Brent’s Thoughts

Well there is all kindsa stuff in this movie that is not blatantly obvious. Hopefully, I can give you my take on them and what I think they mean. Unfortunately, it has been about 2 hours since I saw it and the stuff is starting to fade a little.

THERE ARE SPOILERS IN THIS!!!! DON”T READ THIS!!! I MEAN IT!!!!

Agent Smith’s Ear Piece: After being “Disrupted” by Neo, Agent Smith seems to have become a uncontrolled process. That is what the ear piece signifies. He no longer takes orders from the Matrix system. This becomes important later.

Agent Smith’s New Power: His new power is essentially a reprogramming of an individuals mind. Usually this isn’t a big deal as he is only reprogramming people still attached to the matrix. Of course it does make a lot of him, but the really bad thing is that he accomplished this on someone that is free of the matrix. This could have a profound effect later.

The Oracle: The Oracle is nothing more that a program, but she is a program that is an essential part of the matrix. She is the part that creates and deals with the various choices that people in the matrix might have. This is how she knows what is going to happen. She is the one that effects the choices.

The hall of doorways: Essentially backdoor paths through the matrix. Effectively paths between modules of the matrix. You must have a key to open these paths. Consider each location in the matrix as a module and the path between each of them as a socket. These are sockets in those modules that are not connected to anything or are able to be remapped to other places.

The Key Maker: The only way to get through these doors apparently. Since he was in exile apparently there is a newer version of him or something. I would liken him to a GPG program. The doors are a encrypted socket and he is the one with the passphrases.

The White Twins: This was something that I thought was pretty cool, but they completely glossed over it. The two guards for the keymaker were werewolves and the two White Twins were what I would call wraiths. Essentially they are programs that have “somewhat” learned to modify the parameters of the matrix. The Oracle talks about it, but there isn’t really any reason for her to be talking about it then. The only thing that really stinks about the whole thing is that one of the people that Neo fights in the Medieval fight scene is one of the Werewolves, but Neo kills him with a regular weapon.

Neo, his powers, and the Matrix: The architect, stated that Neo was the product of an equation in the matrix that was introduced by the Oracle. This equation was an irregular one with side effects that could not be predicted, but could be controlled. That was basically what the whole two movies were about. In order to control is unpredictable equation an elaborate cycle was created. Neo is apparently the eighth iteration of this cycle, but at the end of the movie he chooses a different path than the last seven. Neo’s power’s derive from the irregularness of the equation. He is able to effect large scale changes in the code and data in the matrix as a result of this odd behavior.

The Choice between Saving Trinity or Joining with the Source: I am not sure of a couple things here. First there is something that Neo carries which the matrix needs to continue to function correctly. I think I missed why the matrix needs that though. So Neo could either give this code to the source, or he could go save Trinity. Previously, all of the “Ones” choose to give whatever code they contained to the source in order to save all of mankind, apparently none of them had a significant other in their lives. Neo chose to save Trinity though and as a consequence of that has doomed humanity to die. My guess is they plan to try and save everyone someway in the next movie. I wonder if Neo joining is essentially a bug fix for the code that runs the matrix?

Mr. Smith’s Motives: Despite what it seems the machines of the matrix don’t want mankind to die. As a matter of fact they have done all they can to get them the option to stay alive. The only people they wish to kill is the rebels that are in Zion. Though they also have some interest in keeping Zion around in some form as well, since it helps to bring The One’s to them. This is why if Neo would have selected to join the source he would have been allowed to pick several people to repopulate Zion after its destruction. Mr. Smith on the other hand doesn’t want mankind to survive. He instead wishes for the destruction of all mankind. This is what he would have accomplished if he had stopped Neo from entering the room with the Architect and if he killed him. This is along the lines of what he talked about in the first movie when he was interrogating Morpheus.

Neo tightening his grip on the chair: At the end of the movie Neo is flying to save Trinity. As he starts to realize that he isn’t going to get there in time, you see him tighten the grip on the chair in the real world. I am sure this was really just to show that he was determined to get there, but I had a thought about it that I think might be pretty cool. After he tightens his grip on the chair you see him start to fly faster in the matrix. I think this is because by tightening his grip on the chair he felt the chair more and it solidified in his mind more that the matrix is not real. This allowed his mind to bend the laws even more which allowed him to go faster. Not unlike Trinity’s kiss helped his mind to realize that he had not died at the end of the first movie.

