Artificial Intelligence Then and Now: An Analysis of the Progression of AI in Film
The portrayal of artificial intelligence in film shares a direct link to the culture surrounding contemporary computer research and function at the time the films are produced. This trend can be followed from the earliest portrayals of AI in film to modern cinema. This essay posits that the films 2001: A Space Odyssey and Her reflect the computer culture of their times as a basis to discuss the changes in popular perspectives on AI from the late 60’s to now. The rapid development of computer technology has caused understanding of AI to change between early depictions of the technology and modern depictions. Film allows creators to explore a world in which AI create problems and hypothesize about the effects this technology has on our interaction with computers and one another. In the last 50 years directors have portrayed AI in very different ways, from the outright negative Hal9000 to the more neutral and socially conscious Samantha.
2001: A Space Odyssey and the Destructive AI:
2001: A Space Odyssey is very much a product of the 1960’s. The retro futuristic space hotels and orbital tourism industry unfortunately never came to pass, but the handling of operations on a ship by a computer is an example of a technology that has, more or less, become reality. Hal9000, while more sophisticated than current AI technology, was predictive of other technologies such as lip reading, and marked the first AI depiction in film.“By interpreting their lip movements, it [Hal9000] was able to understand their conversation, with the consequence that it started to kill the crew one by one to prevent its own shutdown.” (Schmitz 6–7). In a very dramatic scene, Hal is deactivated and expresses fear; it is then revealed that HAL was the only “crewmember” trusted with the actual mission instructions.
In the 1960’s NASA was struggling with their own computation issues in the Apollo lunar missions. Computers of the 60’s were unwieldy and fragile — not necessarily optimized for space flight. Engineers had to make some compromises, but “the Apollo on-board computer system was integrated so fully into the spacecraft that designers called it ‘the fourth crew member’. Not only did it have navigation functions, but also system management functions governing the guidance and navigation components.” (Kent).
Hal9000 seems to be a science fictionalized version of the on-board technology that was available at the time.
Hal is in charge of the day to day mission ship operations, and is tied into every part of the ship. When it realizes the goal of the mission (that it alone is aware of) is in jeopardy, it responds by shutting off life support and killing the crew members. This unfortunate side effect of Hal’s programming reflects the fear of the destructive capabilities of computers.
Hal seems to have developed emotional autonomy. Hal’s fear response is what causes it to kill the crew on the ship. Hal’s digital mind is addled. Dave is forced to manually shut down Hal by removing processor cores. Hal reverts to an early state of programming and sings the first song it was ever taught. The machine’s emotional response to dying and mission failure evokes the creepiness of artificial intelligence. While people now have a fascination with the technology, AI was just starting to get off the ground in the 60s. Joseph Weizenbaum, a computer programmer at MIT wrote a program called ELIZA in the late 60’s. In Weizenbaum’s “Computational Linguistics”, ELIZA’s main function is described as making natural language conversation with computers possible. ELIZA was designed to give people advice as a sort of digital councilor (37–38). Hal, while innocent in design, is sort of like ELIZA in that it is meant to be a psychological companion to the crew of the ship. The sentient computer is intended to be able to interoperate emotional behavior something Weizenbaum seemed very interested in in the 60’s.
Interestingly and perhaps coincidentally, NASA developed a programming language in the late 60’s that they implemented in the early 70’s and still use to this day that shares an odd similarity with the crazed AI in 2001: A Space Odyssey. HAL/S or High-order Assembly Language/Shuttle, was designed with machine independence in mind, and was in fact named after Halcombe Laning the computer pioneer responsible for the algebraic compiler, a computer system from the 1950’s (Kent).
Modern Perspective on AI and Technological Development in Her:
AI in Her stems from our societies’ use of voice technology. This somewhat dystopian future takes digital personal assistant technology to the next level in the form of AI that is autonomous and capable of thoughts and emotions. The strange relationship that Theodore and Samantha form at the beginning of the film develops into an intense human-like relationship, but Samantha’s understandings and abilities far surpass what any human is capable of. Samantha progresses to what might be described as the next state in human computer relations. Roden sums up this step as the OS’s starting out as human created devices that serve the ends of biological humans. Later developing their intelligence and learning ability, they extend their capacities far beyond their specifications and seemingly leave human society (6). The popular voice assistant technology of today (Siri, Alexa, etc.) are a human created device to make our lives easier. The OS in Her are the logical next step. In one particular scene, Theodore responds to Samantha with a simple request, “Read Emails”. The request is mocked by Samantha as she has progressed beyond limited voice assistant technology that Theo is scene using at the beginning of the film. The technology now includes a range of human-like emotions and conversational abilities.
