In the 1999 movie The Matrix, Morpheus (played by Laurence Fishburne) is a rebel leader battling an all-powerful computer system. In one scene, he’s trying to convince Neo (Keanu Reeves) that human beings are living in a false reality created by the machines. Morpheus offers Neo a choice between two pills, both of which will reveal “the truth.” One pill is blue. The other is red.
“You take the blue pill,” says Morpheus, “and the story ends. You wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe.”
“You take the red pill,” he continues, “and you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.”
Morpheus then explains that if Neo takes the blue pill, he’ll continue living in blissful ignorance of reality. If he chooses the red pill, however, he’ll be forced to confront some ugly truths about his world and himself.
I’m not going to tell you which pill to take. But I am going to warn you about one way that Hollywood gets it wrong about death and dying: our society’s tendency to overlook or trivialize death and dying until it’s too late.
On May 1, 2015, the actor best known for his role as Morpheus in The Matrix trilogy, Laurence Fishburne, lost his father to lung cancer. His father died at 81 years old after a long and painful battle with the disease.
Fishburne’s response to his father’s death was one that many of the people who visit this blog would agree with: he did not want a funeral and his body was cremated.
“I’m glad that we were able to help my dad die the way he wanted,” explained Fishburne. “I have been thinking about death and dying for a long time now — I’ve had a number of friends and family members pass away over the last few years — and I’ve come to realize that there is no ‘good’ way to die.”
“Dying sucks,” he said.
There’s no doubt that the actor Laurence Fishburne, who plays the character Morpheus in the movie Matrix, is one of the finest actors in Hollywood. But his recent comments about death and dying fall more into the category of fiction than reality.
Fishburne makes several claims that are simply not true. For example, he says we’re “afraid of death,” but polling shows most people are not afraid of death; they’re afraid of dying. He says we need to be “introspective” about death and dying, but most people don’t want to think about it; they want to avoid it altogether. It’s a good thing too, or else most of us would be paralyzed by fear and unable to live our lives.
Fishburne also claims that “we can’t do anything about death,” but this is simply false. We’ve been doing things about death for thousands of years: from building tombs and mausoleums to performing human sacrifices; from setting up hospices and palliative care centers to writing wills and living wills; from creating funeral pyres and cemeteries to having conversations with loved ones about end-of-life medical care.
What’s the first thing that comes to your mind when you think of someone who is dying? Do you think of a person with a terminal illness who is in the hospital and nearing death? Do you picture someone elderly and frail? Do you picture a person who is in pain?
If so, you’re not alone. But that image isn’t accurate. People with terminal illnesses often don’t suffer from pain or physical discomfort until the very end. The majority of people who die each year are not in hospitals. And there are many people who are dying at home, in nursing homes, or even here in our communities, who are not elderly but are young adults, teenagers and children.
As a society, we have a very unrealistic view of what it means to be dying.
A few weeks ago I was with my dad as he met with his hospice nurse for the first time. She asked him what he wanted to accomplish while he was still here on Earth. He paused for a moment and then said: “I want to live long enough to see my last grandchild get married.”
Morpheus, who was famous for his roles in the Matrix trilogy, is currently suffering from liver cancer. The actor’s disease is not the first he encountered. In fact, he had to face his own mortality twice during his lifetime.
Morpheus was diagnosed with prostate cancer a few years ago. He has been cancer-free since 2013, but now he has to fight against liver cancer – an illness that is often fatal.
The actor has been reported to be undergoing chemotherapy treatment and living with his wife and children in Los Angeles. He has decided not to divulge any details about his illness or treatment.
In the 2014 movie “Transcendence,” starring Johnny Depp, scientists upload a dying man’s brain into a supercomputer to create a sentient machine.
The premise of the film is that we can’t prevent death, but we can extend life by digitizing our brains and transferring our consciousnesses into computers (or robots). While this concept may seem far-fetched, it’s not entirely a new idea.
On his website, Ray Kurzweil, Google’s director of engineering, claims he will be able to upload his brain or consciousness into a computer by 2045. In fact, he believes that within 25 years we will be able to upload our memories and consciousnesses into machines and that these machines will be able to operate bodies for us.
And if you think about it, we’re already doing something similar today by relying on technology to memorize things for us. Just look at the popularity of apps like Evernote and Remember the Milk! The more we use technology as an extension of our brains, the more likely the concept of uploading our brains onto a computer no longer seems like science fiction. But there are many reasons why this is not only unrealistic but also dangerous.
For one thing, there are too many ethical questions involved with human consciousness
After serving in the military, Laurence had a desire to act and moved to New York City. He soon landed a role on the CBS soap opera Love of Life. In 1978, he appeared in the CBS television film, King, with Paul Winfield. He then played Mr. Carter in the 1979 film The Chinese Typewriter, a comedy geared toward children.*