Neo’s Death, Trinity’s Death: In the matrix if you die, you die in real life? Yes, but wait… now we have seen two people die in the matrix and not die in real life. What gives? Well it has a lot to do with your minds perception. In the first movie Neo died when Agent Smith shoots him. His heart then ceases to beat and his mind shuts down. This is because the matrix has told his body that it is dead and the mind has accepted that. Trinity then kisses him and he realizes that he is not dead. His mind having realized this restarts the bodily functions that it had stopped controlling. Neo’s mind, still connected to the matrix, reactivates his Avatar and he then has a greater control over the matrix and his powers. This is because his mind has realized more fully that the matrix is not real and the signals and sensations that it sends his body are not real. Trinity does not experience this effect as supposedly her mind is not as open to this process as Neo’s. Trinity’s death is resolved somewhat differently. While Trinity is dying Neo reaches into her Avatar and removes a bullet from it. What he has essentially done is remove the references of a bullet form Trinity’s avatar. This is little different than removing a bug in computer code from a program. Trinity then dies in the matrix and the matrix sends signals to her body to cease its functions. Once it has done this it then drops the signal to Trinity as evidenced by the “NO CARRIER” on the readout screen. In order to bring her back to life Neo does two things. Reaching into her avatar he re-establishes a connection to her mind and then changes the code that represents Trinity’s avatar so that it no longer references her as dead. The matrix then signals Trinity that she is alive and her mind restarts the functions that it had stopped controlling. Neo should be able to accomplish this process on anyone in the matrix as long as they have not been removed from the hardware to connect them and it hasn’t been so long that they brain has used all oxygen and it no longer functions (about three minutes I believe).

Neo’s newfound powers in the real world: I am at a loss here. One possibility that I have is that the real world is actually another matrix that they are in. Neo’s mind might have started to realize this after seeing the total control the matrix has over him even when he is outside of it. Another possibility is that when he entered the source and talked to that Architect he somehow integrated into his mind a part of the machine’s system. That coupled with the hardware in his brain might be allowing him some access to the machine’s neural network that they must be using to communicate. He then linked himself to the machine’s coming after them and shut them down. In the process of doing this he also shut himself down.

Iterations of “The One” and Zion: Apparently they are currently on the eighth destruction of Zion. Each time it is repopulated with rebels and then destroyed after “The one” is assimilated. Why do they do this you might ask? Well a 99% acceptance rate would still leave a large amount of people that do not accept the matrix. Assuming a population of 6 billion people, that would leave sixty million people that do not accept the matrix. Allowing the rebels to remove themselves from the matrix, places them all in a central place to destroy. It also keeps some semblance of harmony in the matrix. The important thing to remember though is that while the cycle has repeated itself eight times, the people where not the same in each one. Just because there was a Neo, Trinity and Morpheus in this iteration, does not mean that in the others there was. The only thing that has remained the same in each iteration is the machines and their programs. That is why all the other programs know about all the others. They have played this game before. I also think that is why some of the programs are attempting to stop Neo, they are tired of the system and want the humans gone. You must remember that these programs and machines have intelligence just like a human. Boredom is something that I am sure they can accomplish.

The monitors in the Architect’s room: Notice that after each statement the Architect gave the Neos in the different monitors all gave a different reaction. This happened every time except one. These different reactions where supposed to be all the different reactions Neo could have. The one time that it didn’t happen was the one time that supposedly there was only one reaction. This was to show that the matrix was a timeless entity that contained all reactions and all possible outcomes. This is attempting to show that what he humans think is randomness in our thoughts has already been determined and expected in the matrix.

Geez there is a lot here. Hopefully it isn’t too out of touch with what they were really going for.

Well there is all kindsa stuff in this movie that is not blatantly obvious. Hopefully, I can give you my take on them and what I think they mean. Unfortunately, it has been about 2 hours since I saw it and the stuff is starting to fade a little.

THERE ARE SPOILERS IN THIS!!!! DON”T READ THIS!!! I MEAN IT!!!!

Agent Smith’s Ear Piece: After being “Disrupted” by Neo, Agent Smith seems to have become a uncontrolled process. That is what the ear piece signifies. He no longer takes orders from the Matrix system. This becomes important later.

Agent Smith’s New Power: His new power is essentially a reprogramming of an individuals mind. Usually this isn’t a big deal as he is only reprogramming people still attached to the matrix. Of course it does make a lot of him, but the really bad thing is that he accomplished this on someone that is free of the matrix. This could have a profound effect later.

