I think, therefore I am!

The Thirteenth Floor (1999)

Sadly, this film got all lost in hoopla created by the Matrix trilogy that nobody actually remembers this under-rated film. It is a convoluted film about consciousness, reality, altered reality and possibly parallels the universe.
'I think; therefore I am', said Descartes. We use our senses to make sense of who we are and our surroundings. Every input that goes through our sense organs helps build composite pictures of our personalities and determine what is right and what is not. We cannot merely rely on our powers of physical perception to ascertain reality, can we? How often our eyes have lied? What we saw was not what we got. Our dreams can sometimes appear so vivid and so real, surreal!

With our addiction to experience everything and yearning for impossible things to achieve in one lifetime, our wants have no boundaries. The creation of alternate universes in cyberspace, where we can take different personas, certainly offers escapism from the stresses of modern living. Are we going to be so impressed with our alter ego that we decide to stay in our alternate life and opt out from this present life? What happens to our current life (or it just consciousness, since all of life is just memory) after that? Do we wonder about in another realm altogether? Are there parallel universes that fit different consciousnesses? Is cyberspace a conduit to other dimensions? Can crime be committed when offenders jump from one universe to another? Well, that is the discussion in another post.

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