And then Neil pointed out that in I, Robot, old code left over in androids in the movie was shown to be the one thing that gave them consciousness. In a similar fashion, I feel the larger reality of our Grand Overall Design has a lot of 'loose ends' from our past too, and uses it to stimulate our growth as a society. Basically, it is showing us how we can realize our future based on our preferences, without making our combined life a terrible mess.