss this theory as illogical. But what has been revealed here is as certain as the laws of physics, regardless of the objections that other people may raise.

Some of our explanations are compatible with these scenes from The Matrix:

A: When nerves reaching the brain are severed, signals can no longer reach us.
B: A pitch –dark world without smells, sights, sounds, tastes, or feelingsof touch.
1: Hearing, 2: Sight, 3: Smell, 4: Touch, 5: Taste

Our Eyes Cannot See Vision Occurs in the Brain

In line with our lifelong conditioning, we believe that we regard the whole world through our eyes. We could say that our eyes are the windows that open up the world for us. But according to the scientific explanation for vision, the truth is not so! We do not see with our eyes. The millions of optic nerve cells only fulfill their role as a "cable," transmitting to our brain the signals which then become "vision."

The hero of The Matrix is misled to believe that he's living a truly vivid life, whereas he is really stretched out on a chair, his eyes closed, with wires connecting him to the machine. All the bright, colorful, vivid images he's ever seen were shown to him without the need for physical eyes. Likewise, he experiences the sensations of moving, running, and fighting without using any of his muscles. He just thinks he's doing so, while actually lying on his chair.

When Neo returns to real life, he is shocked to realize that until then, he's been living in a glass cylinder, albeit in an imaginary world created by electrical impulses to the brain. In that virtual world, he was a computer programmer, whereas he was actually sleeping in the room, as shown in the accompanying photographs. In other words, everything he thought to be real life was actually an illusion.

As this dialogue shows, Neo was under the impression of living a real life without his ever using his eyes or muscles, thanks to artificial signals being transmitted to his brain. In spite of never having used his vision, he experienced a truly bright and vivid and colorful world. Likewise, without ever using his muscles, he always thought himself to be on the move.

This situation is more or less the same for every human being. For instance, when you watch people shopping in a supermarket, you do not see them or the supermarket with your eyes:This sight is formed not in front of your eyes, but in the vision center at the back of your brain. Therefore, it will be possible for you to see the same sight by stimulating the relevant area of your brain with artificial impulses, with no need for using your eyes.

Some passages from our books are relevant to the frames from the film shown above:

All Flavors are Formed in the Brain

As with all the other senses, taste can be explained in a similar way. In the small bumps of the tongue are the taste receptors, which respond to the flavors of salty, sweet, sour and bitter. Following various processes, these stimuli are converted into electrical signals and transmitted to the brain, where they are perceived as tastes. The taste of cheese, an orange, or a cake you like to eat is in reality the brain's interpretation of electrical signals.

In The Matrix, this point is dramatized in a conversation taking place at the table:

In another scene, one character who knows the reality—that the Matrix system keeps them in an artificially created World - describes the food he's eating:

If nerves connecting the taste buds to the brain were severed, someone drinking strawberry juice would not taste anything at all..

He knows that a computer program makes his whole life appear to him as if it was real. Therefore, he says that the taste of the beefsteak he's eating doesn't exist in reality, that his brain only perceives this is so. But he also says that he enjoys it, just as if it was real. Some of the similar passages in our books are as follows:

All Smells Form in the Brain

The smells you perceive do not reach you from any distance. You mistake the effects taking place in your olfactory center are the smells of some external matter. Just as the sight of a rose occurs inside your vision center, likewise the rose's smell "happens" in the brain's center for smell. You cannot know the outside existence of a rose or its scent: The external world that our senses present to us is really nothing more than the totality of electrical signals reaching our brains. The brain interprets these signals throughout our lives, and so throughout our lives, we never realize that we're wrong to believe that we're interacting with actual matter "out there."

One scene of The Matrix questions the reality of smell, but on the other hand, notes its overpowering presence:

From this statement from the Matrix system's agent, we can deduce that it's impossible to determine what the original of the smell is, just like all our other senses,. Our books also explore this subject:

How Can You Prove That You're Not Dreaming Right Now?

When people awaken from a dream, straightaway they realize what they experienced was a dream, but never question what they call "real life," beginning with the "waking scene." They never consider that for some reason, it might possibly be a dream itself. We perceive what we call "real life" identically as we do our dreams: Both are visions of the mind. As long as we are not awakened from a dream, we're not aware that it is one. Only on awakening can we say, "Ah, it was only a dream."

How can you ascertain that what you're seeing now is not a dream? Couldn't you be considering this moment as real simply because you haven't yet woken up? It's very possible that one day, we'll waken up following a longer dream than usual and have to face up to this reality. We have no evidence to the contrary!

