The world in which the apes found themselves was completely out of their control and foreign, whereas the room the ‘futureman’ finds himself within is completely of his (in the species sense) own creation and understanding. Whereas before the sun was the only source of light, now the source is fluorescent and man-made. We see a fully civilized, cultured man surrounded by a pleasant bright white light in an ordered and structured room. Just as the apes, the bones-as-a-weapon realization and the rocky, wild and unconquered landscape acted as an allegory for where conscious awareness found itself, the ending “room” is the same. Kubrick was describing the birth of conscious intelligent life. The apes realize that one can use objects as weapons and begin to interact with the world in an evolutionary manner. The black slab was so sudden and so out-of-nowhere, that there was no way to not perceive it with intense reactional response, elevating one’s self from a lower conscious level to ultimately realize human potential. The apes had their first intelligently conscious moment. It captivated them in a manner which superseded all that in the background. Then, one day, they saw something in a way which they could not describe. The apes saw the world from a primal and survival-based intelligence level. What I think Kubrick may have been illustrating was how we transitioned from a lesser state of awareness and into something more.

It hypothetically put forward how we evolved from apes to humans, as despite it being so obvious, one does have to be consciously aware to detect a change in one’s environment - to detect a spontaneous black slab that appears out of nowhere. It was something that could not be ignored if one was consciously present within the room. The marbled monolith represented exactly what it was - a massive slab of obviousness.

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