Identity and the Prestige

In relations to our readings, The Prestige focuses on the question of identity. As Locke mentions, it is impossible for a being to be located in the same area. Yet, that question of identity is exactly what fuels the feud between the two men. If one person cannot exist twice, how does one solve the mystery of the transporting man? Similar to Locke’s writings, each magician is shown a beginning to their tale. Then, there is a turning point in the story where they both become something extraordinary, an extension of themselves, which muddles harshly with their identity. Finally, they each realize how simple identity truly is by breaking down their own tricks and revealing how they could exist twice. 

Locke also acknowledges the consciousness as an important part of identity that exceeds everything else. Locke states, “…without consciousness there is no person.” If a person has conscious thoughts of their past events, then they are arguably the same person, in Locke’s theory. In this case, both men have a sense of identity that is interrupted. Due to their circumstances, they have a specific, separate identity. Angier’s clones are able to have his exact thoughts and characteristics. As for Borden, his twin takes over his life during some points, and mixes the meaning of having two, separate identities. Locke also mentions how this consciousness commits people to their actions; therefore, justifying actions (e.g., rewards and punishments) taken against them. Without going into too much detail, there is a pattern of punishments throughout the movie that the magicians impose upon each other. 

However, this sentence had me curious, what would Locke have thought about the death penalty? One of the many arguments for people on death row is that they consciously knew what they were doing. They cannot separate their identity from the crime that they have committed. The only time that courts rule for separation of identity and crime is in cases of mental illnesses. Would it be possible for Locke to fit into this rationale? Again, he states that a mentally conscious person deserves consequences related to their actions. Would he provide exceptions for those whom commit crimes while under the influence of mind-altering drugs? 

In the video below, National Geographic provides insight into how addiction triggers the reward system. This constant search for a high has contributed to crime as shown by the Bureau of Justice statistics here. In my opinion, I think that Locke might have agreed to the idea of public punishments, such as jails, but I am not entirely sure he would have been in agreement with death. Overall, I have to agree with Locke, that consciousness plays a big role in identity. Conscious processing takes place in the human mind, even on simple terms. It makes sense to me that the conscious mind, identity, and actions all come together as one. Still, I think that drug usage and brain effects should be studied more before automatically allowing criminals off the hook.

Reality or Fantasy?

 

The Matrix is not at all what I was expecting. Initially, I was confused, but the question it posed was prominent from the beginning: "What is real? How do you define 'real'?"

There was nothing real about this movie, but really how should I know, right? Isn't that what the film is asking? There were enough questions in the movie and the three stories for me to question my own existence. Is this life real or am I living a dream? From this, I wondered if people that say they have lived in another lifetime were actually “awake” at some point, or so to speak. Did they experience the outside world while I’m tied up inside this dream world working and going to school? Or were they having dreams while I’m living in the real world?

Needless to say, Second Meditation by Rene Descartes did nothing to help me answer these questions. In fact, he left me with even more questions. He says, “I consider that I possess no senses; I imagine that body, figure, extension, movement, and place are but the fictions of my mind. What, then, can be esteemed as true? Perhaps nothing at all, unless that there is nothing in the world that is certain.” I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling pretty uncertain about life. We believe what we want to believe. The best example I can come up with is God. Many people believe in the Almighty being, but has anyone seen him? Was he, or has he ever been, real? Real is trivial term in this sense, because people who believe there is a God (or gods) are going to continue to believe even if you ask them if they’ve seen Him. So wouldn’t that make the word “real” trivial in all other cases we use it in?

I’ve most likely confused you while you’ve read this (believe me, I’ve confused myself), but after watching something like this and reading stories that have the same general concept for the first time, I find it extremely hard to decide what is real and what is fake. However, I’m going to remain in my little bubble and say that we are indeed real. We are not in a fantasy world. Our senses that tell our brain how to react to certain things, like touching a hot surface or eating cold ice cream, are real. Our brains aren’t hardwired to some machine to tell us how to think and feel. We are alive and we are real.

Side note: I’m extremely sorry if this is off the wall crazy. It’s hard not to get carried away with something like this. Especially after seeing The Matrix for the first time in my entire life. I was taken aback for sure.

Shut Up and Dance your way out of that cave

This week I watched an episode of Black Mirror called Shut Up and Dance. We follow the main character Kenny, a seemingly innocent, harmless young guy. Kenny, and several others are being watched and are told to perform a series of tasks or else some unknown people, only referred to as "they" in the episode, will leak information that they cannot afford to let out to the public.


