If you want to live life for what it is, and not what it seems to be, first you have to know that you are quite literally in a form of a "matrix" as represented in the popular movie. The way one lives is only according to his or her perceptions. We come to know reality only by metaphorical zeros and ones. You see, either our electromagnetic signals charge through a neuron and travel through the neuro-cortical pathways, or not at all. Similarly, a computer works with a series of on-off switch where either the signal is on or off. By connecting the series of on-off switches, the computer runs through and provides a particular signal according to it's software programming. The matrix can be a metaphor for many things, but I find the one that works best is describing the mind. It is an imperfect representation as computers don't have "holographic memory" and the circuits aren't capable of entirely reorganizing entire sets of circuits to form a net of new connections where there previously existed none, but it is close. Should computers evolve to holographic memory and be constructed to more represent the mind through nets of connections rather than always a direct on or off link as I imagine they will in the future, the metaphor would be almost perfect. Even so, it is probably the best metaphor I can think of to describe the mind and how it processes data.
You see, "programming" is done by our input... our senses. We perceive according to the signals we get, and according to reinforcements of various signals, our brain adapts and programs itself according to our memories and experience.
We learn through association. You may associate the natural loving state you are born with and the connection with your mother to the visual input your eyes get from seeing her as well as her saying something like "come to mommy", you eventually learn not only that the word "mommy" represents your mother, but how to say your first word "mommy". Eventually you learn to associate much more words by what they seem to be and the word that represents them and you learn to combine these words to form phrases, sentences and much more to develop deeper meaning and to ask questions and communicate at a very high level. But ultimately everything that is defined is done so by association. Then you learn to associate those words and the sound those words make with visual symbols, and you also learn each individual word is represented by multiple letters and you learn the sound that those letters make. Much of what we are going to come to understand in life has to do with the understanding of language, since we only then learn to define reality with words, rather than what it seems to be. The words we use to represent memories and experiences, change our understanding of reality to be a bit more indirect, but in the process it allows us conscious communication and to create images in other people's mind based upon their representational system of lanauge which is very similar in nature, and as such although there are a few instances where a general conceptual word like "American" or "liberty" can mean entirely different things to different people, for the most part communication is consistent enough to where we are communicating on the same level most of the time. This representational system of language is derrived from another representational system... our basic 5 senses. Our 5 senses are not what we are "seeing" "tasting" "smelling" "feeling" and "hearing", but only an interpretation of waves at different frequencies that various organs such as our eyes, tongue, nose, skin and ears interpret. The interpretation occurs in the brain after these organs relay the signal to the brain which then associates them with something else to construct the mental model such as a mental image that we "see", rather than "seeing" reality itself.
The matrix could go extremely far and continue to disassociate further and further from reality itself. Our "reality" is only what our 5 senses tell us... if we are verifying our reality is "real" by our 5 senses, it lacks objectivity. Even if someone "tells us" "reality is real", YOUR understanding is only your interpretation of what your 5 senses tell you... But that is only based upon how you believe your brain works. Why? Because you were "told" or taught that? The matrix could also represent our imagination as our subconscious doesn't distinguish between a real and vividly imagined event. It could be the representational system derived from the TV which is a simulation or projected of an imagination of our 5 senses involving really just sight and sound that our subconscious doesn't distinguish between a real and imagined event, which is why we can still "feel scared" while watching a scary movie, even though consciously we know it's not real.
The matrix can also become closer and closer to reality, but I don't think it ends at the 5 senses in as far as "learning" goes, but that is as close as most people go.
However, while it doesn't end there, this particular blog post does.
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