"A lot of things that you see very clearly as 'being there' are actually products of your brain," one scientist said. Another added, "By manipulating sensory impressions, it's possible to fool the self…"
It was explained, "The illusion happens as a result of a conflict between senses. The brain has to interpret the conflicting sensory information. The brain hates ambiguity. It always tries to come up with an explanation." There were said to be over 50 types of illusions. Experiments to understand out-of-body-like experiences (seeing one’s own body from a location outside the body) in healthy people concluded, "...This has been discussed for centuries in philosophy, but it's hard to tackle experimentally."
Director and writer Andrew Niccol's first movie, 'Gattaca', about genetically made babies premiered in 1997. He made the observation in 2002, "We live vicariously through celebrities. People used to say that celebrities are America's royalty; now I think celebrities are the world's royalty. We're entering an interesting time where we don't know what's fake and what's real anymore. And for me, that's an interesting area to explore."
Of his movies, "I never knew I was actually making science fiction, because it was always social science fiction. I was never so interested in the hardware. I was more interested in the humanity...Genetic engineering has gotten better — or worse, depending on your point of view…"
The 2011 movie 'In Time' which starred Justin Timberlake "is the bastard child of 'Gattaca'. I realized way back then that the ultimate goal is to live forever. The holy grail of genetic engineering would be to find the ageing gene and switch it off. It's the perfect metaphor for living in the moment. If you have a literal body clock, it's reminding you that every second counts as you're watching it tick down. I think we could all benefit from having one." However he pointed out, "Even if you could switch off the aging gene, I'm not sure our psychology could keep up with our biology."
Ethan Hawke believed, "When sci-fi and genre films are done well, a metaphor pops. Sometimes you can write about those ideas more effectively coming at it from an angle rather than straight up." He also made the comment, "We live in a world where everything is downloadable and globalized and people are staring at their computers. It's wonderful to be part of a live art, it's like a rock show. Theater and rock shows are the few times when people experience something that's living in the present tense; it's living in the moment."