In your dreams, you hold objects in your hands and see with your eyes, but there are really no hands or eyes, nor anything to behold or hold. There is no material basis for all this outside the brain; clearly you are being fooled. But what separates real life and the dream world? Is real life continuous, and dreams seen only in intervals? Or in the dream world, do perhaps a different set of cause-effect rules operate? Fundamentally, these differences are not significant, because in the end, both lives are lived in the brain. If we can perfectly live an unreal life in our dreams, couldn't the same be true for the so-called "real" world we live in? When we wake up from one dream, we can't be certain that another new, longer-lasting one called real life doesn't begin. Our only basis for concluding that dreams are imaginary and the world is real are habit and conditioning. One day, we might get woken from the life we think we're living in this world, just as when we're woken from a dream.

This important subject is explored in The Matrix, where Neo finds himself in an ongoing confusion between real life and a dream world. In one scene, he sees his face split three ways in a cracked mirror. But then the cracks in the mirror disappear, and he sees himself reflected whole, as he would expect. Still stunned from this experience, he turns and asks the others whether they also saw this transformation. To check the reality of his experience, he touches the mirror—which immediately turns into a sticky substance that starts to cover his body in a metallic coating. He even feels the coolness of this substance on his body. But even though he doesn't consider this to be possible, it's realistic enough for him to lose his equilibrium. The wise Morpheus asks him what the difference is between the real and the dream world, with the intention of helping Neo not be fooled by what he sees and experiences.

Below are some extracts from our previous books on this subject:

Another Matrix scene draws attention to the similarity between dreams and the real life, in which Neo addresses customers coming to his front door to buy computer chips. In the adjoining stills, Neo just can't tell whether or not he has woken up. When he does wake up, he hears the alarm clock ringing. He is in his room and he sees his desk and his computer. But what he experienced in his dream was so realistic that he can't be sure it was only a dream. Customers coming to his door tell him that he doesn't look too good, because of Neo's confusion over his contradictory experiences. He tries to share this duality he witnessed by asking them, "Ever have that feeling where you're not sure if you're awake or dreaming?"

Actually, the duality Neo experiences is quite natural; every thinking person can become aware of it. Many parts of our books deal with this issue, of which the following are only a few:

What would happen if we didn't wake up and kept on dreaming? Would we be able to realize that we weren't actually dealing with the originals of anything we lived and saw in our dream?

Morpheus, who is aware of the reality, repeatedly advises Neo not to believe everything he sees, because one must investigate reality in order to understand it. In the following dialogue from the film, Morpheus points out that Neo must question everything he perceives before believing in it:

We too must question the reality of the world we live in. We must come to realize that we'll never be able reach the actual world that exists outside ourselves and from "inside" here, we must find our true purpose in this world.

The reality—that we are not interacting with matter itself—is frequently brought to our attention in the film; below are some excerpts from our books on the subject:

1. Past, 2. Present, 3. Future

The Reality of Timelessness

Time is a relative concept, based on comparisons we make between the events we experience. For example, someone gets in a car, turns on the ignition and puts his foot on the gas pedal. After driving a certain distance, he parks at the curb. Making comparisons between these actions, he thinks that a certain amount of time has passed between them, and thus he obtains a sense of duration.

Because we perceive everything sequentially, in a certain order, we come to believe that time flows forward. For instance, a leaf always falls down, not up. And raindrops fall from the sky; we never see them moving upwards, drop by drop. In this scenario, a leaf still on the tree is the present. Its falling to the ground is the future.

But if the data in our memories were to be rewound like a film on tape, the future—in other words, the leaf on the ground—would be past, and its being still on the tree would lie in the future. As we can see from this example, time is relative, dependent on the viewer's perception. A great span of thousands of years in our view, can be less than an instant in another dimension.

The Matrix points out that alongside all other perceptions, time is relative too. Neo comes to realize that he was wrong about time. In the frames shown below, Neo finds himself inside an American-ship built in 2060 designed for land and air transport. The fashionable garb he wore in the Matrix is replaced with worn clothing, and the 20th-century world he lived in has made way for a derelict environment.

As with everything else experienced with artificial stimuli, it is possible to alter someone's perception of time. From our books, here are some passages on the subject of timelessness:

The Matrix and Matrix Reloaded created great controversy. Many TV channels, magazines, and newspapers discussed the scientific facts of matter in relation to these films' subject. One of the foremost reasons why the film attracted the interest of millions, is their awareness of—and pondering on—this subject's importance. Newsweek; Dec, 30, 02/Jan, 6, 03

Our Memories are Also Imaginary

Upon Neo's return to the virtual environment of the Matrix, after discovering that what he thought to be his life was only imagined, he is simply amazed by this environment. Throughout the car journey, Neo remembers events of his past, but is perplexed to consider that none of it was real. Everything he thought was a memory of his past, had been planted in his memory artificially.

