Twenty years ago a Romanian sci-fi author came with the idea that humans might very well be extras left behind a gigantic production "filmed" millenniums ago. Other writers, such as Heinlein, Frank Herbert or even Asimov (in "The End of Eternity") flirted with the same concept in one way or another. But there were the Wachowskis who put that subject in the spotlight, using America's ultimate propaganda weapon, the Hollywood. However, there was nothing new under the sun, as The Matrix was inspired by other films, books, myths and philosophy including Messianism, Buddhism, Gnosticism, Existentialism, Nihilism, Vedanta, Advaita Hinduism, Yoga Vashishta Hinduism and Sikhism. As Wikipedia mentioned, the film's premise resembled Plato's Allegory of the cave, René Descartes's evil genius, Kant's reflections on the Phenomenon versus the Ding an sich, and the brain in a vat thought experiment, while Jean Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation. After all, the question still remains... How can you tell how real is your world?
