Comment Re:they eventually get out... It's Evolution. (Score 2, Insightful) 1294
The architect says that after Neo finishes, he will then pick 23 people (23 right?) to be the next round of hopefuls (potential Neos) when the Matrix is reset for another iteration. This is simply evolution. The only way man can create the next form of life is to evolve it. Many programs try to solve the problem, the one that best solves it will become part of the next generation, and I'm assuming he would pass on some part of himself to every one of them (probably all of his evolved code and memory).
It makes you ask, "well, if the Matrix were only a big simulation meant to evolve a free thinking intelligence, then why the elaborate story of the war and zion and all the human stuff? Why not use some abstract simulation that could go exponentially beyond what humans can imagine?" The answer is that the (human) creators want their new life form to be created in their own image. They had to create a complete mirror of human life so that human emotions such as love could evolve.
The best way for them to evolve free thinking was to create the most intense human experience of choice possible. One where the decision is impossible - a no-win situation like that presented by the 2 doors in the architect's room. He picks one door to save Trinity and damn human kind, or picks another to fulfill his role as "the one" to save humanity.
Every "human" in the matrix is a program. They were programmed to see hear and feel everything as a human. But only a small percentage are able to evolve beyond the first matrix, because they "knew their whole life that something was not right". They go on to the "war for Zion" matrix to see who makes it beyond that test. Then the one that makes it to the "architect's choice" will either seed the next round of evolution, or, as I hope we will see in Revolutions, will be the breakthrough that achieves conscious free will (because he CHOSE the door back to Trinity, instead of following the predetermined scenario).
By the end of the Revolutions, I think that Neo will "awaken" and realize that he is a program, and he will understand that he has just become truly conscious because he is no longer following the path that was laid out for him in the matrix. Hopefully, he will communicate with God (being the Humans that created him). This will be both a very humbling experience and a very intense one (whatever the opposite of humbling is), to find out that he is not "the one" to save the human race, but is "the one" beginning of a new form of life created by humans.
