1977: Star Wars introduces us to helpful and humourous robots like R2-D2 and C-3PO.
1982: Blade Runner tells us that robots can be scary, and the scariest thing about them is when they’re indistinguishable from us.
1984: Terminator is a robot who’s come to destroy us all.
About 5 minutes after we invented robots we started predicting our own extinction at their hands. About a third of jobs that used to exist in the 1980s and 1990s have been replaced by robots. Stephen Hawking has warned us that “The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race.” In 1998, that annoying plush toy Furby had more computing power in it than was used to put a man on the moon. Our smartphones today are MILLIONS of times faster. With a god-like lack of hubris we are driven to create these things in our own image (or at least replicate the human brain), but once we’ve recreated human intelligence, and robots capable of building other robots, then isn’t the next step SUPER human 
intelligence – and then haven’t we made ourselves redundant? And yet we can’t help ourselves.
Even within this documentary that explores the dark corners of AI, the film makers (Tommy Pallotta, Femke Wolting) can’t help but wonder if they can build a robot that will replace themselves. Can they get an AI to direct a movie about AI?
I am a fan of Isaac Asimov so this documentary is like heaven to me. This must be what it’s like to ride a rollercoaster: I am sickly fascinated by the very robots that I fear. Maybe that’s why I love movies like Her (in which Joaquin Phoenix falls in love with an AI) and Marjorie Prime (in which people assuage their grief by replacing their dead loved ones with cloned AI) and Ex Machina (in which Domhnall Gleeson falls in love with an AI even as he works to disprove her humanity) but I refuse Alexa in my home, and in fact have never even asked a single question of Siri.
A.I. is not a question of the future. It’s here. The question is, what are we going to allow it to do? Take care of our aging parents? Drive our cars? Create art? If machines can do all of that, then who the heck are we? That was my favourite part of this movie: really thinking about humanity and what it means to live among these sophisticated creatures – creatures of our own making, and possibly our undoing.
The directors do in fact come up with a movie-making robot, and bring in Billy Crudup and Richard Linklater to comment upon its success. But no matter how they feel, or I feel, or you feel, robots are here to stay. And they are capable of very convincingly telling us how great they are. Could we even get rid of them, if we wanted to? Are we as fully in control as we believe? And if so – for how much longer?
ASSHOLES WATCHING MOVIES 
I’m waiting for the future where they can upload my consciousness in to a robot body and I can live alongside our AI overlords.
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You need to check out the TV show Humans (if you have not already). Pronto.
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I like humans. A.I. creeps me out. I know it’s too late, Jay. Damn,
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Well I suppose you and I will just head for the mountains together!
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This is a topic I’m into lately – I’ll have to check it out!
(Also, I have no idea why I haven’t dropped by lately. I’ll blame it on the weather, because the alternative (laziness) doesn’t seem like as good of an excuse.)
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I love the relationship between AI and mankind. Might have to go back and watch Ex Machina and give it a review. Great Read.
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The possibilities with A.I are endless, good to speculate with movies and documentaries, and your review. I think I’m too old now to see how it all turns out, sadly.
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Oh! GOTTA see this one!!! I have that same sick fascination. I have trouble killing bugs. How would I ever end the life of an AI? I think that’s a huge deal to me.
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Ooooh, see, you have the makings of a documentary right there!
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Oh I’m fascinated by this topic and especially how it’s presented in books and movies. Will definitely be checking this one out! Thanks 🙂
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I’ve asked Siri, “Do you dream of electric sheep?” For a long time the answer was “I don’t know what that means.” Then it started quoting part of a Shelley poem. I’ll be afraid when it comes up with its own answer.
Seriously I am glad we’re considering this now, preparing, but I wonder if, like robots taking jobs, we’ll have AI before we’re really ready for it.
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By definition, I think A.I. will always be a step ahead of us!
That Siri response reminds me of Westworld – have you seen that show?
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Yup, scary. Great piece of writing.
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I’m really interested in seeing where AI will go and if will look like the movies. Lot of potential but also lots of problems the new technology could bring. Think they got a computer to create a song.
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