The great thing about the Matrix and its components was that though a great diversity existed among the machines, their behavior closely mimicked their human creators. Their acts of hunting, construction, herding, and using, however, was less similar to the acts of man at the beginning of the twenty first century and more akin to man’s adolescence, back when they were a loose society of hunters and gatherers. Although their method of “domestication” was highly advanced and their consumption was merely an extraction of energy, it is easy to see why their rational and intelligence is limited. A limited intellect that not only focused on simplistic means of survival and a stagnation of civilization, but one that allowed a lesser part of itself confuse a mammal with a virus.
So why the confusion? If the machines had all the elements of knowledge that humanity obtained in their records, wouldn’t they realize that a profound difference can be realized easily between the Homo Sapien and virus species? Also, that those virus-like tendencies exist in other mammalian species besides humans? Of course they could, but the ease of logical rationale disappears when a hateful emotion wells up and allows likeness of loathing to occur – however incorrect. Humanity loathes viruses and their rampaging effects that dominate our bodies; the agents within the Matrix loathe humans and their rampaging domination of the world. It was said with the intent to get the hate across.
However, it is also stated that humanity cannot be compared to any other species of mammals. That is also incorrect, overlooking many facts and truths of nature in a poor attempt to make a point. The reality of our connection is evident in one of the smallest and greatest widespread mammal over the face of the planet: The Rodent.
Rodents, rats and mice in particular, are very much like humans. Remove a top predator or induce a phenomenon that mitigates the effects of the predators and over-population occurs. To any in the world who have seen years of dramatic over-population can think of only one word that describes the resulting nightmare: a plague. In a plague of mice or rats even the predators are helpless before their numbers, often becoming the prey themselves. These mass quantities of little hungry mouths destroy anything in their path they can chew or what they think is food, until starvation or natural events end their rampage.
Of rodents, another popular and well known example is Lemmings. Most well known for drowning themselves in times of population explosions; this is a misconception. Instead, in the process of trying to get to a new food source across a large body of water many drown. But were these rodents given an intellect and an ability to overcome their natural obstructions, they would devour all the vegetation from one island to the next, spreading like a virus until there was nothing left. Given increased understanding and knowledge these Lemmings would be very much like humanity.
Were Agent Smith to think of these examples of nature, he might have called us rodents instead, but it would do little to carrying weight of his emotions. Whether virus by feeling, or rodent by tendency, either way humans are mammals.