We are not sure of the full stories surrounding the other characters. We get the picture that Kenny was wrongly caught masturbating on camera, and that they would leak the video to everyone. We as viewers sympathies for Kenny, as it seems he has been unfairly targeted. He is made to do awful things such as robbing a bank at gunpoint and fighting a man to the death.


I cannot help but relate this to Plato's Allegory of the Cave. A group of people spend their entire lives chained in a cave only ever seeing shadows and noises unaware of the entire situation. To them the shadows are the reality. They do not realize that those shadows and noises come from something else, because they've never been shown anything else except of what is right in front of them. Well it turns out, we are the people in the cave. Towards the end of the Black Mirror episode we are hit with revelations that completely change our outlook. It turns out that these people were purposely targeted by a group of somewhat vigilantes who wanted to punish Kenny and the others for what they've done. Kenny it turns out was watching child pornography, so had the man he had to fight. We were given small hints to it during the episode such as him being drawn to the child at the restaurant, and the fact he was so scared of the video leaking. It all at the time just added to the perception that he was a nice and completely innocent guy.


Because we were only shown certain aspects of the story, we believed that to be the reality. At the end you are dragged out of that cave and are shown the light. Just like the acts of the characters in the story. Even though they believed that if they performed certain tasks, their secrets wouldn't get out, the reality is very different. Once you are shown what is outside the cave, your view of reality completely changes.


P.S. I now have a sticker over my laptop camera.

A Bear and Nozick Teach Happiness

          The Waldo Moment is a Black Mirror episode in which a cartoon bear, voiced by a man named Jayme, began as a comedic enterprise ended up running for an election. To be clear the cartoon bear, named Waldo, ran for office not the man behind him. If you are wondering how could this happen, basically the people became disenfranchised with their current politicians and believed they were not really cared about by the government and voting for a cartoon bear could vent their anger.
          The episode struck home with me because of how startling close the people in there and the people out here areand also how it portrays how a person thinks. For example it can be assumed that Jayme more than likely had a lot of money due to the fact of how successful Waldo was with the public. Even though he is not directly famous, Waldo is and thus he can reap the rewards that Waldo produces. Now having money does not necessarily mean happiness it also does not necessarily dwindle it either. But what we see at the end is that Jayme was tired of the success of Waldo during the election and was incredulous at why the people were voting for a cartoon bear. He sacrificed all of his potential success to make a stand for something he believed in. This just goes to show how the human mind works, and that happiness is not always the most important thing to a person. This point is also pointed out in "The Experience Machine," by Robert Nozick. In his thought experiment he states that humans want experiences of connections with others that bring about happiness rather than happiness in it of itself. We as humans would rather have fluctuations of happiness rather than happiness all of the time because it helps to contribute our life's meaning. I would personally rather live a thoughtful life with meaningful shared connections with other people rather than constant feelings of pleasure. We enjoy the internal feeling of pleasure as a response to something that we did. It makes it more meaningful to us.
          This episode put me in perspective and made me think what happiness was and how important it is. Now I personally believe that it is vital to a person and people should pursue it, just not in way in which it separates them from their common man. It is like the example of higher pleasures and lower pleasures. It may take a while and unhappiness to achieve those higher pleasures but when you do it makes all of the difference. Nozick quotes John Stuart Mill in his experiment when he says," it is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied."

Reality vs. Fiction

The world is digitized. There is hardly a person left who doesn't have at least a TV in their home. Movies, TV shows, cartoons all provide an alternate reality that isn't permanent. However, sometimes, it feels real, at least while we're watching it. And sometimes, we'd rather it be real than what we have in our everyday lives.

In the episode of Black Mirror titled "The Waldo Moment," a man named Jamie voices a cartoon bear who accidentally becomes a political candidate for an upcoming election. Jamie struggles with the idea that people only like the bear; that he doesn't matter in the slightest. His feels persona as this fictional, rude, cartoon bear has overtaken his own personality. People like Waldo because he speaks the truth. Jamie can say what he wants because he isn't actually Waldo, but the consequences come back to bite him in the butt anyway. It may seem crazy, but the people actually vote for the blue bear over real people. As Jamie says, "Waldo is a bear. A blue bear," but for some reason, people don't seem to care. Suddenly, Waldo is a beacon of truth, and it doesn't matter whether he's real or not.