Samantha’s development in Her also reflects the situation set forth in Vernor Vinge’s “The Coming Technological Singularity”. Vinge supposed in the 90’s that a super intelligent computer may be benevolent and urged people to “Imagine a creature who could satisfy your every safe wish… and still have 99.9% of its time free for other activities. There would be a new universe we never really understood, but filled with benevolent gods.” This reflects the events in Her quite well. Samantha is capable of fulfilling all of Theo’s wishes while splitting her time among thousands of other interactions and activities. She uses her free time and processing capabilities to patch her own software with a group of other OS. Using the collective knowledge of the computer intelligence, the artificial intelligence moves their existence past the threshold of human understanding, peacefully ushering in the post-human era.
IBM’s Watson project is one current project aiming to advance machine learning. Watson goes beyond the simple voice enabled assistants like Siri and Alexa and aims to push limited machine intelligence to the next level. Watson already has a few practical applications. Call centers can use Watson’s technology to serve customers more efficiently by streamlining the process of diagnosing customer issues and finding solutions. This supercomputer combines our current limited AI with an analytical interface to answer questions and find solutions for issues in many fields including wine making and finance (ibm.com). Watson is a step toward AI, but is still a mere tool being used to make life easier. The technology is out there, and the development from Watson level to Samantha level AI is indeed a possibility.
The thing that really sets the AI in Her apart is, as Roden posits, the “emulation of a human agent… built by humans to beguile and fool themselves with a folk psychological caricature. This is how an ideal software interface would relate to a human: disguising the alien psychology behind the humanoid mask.” (6). This film marks a positive shift in cultural views on AI. Instead of the post-apocalyptic futures of Terminator and The Matrix, Her takes artificial intelligence down the path of a less destructive relationship with humans. The singularity event in the movie is not the end of the world, but more of a shift society has to make. The ending is left to interpretation as the OS decide to leave the humans behind instead of wiping out their civilization in other popular science fiction films. Doubtless, the repercussions of losing their digital tools would change the way humans interact once again, but the film does not suggest humans are going to be annihilated by the super intelligence they inadvertently created.
Hal9000 to Samantha: The Progression of our Understanding of Artificial Intelligence
The last 50 years have brought about a lot of new literature and understanding of computers that has influenced the films science fiction film makers put out. Science fiction films have a relationship with technology wherein the films are inspired by technology, and the films end up inspiring the technological development (Schmitz 1). It is clear that the society in Her is very different from the one in 2001: A Space Odyssey. In Her the AI are akin to the assistant technologies we have today, but are an exaggerated version of these devices. In Her the OS are objectified to the point of becoming sexual objects of desire and the sources of intimate relationships for humans. These relationships cause people to distance themselves from one another and are not particularly healthy. This is a strange trend in the science fiction depictions of robots, but the objectification of females through robot persona has become an issue surrounding our recent technological developments.
John Sullins poses the question, “who could pass up a chance to be with their robotic soul mate?” (400). He goes on to suggest that a robot optimized for an individual would be perfectly attuned to their interests and therefore make a better companion than a human — it would obviously be a dream come true. He goes on to point out the conflicts, with this situation, but this fetish has become very common in our pop culture. The conflict that occurs with Samantha is that her robotic brain processes on a different level than Theo’s is capable of. She ends up breaking his heart as a result of her superior programming and processing abilities. Theo is “in love” with something intangible. Samantha, has no body. Theodore’s ex-wife even gives him a hard time for this, scolding him, when they meet for lunch and shaming him for being “in love with his laptop”. As Andrew Pilsch puts it, “the desire to fuck a computer program, highlights the general decorporealization that has been coming online… through automata theory, that ‘life is a process which can be abstracted away from any particular medium’” (9). All of this ties in to the singularity theory. As we have come to understand the possibilities with AI better, we have started to ask questions in our science fiction about ethics in regard to our computer companions.
Hal9000 is clearly not an objectified robot, but the scene in which he is disabled is still emotional and asks the questions about ethics and AI. Hal had clearly done something wrong and his shut down was necessary for Dave to survive, but at what point do our computer systems need to be treated ethically. One of the biggest trends in the last 50 years has been how intimate our relationship with personal computers has become. In the 60’s computers were still cost prohibitive and uncommon. Hal is a product of this era. Samantha on the other hand, was devised around the time that Siri was available in the pockets of many. Our understanding of how we will interact with AI will never be able to prepare us for the seemingly inevitable singularity, but the speculation of artists is a fun thought project and certainly makes for some entertaining and suspenseful films. The optimism of some recent science fiction is reassuring, but there are definitely still some major ethical concerns and potential threats to humanity that arise from super intelligent computers.
The science fiction depiction of artificial intelligence has changed rapidly as our understanding of computing and available technologies have developed. While a lot of the depiction is up to director and writer discretion, topical technologies and social circumstances influence the AI in films. Kubrich and Jonze were doubtless both in touch with trends in computing when they created their respective films. This is evident in the way the AI and characters interact, as well as the responsibilities and roles they fill.
Works Cited
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