The Oracle: The Oracle is nothing more that a program, but she is a program that is an essential part of the matrix. She is the part that creates and deals with the various choices that people in the matrix might have. This is how she knows what is going to happen. She is the one that effects the choices.

The hall of doorways: Essentially backdoor paths through the matrix. Effectively paths between modules of the matrix. You must have a key to open these paths. Consider each location in the matrix as a module and the path between each of them as a socket. These are sockets in those modules that are not connected to anything or are able to be remapped to other places.

The Key Maker: The only way to get through these doors apparently. Since he was in exile apparently there is a newer version of him or something. I would liken him to a GPG program. The doors are a encrypted socket and he is the one with the passphrases.

The White Twins: This was something that I thought was pretty cool, but they completely glossed over it. The two guards for the keymaker were werewolves and the two White Twins were what I would call wraiths. Essentially they are programs that have “somewhat” learned to modify the parameters of the matrix. The Oracle talks about it, but there isn’t really any reason for her to be talking about it then. The only thing that really stinks about the whole thing is that one of the people that Neo fights in the Medieval fight scene is one of the Werewolves, but Neo kills him with a regular weapon.

Neo, his powers, and the Matrix: The architect, stated that Neo was the product of an equation in the matrix that was introduced by the Oracle. This equation was an irregular one with side effects that could not be predicted, but could be controlled. That was basically what the whole two movies were about. In order to control is unpredictable equation an elaborate cycle was created. Neo is apparently the eighth iteration of this cycle, but at the end of the movie he chooses a different path than the last seven. Neo’s power’s derive from the irregularness of the equation. He is able to effect large scale changes in the code and data in the matrix as a result of this odd behavior.

The Choice between Saving Trinity or Joining with the Source: I am not sure of a couple things here. First there is something that Neo carries which the matrix needs to continue to function correctly. I think I missed why the matrix needs that though. So Neo could either give this code to the source, or he could go save Trinity. Previously, all of the “Ones” choose to give whatever code they contained to the source in order to save all of mankind, apparently none of them had a significant other in their lives. Neo chose to save Trinity though and as a consequence of that has doomed humanity to die. My guess is they plan to try and save everyone someway in the next movie. I wonder if Neo joining is essentially a bug fix for the code that runs the matrix?

Mr. Smith’s Motives: Despite what it seems the machines of the matrix don’t want mankind to die. As a matter of fact they have done all they can to get them the option to stay alive. The only people they wish to kill is the rebels that are in Zion. Though they also have some interest in keeping Zion around in some form as well, since it helps to bring The One’s to them. This is why if Neo would have selected to join the source he would have been allowed to pick several people to repopulate Zion after its destruction. Mr. Smith on the other hand doesn’t want mankind to survive. He instead wishes for the destruction of all mankind. This is what he would have accomplished if he had stopped Neo from entering the room with the Architect and if he killed him. This is along the lines of what he talked about in the first movie when he was interrogating Morpheus.

Neo tightening his grip on the chair: At the end of the movie Neo is flying to save Trinity. As he starts to realize that he isn’t going to get there in time, you see him tighten the grip on the chair in the real world. I am sure this was really just to show that he was determined to get there, but I had a thought about it that I think might be pretty cool. After he tightens his grip on the chair you see him start to fly faster in the matrix. I think this is because by tightening his grip on the chair he felt the chair more and it solidified in his mind more that the matrix is not real. This allowed his mind to bend the laws even more which allowed him to go faster. Not unlike Trinity’s kiss helped his mind to realize that he had not died at the end of the first movie.

Neo’s Death, Trinity’s Death: In the matrix if you die, you die in real life? Yes, but wait… now we have seen two people die in the matrix and not die in real life. What gives? Well it has a lot to do with your minds perception. In the first movie Neo died when Agent Smith shoots him. His heart then ceases to beat and his mind shuts down. This is because the matrix has told his body that it is dead and the mind has accepted that. Trinity then kisses him and he realizes that he is not dead. His mind having realized this restarts the bodily functions that it had stopped controlling. Neo’s mind, still connected to the matrix, reactivates his Avatar and he then has a greater control over the matrix and his powers. This is because his mind has realized more fully that the matrix is not real and the signals and sensations that it sends his body are not real. Trinity does not experience this effect as supposedly her mind is not as open to this process as Neo’s. Trinity’s death is resolved somewhat differently. While Trinity is dying Neo reaches into her Avatar and removes a bullet from it. What he has essentially done is remove the references of a bullet form Trinity’s avatar. This is little different than removing a bug in computer code from a program. Trinity then dies in the matrix and the matrix sends signals to her body to cease its functions. Once it has done this it then drops the signal to Trinity as evidenced by the “NO CARRIER” on the readout screen. In order to bring her back to life Neo does two things. Reaching into her avatar he re-establishes a connection to her mind and then changes the code that represents Trinity’s avatar so that it no longer references her as dead. The matrix then signals Trinity that she is alive and her mind restarts the functions that it had stopped controlling. Neo should be able to accomplish this process on anyone in the matrix as long as they have not been removed from the hardware to connect them and it hasn’t been so long that they brain has used all oxygen and it no longer functions (about three minutes I believe).