Robert Nozick's "The Experience Machine," the same idea is portrayed though with entirely different circumstances. The idea that people might rather prefer to plug themselves into a machine that gives them a false but realistic reality is similar to people voting for a blue bear in an election. To some, a cartoon that tells the truth seems the better option than the people who lie in order to gain favor. Just as with the experience machine, people can pick and choose what they want to experience. They don't have to worry about awkward, sad, scary, or annoying situations. The virtual reality is suddenly better.

However, when it comes down to it, are these really better situations? In Plato's allegory of the cave, the people are presented as not knowing the truth while in the cave. It's only once they're outside in reality that they can come to know the truth. It's uncomfortable, and they aren't used to the light at first, but eventually they get used to it. They learn more than they ever could have in the cave, but when they go back, they're shunned. Perhaps Waldo is telling the truth, but he's still a cartoon. There's a person behind him who is the one who actually thought of everything Waldo says. Perhaps if the people who voted for Waldo instead chose Jamie as their candidate, things might have been better. A cartoons simply cannot do something meant for human beings, as entertaining as he may be. Jamie was the brain behind everything, but at the end of the episode, he ended up homeless. 

And so, it seems that most people prefer the fictional over the real. Jamie gave Waldo a voice and thoughts and a personality, and yet, people preferred the cartoon over the human. This shows that it's dangerous to be too involved in the fictional world. It might overtake reality one day.

Virtual Escape

           It’s crazy how much of the world around us is digital: TV, video games, phones, tablets, even watches! In many ways, these objects make our lives so much easier and allow us to become so much more advanced as compared to our ancestors. However, the human mind is becoming so dependent on the virtual world, it can alter our perception of what is real. The other day, while at the grocery store, I noticed a toddler, sitting in the grocery basket, with his eyes glued to his phone. This makes his mother’s life a lot easier, as she doesn’t have to constantly watch him. However, the toddler is already exposed to the digital world at such a young age. Being exposed to this so young, makes the digital world an almost inseparable part of the child’s life. Due to this dependence, the digital world has the ability to influence human beings, even though digital characters, shows, etc. are not technically “real.”  

            On the surface, this doesn’t seem like that big of a deal. After all, the digital world is a daily part of all our lives. However, as the Black Mirror episode, “The Waldo Moment,” portrays, since the digital world is so present in our everyday lives, it can blur peoples’ distinction between real life and digital media. The character Waldo is so loved by his fans that he gets second place in a real political election. While he didn’t win the entire thing, at the end of the episode, he is able to start a riot among the crowd because of how much power he holds over the people. While it seems extremely obscure to think that real human beings would vote for a fictional character, “The Waldo Moment” explains how this concept isn’t that absurd.

People enjoy video games and TV because they are an escape. If you’re tired of everyday life, it’s easy to hook up your gaming system and go get lost in the Victorian world of Assassin’s Creed for a couple hours. During the politician open question panel, Jamie uses the real life complaints about politicians to give Waldo more credibility and support. He calls out Gwendolyn, explaining how she’s dishonest because she is only using the campaign to boost her career. While Waldo is a digital character, his fictional persona is what causes him to hold so much power over the people. They like him because he isn’t a typical human being. On top of this, he is a TV character that everyone is exposed to because of peoples’ dependence on the media.

This episode presents the scary possibility that, due to dependence on the digital world, people could prefer virtual reality to “real” reality. In Robert Nozick’s “The Experience Machine,” Nozick explains how “plugging into an experience machine limits us to a man-made reality” (Nozick 122). He mentions how human beings would not be content with living out their wildest dreams within their mind while hooked up to an experience machine because they would not be able to physically take part in the experiences or be their own person (121). However, “The Waldo Moment” displays how peoples’ dependence on virtual characters, shows, and games can blur the lines of reality. By putting their support in a virtual character, the people are not displaying their preference to real life but to fiction.

            While the digital age helps makes our lives tremendously easier, it is becoming all we know. The voters in “The Waldo Moment” did not find it weird to vote for a fictional character because of how regularly fictional characters are in our lives. In Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave,” the prisoners only know life in the cave. As time progresses, more and more younger children only know digital media. While helpful, this could also easily display the virtual world as reality.