Inception: Virtual Realities

Christopher Nolan’s 2010 film Inception artfully achieves the creation of alternative realities through dreams. More specifically the movie is based on the skills of Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCapprio) and his team who can retrieve information from a person’s subconscious while they dream. This is a highly valued skill that can change the decisions of powerful men mainly in the corporate world. In order to be pulled out of a level, there must be a person on the level before who can trigger a kick that will bring you back up a level.

An important law of going into the subconscious is that dream time is longer than real time so you could feel like you were in a place for days when only a few hours have passed in reality. In order to assure that he is in reality, Cobb carries a token, a top. If the top eventually falls he knows he is in reality, but if the top does not cease spinning he knows he is still in a subconscious level. Because in the subconscious what most people use to establish reality, their perception and what Plato calls sense-impression, can easily be fooled (Vesey & Foulkes, 1990,p.225).

“If you can steal an idea, why can’t you plant one there instead?”

The movie is centered a around a challenging job from a client, Mr. Saito, who wants a memory planted into a competitors mind to break up their business. In the subconscious there are multiple levels, the deeper you go in levels the more powerful the planted memory will be. Cobb and his wife traveled so deep into their subconscious realms that the lines between reality and the subconscious became blurred. Cobbs wife eventually killed herself in reality thinking she was still in the subconscious and needed to wake up. Mal died leaving behind Cobb and two children. Mr.Saito promises to return Cobb to his children in the United States where he is currently at large.

“They say we only use a fraction of our brain’s true potential. Now that’s when we’re awake. When we’re asleep, we can do almost anything.”

Is there something wrong with living in a virtual reality? There is a part of the film where Cobb goes into buy strong sedatives needed for his current job. He walks through what is reminiscent of an opium den, where people are laying on beds all hooked up to deep sedatives. The chemist Yusuf explains that the virtual reality is what they prefer. Is that wrong? What does that mean for society?

“Dreams feel real while we’re in them. It’s only when we wake up that we realize something was actually strange.”

Some say that the current generation of teenagers will not be able to effectively communicate because a majority of their interactions are in a virtual world of texting, MySpace, and video simulations.  Is killing more socially acceptable because of the virtual reality of violent video games? Miller (2008) says that there are dangers n the virtual world just like that in the real world, but that because a person is less guarded in the virtual world they are more at risk. (p.6) Yet, according to Rowlands (2003), there is really no way of ever being sure that what we currently consider reality is actually the real world (p.55-56). Then making people abandon their virtual realities would just be bullying by the majority opinion that this world is real, when in actuality no one can ever be certain.

Word Count: 523

References

Miller, C. (2008). Virtual worlds, real exploits. Network Security, 4, 4-6.

Vesey, G. & Foulkes, P. (1990). Collins dictionary of philosophy. Great Britain: Collins.

Rowlands, M. (2003). The philosopher at the end of the universe: Philosophy explained through science fiction films. London: Ebury Press.

Nolan, C. (Producer & Director). ( 16^th of July, 2010). Inception [Motion picture]. United States: Warner Bros. Pictures.