Neo’s newfound powers in the real world: I am at a loss here. One possibility that I have is that the real world is actually another matrix that they are in. Neo’s mind might have started to realize this after seeing the total control the matrix has over him even when he is outside of it. Another possibility is that when he entered the source and talked to that Architect he somehow integrated into his mind a part of the machine’s system. That coupled with the hardware in his brain might be allowing him some access to the machine’s neural network that they must be using to communicate. He then linked himself to the machine’s coming after them and shut them down. In the process of doing this he also shut himself down.

Iterations of “The One” and Zion: Apparently they are currently on the eighth destruction of Zion. Each time it is repopulated with rebels and then destroyed after “The one” is assimilated. Why do they do this you might ask? Well a 99% acceptance rate would still leave a large amount of people that do not accept the matrix. Assuming a population of 6 billion people, that would leave sixty million people that do not accept the matrix. Allowing the rebels to remove themselves from the matrix, places them all in a central place to destroy. It also keeps some semblance of harmony in the matrix. The important thing to remember though is that while the cycle has repeated itself eight times, the people where not the same in each one. Just because there was a Neo, Trinity and Morpheus in this iteration, does not mean that in the others there was. The only thing that has remained the same in each iteration is the machines and their programs. That is why all the other programs know about all the others. They have played this game before. I also think that is why some of the programs are attempting to stop Neo, they are tired of the system and want the humans gone. You must remember that these programs and machines have intelligence just like a human. Boredom is something that I am sure they can accomplish.

The monitors in the Architect’s room: Notice that after each statement the Architect gave the Neos in the different monitors all gave a different reaction. This happened every time except one. These different reactions where supposed to be all the different reactions Neo could have. The one time that it didn’t happen was the one time that supposedly there was only one reaction. This was to show that the matrix was a timeless entity that contained all reactions and all possible outcomes. This is attempting to show that what he humans think is randomness in our thoughts has already been determined and expected in the matrix.

Geez there is a lot here. Hopefully it isn’t too out of touch with what they were really going for.

Well mirage is here now (actually has been for about a week and a half… sigh). Seems like it took forever to get here. I am pretty happy with it. Hopefully it will allow me to be more prompt with my posts. I might need to find some other way to post though haven’t looked into that yet.

Unlike most things that try to be more than one thing at a time it does a good job of being both a laptop and a tablet PC. It gets a little hot on the lap while you are working with it, but that is with the charger running and playing MP3’s and stuff. Lots of little groovy things about it. The pen has an eraser on the back to correct mistakes. The really interesting thing is that the screen isn’t touch sensitive. It only works with the pen and not with a finger tip. That is a little odd from working with a PDA Where you can run it with you finger and not just the stylist.

I would definitely give it :) :) as a rating though. It does a damn good job as not only a laptop, but a tablet PC. It even has a fairly decent setup as a Linux laptop. I haven’t got everything working as far as the active screen, but as far as a laptop it is great.

WooooHOOOOO!!!! Sweet movie. I just got of the theater and man it was a good flick. I haven’t read any of the other reviews so I am not sure what other people thought about it. I guess it doesn’t matter really. If you haven’t seen it yet… go…. go…. no now…..GO!!!!

I think I saw Katz or someone say that it was just an action flick, if that was so then obviously they didn’t really catch the stuff that was going on around the fight scenes. The only thing that I think could be wrong with the movie is that it seemed like there was soooo much stuff that they were trying to get into it, but that they were forced to keep it short, so they took out a portion of the scenes. The movie flows so fast, sometimes you are still working on one concept and they are already into another one. There are few transition scenes in it and it makes it flow really fast. It also explains a little why someone would think that it is a purely action movie, because the fight scenes flow so fast one after another.

All in all though it is a great flick and I think if they release a directors cut, a la LotR, it would be awesome.

:) :)

The next post will be a analysis of some of the things they go through during the movies and will contain EXTREME SPOILERS!!!! Don’t read if you don’t want to know.

