Our Legacy *Metal Gear Solid 2 SPOILERS*
So finally after like 8 years (or was it 7...) of putting it off, I finally beat the first game I got for the PS2; Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty.
The game is all about information control, censorship, idealism and how that transfers from our past, our present and our future. How the things we do in the past, whether it'd be bad or good, must be communicated to ourselves in the present and understood so that they may be passed onto our children and generations in the future.
The Metal Gear; Arsenal Gear, which houses an AI program is designed to control and filter information of any kind, and pass on the things which can help us evolve as a species. The creators and the AI itself, both understand that due to the creation of the Internet, the power of how much an individual has over his or her own information and how much power to communicate this information to other people is immense and uncontrollable without a super power. In the past, authorities whether it'd be governments, corporations, media and even entertainment was able to moderate and control the flow and even the type of information we're subjected to day in and day out of our activities. The AI program, Arsenal Gear, and whatever was presented in the game, is just a small example of what could be controlling what we see, hear, feel, and touch today.
If you think about it, how much of the stuff we see on TV, the Internet, books, newspapers, etc., are considered fluff and totally useless information compared to the things that matter the most in our lives? I'd probably guess a great percentage of it. I turned on the TV this morning and flipped through the channels seeing how much of it was useless to our everyday lives. Not everything is practical I understand, but some of the programs were just pure sensationalism with little to no morale benefit.
Now what is an almost totally different discussion in itself is whether this media programming is something that evolved out of information control like 50 years ago, and is just part of an unintentional design which controls us today? I think about all the people who drone about their lives without much direction, ambition, or inner strength to do the things they really want to do to express themselves, contribute to the people around them, or even build a so called legacy which they want to pass to their children?
I can't be the one to judge those things but I can question them so that everybody can think about their own terms.
Snake said in the game that although we could be under control mentally and physically in any respect, our own actions define who we are as a person; that itself is a given. He also suggested that the human species is will probably cease to exist sometime in the future. Whether it'd be, ideas, art, music, culture, history, knowledge, morality, is what we decide to pass into the future, for our children, for someone else's future, it doesn't really matter.
It's a tired subject sometimes; deciding what our legend and legacy should be as a species or on an individual level. But, it's good to know that something like a video game, almost insignificant in the eyes of the majority of the world, can bring about such important and critical issues to our own eyes so that we can better question our relatively short existence and purpose.
The game is all about information control, censorship, idealism and how that transfers from our past, our present and our future. How the things we do in the past, whether it'd be bad or good, must be communicated to ourselves in the present and understood so that they may be passed onto our children and generations in the future.
The Metal Gear; Arsenal Gear, which houses an AI program is designed to control and filter information of any kind, and pass on the things which can help us evolve as a species. The creators and the AI itself, both understand that due to the creation of the Internet, the power of how much an individual has over his or her own information and how much power to communicate this information to other people is immense and uncontrollable without a super power. In the past, authorities whether it'd be governments, corporations, media and even entertainment was able to moderate and control the flow and even the type of information we're subjected to day in and day out of our activities. The AI program, Arsenal Gear, and whatever was presented in the game, is just a small example of what could be controlling what we see, hear, feel, and touch today.
If you think about it, how much of the stuff we see on TV, the Internet, books, newspapers, etc., are considered fluff and totally useless information compared to the things that matter the most in our lives? I'd probably guess a great percentage of it. I turned on the TV this morning and flipped through the channels seeing how much of it was useless to our everyday lives. Not everything is practical I understand, but some of the programs were just pure sensationalism with little to no morale benefit.
Now what is an almost totally different discussion in itself is whether this media programming is something that evolved out of information control like 50 years ago, and is just part of an unintentional design which controls us today? I think about all the people who drone about their lives without much direction, ambition, or inner strength to do the things they really want to do to express themselves, contribute to the people around them, or even build a so called legacy which they want to pass to their children?
I can't be the one to judge those things but I can question them so that everybody can think about their own terms.
Snake said in the game that although we could be under control mentally and physically in any respect, our own actions define who we are as a person; that itself is a given. He also suggested that the human species is will probably cease to exist sometime in the future. Whether it'd be, ideas, art, music, culture, history, knowledge, morality, is what we decide to pass into the future, for our children, for someone else's future, it doesn't really matter.
It's a tired subject sometimes; deciding what our legend and legacy should be as a species or on an individual level. But, it's good to know that something like a video game, almost insignificant in the eyes of the majority of the world, can bring about such important and critical issues to our own eyes so that we can better question our relatively short existence and purpose.