MovieChat Forums > The Matrix (1999) Discussion > not just "batteries"

not just "batteries"

posted 4 years ago by ExTechOp (2749)
11 replies | jump to latest

In "Matrix" discussions, the issue repeatedly comes up that humans are net-endothermic, so they generate less energy than they consume. Using humans as batteries makes no sense, scientifically.

However, I THOUGHT Morpheus referred in passing to the Matrix using human brains for a "limited processing power." Pretty sure I'm wrong though, because I can't find it in the film or screenplay.

The original script DID, however, claim that humans were needed to jumpstart the fusion reactors. That doesn't fix the problem, though, since a running fusion reaction should be able to jumpstart another.

Anyway ....

I only recently recalled a Dean Koontz short story from 1973 called "Wake Up to Thunder" where humans are willingly kept in a Matrix-like virtual reality for a supercomputer (named "Thunder").

The difference is that they know they're in Thunder's "Matrix" and are perfectly content to be there.

The reason I bring it up here is that, in Koontz's story, the humans' brains are being used to augment Thunder's computing power.

Seems like a more sensible use of human bodies than just "batteries."

[–] aavfreak (2863) 4 years ago

I don't know that I've ever used the term "plot hole" for anything. Ever. Except for this. It makes zero sense to attempt to harvest the heat from a human body to power anything. As you mentioned the human body consumes far more energy than it would ever put off as heat. And that heat would then need to be converted to electricity - another loss proposition.

The machines would have been better off simply incinerating whatever nutrients they were feeding to the humans.
The whole idea that the remains of the dead are being liquefied to feed the living is akin to plugging a power strip into itself and expecting unlimited electricity.

[–] sonans (1216) 4 years ago

If pig and cow can talk, they'll have the same discussion: Why humans eat us?

Humans will say: To feed us.

A pig or cow who go to college will ask: Why use plant base food to feed us, then eat us? Why not just eat plant?

[–] aavfreak (2863) 4 years ago

This is a terrible analogy. A better analogy would be an attempt to raise cows for food by feeding them other cows. It would never work and you certainly wouldn't generate a surplus of cows that way.

[–] sonans (1216) 4 years ago

Yes and wrong, in movie they say machine melt humans to feed humans, they didn't say that is the only way machine feed humans, maybe they just don't want to waste dead humans body.

And in China, they do feed pigs with pork(supermarket waste).

[–] [deleted] 4 years ago

Science FICTION. FICTION. Its FICTION. it doesn't have to be fully operable.

"Combined with a form of fusion...." is all you need to know to and accept suspension of belief.

WE don't know anything about how this fusion worked.... it's so far beyond our comprehension, or we wouldhave invented it already.

Fiction equals interesting and fun. Let it be.

[–] sonans (1216) 4 years ago

In the 1996 script, dialog is a little different:"They discovered a new form of fusion. All that was required to initiate the reaction was a small electric charge."

[–] actionkamen (23176) 3 years ago

Thank God! Good thing they changed it. When it's a nonsense, better to keep it as one than trying to over explaining it into a more incoherent nonsense.

The important part is that the AI uses living human bodies to supply their energy needs. That's it. It's enough explanation. Let's proceed to the kungfu fighting, shall we?

[–] moviechatterer (13327) 3 years ago

"All that was required to initiate the reaction was a small electric charge."

Its still nonsense, keeping farms of humans surely cant be the easiset way to get " a small electric charge."

Although , like you say , It's enough explanation , suspend disbelief (just about!) and carry on

[–] Ace_Spade (9350) 4 years ago

I always assumed that the plant-grown humans were augmented in ways beyond just the plugs. I figure the augmentation makes them output energy somehow. Maybe it's psionic in nature? Their minds generate some "force"...? I'm also assuming that the liquified dead aren't the only thing the humans are being "fed", it's just a supplement. Waste not, want not.

[–] HAL9000 (935) 3 years ago

i read the humans were suppose to work as a "neural net" to feed computing power to the matrix. makes much more sense.

[–] degray9 (1126) 3 years ago

They changed the “humans as processing power” plot point because test audiences didn’t understand it.