Man, wouldn’t it be nice to have enough time to get to write all the stuff you want to write?

Well to keep up with what has been going on…. I am proud to announce that Pauline has officially graduated from Western Kentucky University. Congrats to her.

A math teacher that I had while at WKU is leaving WKU for at least a year to go to California to teach. She had a party last week and me and P went. While we were there I was showing her the pictures of the Triumph from the other post (which seems dumb now since I drove it there). She said how cool it was to have something like that and that it would be cool to have one while she was gone. I offered her an account on here and she decided to try it out. Hopefully you will see something from her soon. Maybe a story about herself?

The Cisco class is doing well. I actually got to spend some time on subnetting the other day with them. I also got to use Mirage for one of the cool things that I had hoped it would work good for…. Teaching. Unlimited paper. There when you come back the next day. Once you get used to it, it is really quick to work with. I think it worked really well. I would show you them, but they don’t really translate well to non-MS. I am working on finding a decent system with Linux, but since the hardware is only somewhat supported it is slow rolling.

I picked up a copy of the Linux System Administrators Handbook the other day. It is an offshoot of the Unix System Administrators Handbook, which is known to be a great book. The Unix version of the book is non-specific to Linux (though it is included), but this one is targeted to Linux alone. That helps to keep some of the static down that is there due to other systems being different than Linux.

Work continues (like work is known to do sometimes). For those of you that I haven’t seen or talked to lately… I have been officially been told that my position is here to stay. I believe the exact words were something like this… “The board voted unanimously to keep your position and there is no time in the foreseeable future that the county will not have two technical people on staff.” So that is pretty cool. Networks are starting to shape up pretty good and things are starting to flow a little easier. Unfortunately, the system was so kludged up in some places it is going to have a real troubling effect on the elegance of some of my solutions. I guess a ghetto running network is better than an elegant non-functional network though so oh well.

The triumph is what we in the business like to call, “Bad Ass”. It is just too fun. All kinds a people asking about it and all kindsa people straining their necks to check it out. Maxx you have to get over here so that we can go rolling around. I think it would be worth the cost of a plane ticket itself.

About a week ago found out that my Aunt Jo had passed away I realized that it had been quite sometime since I had seen her and I then realized that most of the people who had read my page had no idea who she was. I spent the last week trying to figure out how best to describe her to you but I have really not found a decent way to do that. Most of my life has been spent without her around me, but ,I remember her quite fondly it seems. I remember her coming to my grandma’s house when I was little and she always seemed so nice. Also that is another thing I should mention I guess She is actually my dad’s aunt, mot mine, So she would be my great aunt. Like I said I have few memories of her and that is because she lived in Texas for as long as I can remember. One time that I remember she came in and spent some time with us.

After that I know that she sent money. me for some occasion. My parents used that money to buy an electric train engine for the train-set that we had. From then on that engine was titled “Aunt Jo”. Which brings me to another point, I have no ideas why we called her “Jo”. Her name was Jewel. I guess that is just one of those odd things.

Not sure what I wanted to write here, but I guess sometimes it is just good to let it flow out.

By not posting on here for a bit I have managed to miss telling you about a really cool thing that has happened. I purchased a car from my Uncle and gave it half to my mom for Mother’s Day.

The Backstory:

About 35 years ago, my mom was looking to buy some kind of convertible car to ride around in. One of the ladies that she worked with said that her brother used to have a convertible and that she thought her mom had it in the barn. Mom went over there and looked at the car. She ended up paying $250 for it. She drove it around for a while and then about 30 years ago she sold it to her brother for $1500. Once he got it, he repainted it, had new carpet put in it, put a new engine in it and just a bunch of other things to make it better and work right.

Present Day:

About three weeks ago we went up to Indiana for a wedding and went over to my uncle’s. While I was out doing something he mentioned to my mom that he thought he was ready to sell the car and that he was thinking about asking $8000 for it. My mom had always regreted selling the car and as eager to get it back, but didn’t want to pay that much for it. He said that he could sell it to her for $6000. I guess that is about where I came back in because when I walked in my mom said that he was wanting to sell it and the price. I right away said that we would take it, because I knew that she wanted it. Of course me being the way that I am they thought that I was joking about the whole thing. Well I wasn’t. Once I made them realize that I wasn’t we setup a way to get it down here and they brought it last weekend.

Summary:

I just bought a 1958 Triumph Tr-3 Convertible and it freaking rocks. Pictures below.