Our books offer some explanations on this subject:

The Conclusion We Reach from This Reality

Outside the brain exists a world we call matter, evoking sensations of solidity and visibility. But you can never reach this world with your senses. Every human being watches a world that takes shape in his brain, touches this world in his brain and listens to its sounds in his brain.

Allah lets every human being watch this material world as a vision in his brain adding to it solidity and hardness, to the point that this vision is perceived as real. Imam Rabbani explained this reality, proven in the twentieth century by scientific evidence, in great detail. In one of his letters, he wrote:

Allah lets every human being watch this material world as a vision in his brain adding to it solidity and hardness, to the point that this vision is perceived as real. Imam Rabbani explained this reality, proven in the twentieth century by scientific evidence, in great detail. In one of his letters, he wrote:

Every human being must reflect most seriously upon the reality revealed here, because everyone who ignores it, is fooled for the duration of his life by a perception appearing on one small area of the brain, which he believes to be real. For example, a man becomes vain and arrogant to think that he owns the buildings appearing on one portion of his brain, forgetting that one day, he too will die. In the brain of someone else, the perception of being destitute leaves him hopeless and depressed. One who loses the visualization of money in his brain becomes instantly devastated. Someone else who sees—in his brain—his car's paintwork scratched becomes angry, and his love of property drives him frantic.

In reality, none of these people is any different, one from the other. Seeing one's self poor or rich, or seeing one's car being scratched, is an image forming in the brain. No one ever can see or know what lies outside his brain. Only Allah, Who creates the world inside—and also outside—our brains, knows this.

People who are ignorant or unaware of this reality or those do not want to acknowledge the very clear truth, will always live in error. They are comparable to someone watching a play or movie in the belief that it's real and therefore, wants to be part of it. No matter how much the audience around him try to persuade him or show him the truth, he will always pretend not to understand.

Without exception, every human being will understand this truth, comprehend, and acknowledge it one day. This moment will come to everyone upon his death, when his brain's perception of life in this world will give way to the perception of death, judgment day, and the Hereafter. As Allah revealed in the Qur'an, death will be like awaking from sleep, like proceeding from a dream to reality. One will move on to the true, endless life; and the perception of this life will become much clearer too. Allah, the Lord of all the worlds, reveals this reality in the verses:

They will say, "Alas for us! Who has raised us from our resting-place? This is what the All-Merciful promised us. The Messengers were telling the truth." (Surah Yasin: 52)

"You were heedless of this, so We have stripped you of your covering, and today your sight is sharp." (Surah Qaf: 22)

Reality is the life after death. Earth is an imaginary world shown to us on a little area of our brains, just like a dream. It is an enormous and heedless error to be misled by this imaginary world, forgetting to ponder the real, infinite life to come. Those who refuse to recognize this fact during this life will suffer great remorse in the Hereafter. When they realize that the people, properties, ranks and offices—to which they were devotedly attached throughout their lives; which they blindly pursued by believing that they were real; which they associated with Allah by forgetting Him and the Hereafter—are actually only imaginary and people who realize that throughout their lives they only ever had direct experience of copies in their brains will express their remorse. They will be devastated to see all the things they thought would exist forever falling, one by one, by the wayside. In the Qur'an, Allah reveals their confessions in the Hereafter:

Then they will be asked, "Where are those besides Allah you associated with Him?" And they will reply, "They have forsaken us. Or rather, we were not calling to anything at all before." That is how Allah misguides the disbelievers. (Surah Ghafir: 73-74)

... Such people's portion of the Book will catch up with them, so that when Our messengers come to them to take them in death, saying, "Where are those you called upon besides Allah?" they will say, "They have left us in the lurch," testifying against themselves that they were disbelieving people. (Surat al-A'raf: 37)

Every single person who refuses to acknowledge and ponder this reality in this life can well be saying these same things, experiencing this same irreversible regret in the Hereafter. Those who lose themselves in this worldly life, which Allah shows us just like a dream; who think that this life is the only real one and that death is its end, will wake from their sleep of ignorance, leave their dreams behind with their death, and see the real truth. On the other hand, every sincere, carefully thinking person will realize the reality while still on Earth and make a genuine effort to win his life to come in the Hereafter.