From: Samantha Atkins (samantha@objectent.com)
Date: Mon Jul 02 2001 - 01:33:20 MDT
The short version. I can see why many mech-heads and AI
affectionados would generally hate this movie as well as why
some would love it. The film is a real tear jerker dressed up
as sci-fi and making a swipe at some real issues. The lead
character is truly fabulous.
**SPOILERS **
Overall though I will pan the treatment of AI as altogether too
formula. The AIs are human equivalent surrogates without human
gumption, self-defense, and the all-powerful and nearly idolized
by the movie *emotions*. Until the AIs finally get emotion they
are just machines. When the first AI does have emotions it is
still considered a machine simulating emotions, not a person -
not a full sentient with rights for sure. David is considered
to be simply property. David loves with a fantastic and
other-worldly love but he largely loves blindly becasue he is
programmed to. It is his supergoal if you will. This does show
an interesting point of what just programming in an emotion can
lead to and does show a minor point that emotions and real
desires can lead to creativity and devotion to purpose. But
David, unlike a human child, cannot learn that those he loves
are not worthy of love or not trustworthy. He simply goes on
loving forever. And the film portrays this mindless causeless
feeling of and acting on an emotion as truly noble and
wondrous!
Do we meat beings really think that our emotions are what is
best about us and that feeling them utterly and monomaniacly is
a mark of tremendous virtue?
It is not believable that human level minds would be content to
simply wait until the humans wake up from their sleep every
night.
To me it is a plus though that the film portrayed humans as they
often are and are especially as they often are to "other". A
possible moral: evolve human beings before you have them
creating other intelligent lifeforms. Except the moral is
lost. Humans are thought wonderful in retrospect thousand of
years after they have died out.
Some of us often see AIs as our salvation. It was not easy to
see them as "toys" and machines to satisfy humans who treat them
like property. It was not easy to see them kept subservient and
only doing blindly with near-human realism only what they were
programmed to do.
I will give the movie overall a "B-" as it at least is a really
good tear-jerker and does provoke some thought.
- samantha
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