"So if everything in this article seems muddy and unclear to you that is only partly to do with my inadequacy".

No, James, for me, the whole text on simulation, reality and illusion is hard to understand in my muddy brain; but I was able to perceive something, owing to your very adequate reasoning.

You explained The Matrix - that you, I, millions of people who have watched the entire series more than once, everyone who reads this work of yours will be grateful to you for your detailed and clear exposition of the fundamental parts of the work that I believe many like me do not. understood.

"But that being said, I can't think of any other movie except for maybe Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey that has inspired so much philosophical engagement — hundreds of articles that transcend the Analytic/Continental divide in philosophy".

"The Wachowski siblings created a work of art that has sparked a philosophical conversation in a way that no other movie ever has. It is easy to get distracted by the criticisms of the Matrix movies and to miss the greater success of the movies as attaining their initial goal. The Wachowskis set out to make a movie that got people thinking and they succeeded at a scale that outstripped all expectations".

No doubt. Even the Wachowski siblings could not imagine the revolution they were creating.

Thanx.