From: Dickey, Michael F (michael_f_dickey@groton.pfizer.com)
Date: Fri Mar 08 2002 - 07:29:26 MST
-----Original Message-----
From: Richard Steven Hack [mailto:richardhack@pcmagic.net]
Sent: Friday, March 08, 2002 12:34 AM
To: extropians@extropy.org
Subject: Re: My Review A.I. the Movie (total spoiler I hope)
"Actually, the way Contact wussed out was to reduce the entire issue to a
question of "faith". I really doubt that Carl Sagan intended it that way,
although I have never read the book."
I read the book about a two years ago and I felt that the main theme Sagan
was hitting on was that there is difference between evidence based belief
and faith based belief. The government officials did not believe Elly
because there was no evidence, until the video tape showed 8 minutes of
recorded time. The theme of the book, at least in my opinion, was different
than that perveyed in the movie. The movie ends with the question open as
to what happened to her. The book ends with Elly finding evidence that the
universe was engineered (based on a hint from the alien she encountered I
believe. Here is a post I wrote on the subject to someone else...
"In the book "Contact" which was written by Carl Sagan, an atheist, skeptic,
scientist. Jodie Fosters character attempts to prove scientifically that
the universe had a designer by finding a pattern in pie. Pie, which is a
fundamental constant of the universe, had a pattern that could not have
occurred randomly, if that is the case then it must put in place by some
intelligence, and since it was a fundamental part of the universe, the
universe must have been designed as well. The reason why she did this was
because the senate committee did not believe her story, they wanted some
evidence. It required no leap of faith and was merely the simplest
explanation for observed phenomena, a point which Carl Sagan hits on
continuously in the book but was left out of the movie. In fact, the movie
took away the entire point of the book, which was that science basis its
belief structure on the why the world is observed to work, and religion does
not. Had this film been made when Sagan was still alive, it would not have
ended the way it did."
(Obviously the arguments that a pattern in pie necessarily denotes
intelligent design (not in the christian sense) has arguments against it as
well. They did not specify the pattern, only that elly was sure that it was
created (I was left with the impression that it was created by the aliens
that built the transportation system, or some predecessor, not by a "god" in
any convention sense.)
Michael
LEGAL NOTICE
Unless expressly stated otherwise, this message is confidential and may be privileged. It is intended for the addressee(s) only. Access to this E-mail by anyone else is unauthorized. If you are not an addressee, any disclosure or copying of the contents of this E-mail or any action taken (or not taken) in reliance on it is unauthorized and may be unlawful. If you are not an addressee, please inform the sender immediately.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 09:12:50 MST