scholarly journals David's Need for Mutual Recognition: A Social Personhood Defense of Steven Spielberg's A. I. Artificial Intelligence

2016 ◽  
Vol 20 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 339-356
Author(s):  
Tuomas William Manninen ◽  
Bertha Alvarez Manninen
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Mutual Recognition ◽  
Social Recognition ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Desire To Have Children ◽  
Science Fiction Films ◽  
The Many ◽  
A Company

In Steven Spielberg's A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001) a company called Cybertronics is responsible for creating, building, and disseminating a large number of ‘mechas’ – androids built specifically to address a multitude of human needs, including the desire to have children. David, an android mecha-child, has the capacity to genuinely love on whomever he ‘imprints.’ The first of this kind of mecha, he is ultimately abandoned by his ‘mother’ Monica, and David spends the rest of the film searching for Pinocchio's Blue Fairy so that he can be made into a ‘real boy’ and gain Monica's love. Their reunion finally occurs at the end of the film, after hundreds of years. Typically, the ending in A.I. is panned by critics, and written off as an egregrious example of Spielberg's sentimentalism. However, we argue that the ending is essential in order to portray a certain conception of the nature of human personhood. While many science fiction films about artificial intelligence are centered on the issue of what constitutes personhood, A.I. is one of the very few films that does not regard personhood as something purely intrinsic to the biological (or, in this case, mechanical) construction of the organism. We contend that one of the many the messages of this film is that the journey to complete personhood requires social recognition.

Screen-Camera-Cars

Film Studies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 53-64
Author(s):  
Sonia Campanini
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
The Self ◽  
Human Interactions ◽  
Cinematic Narratives ◽  
Science Fiction Films ◽  
Self Driving Cars ◽  
Machine Interaction ◽  
Theoretical Considerations ◽  
Minority Report

Self-driving cars have long been depicted in cinematic narratives, across genres from science fiction films to fantasy films. In some cases, a self-driving car is personified as one of the main characters. This article examines cinematic representations and imaginaries in order to understand the development of the self-driving technology and its integration in contemporary societies, drawing on examples such as The Love Bug, Knight Rider, Minority Report and I, Robot. Conceptually and methodologically, the article combines close readings of films with technological concerns and theoretical considerations, in an attempt to grasp the entanglement of cinematographic imaginaries, audiovisual technologies, artificial intelligence and human interactions that characterise the introduction of self-driving cars in contemporary societies. The human–AI machine interaction is considered both on technological and theoretical levels. Issues of automation, agency and disengagement are traced in cinematic representations and tackled, calling into question the concepts of socio-technical assemblage.

scholarly journals Dirbtinis intelektas moterišku kūnu filmuose Ex Machina ir Ji

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 ◽  
pp. 69-90
Author(s):  
Justina Žiūraitė-Pupelė
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Female Body ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Contemporary Science ◽  
Science Fiction Films

The article explores how artificial intelligence is constructed in a female body and showcases the boundaries between human and technological traits, as well as the relationship between human beings and technology. The article defines the notion of artificial intelligence and discusses how artificial intelligence is portrayed in science fiction films. The article does not attempt to provide new theoretical insights into artificial intelligence but, instead, to show how artificial intelligence is characterised in the context of modern science fiction films. Two contemporary science fiction films, which focus on the artificial intelligence in the female body, are analysed: Alex Garland’s Ex Machina (2014) and Spike Jonze’s Her (2013). The analysis of the films showcases the blurred lines between being a human and being a robot: AI in the female body is portrayed as having adequate cognitive abilities and an ability to experience or to realistically imitate various mental states. The AI embodiment found in the films explores different narratives: the anthropomorphic body (Ex Machina) motivates to get to know the world and thus expands one’s experience, while the partial embodiment (Her) “programs” intellectual actions and development beyond the human body. Ex Machina highlights the anti-humanity of the female robot: another (human) life is devalued in order to pursue a goal. On the contrary, Her highlights the hyper-humanity of the operating system: continuous improvements exceed the boundaries of communication with other people.

scholarly journals Avaruudessa konekaan ei kuule huutoasi

2020 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-46
Author(s):  
Pertti Grönholm ◽  
Kimi Kärki
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
The Other ◽  
Ridley Scott ◽  
Stanley Kubrick ◽  
Social Hierarchies ◽  
For Profit ◽  
Intelligent Machine ◽  
The Future ◽  
Science Fiction Films

Artikkelin kirjoittajat tutkivat kolmea tieteiselokuvaa: 2001: Avaruusseikkailu, Pimeä tähti ja Alien – kahdeksas matkustaja, joiden yksi keskeisistä teemoista on älykkään koneen ja ihmisen välinen vuorovaikutus. Kirjoittajat erittelevät elokuvien ihmisten ja koneiden muodostamia suljettuja yhteisöjä, erityisesti keinoälyn ja miehistön suhteita ja dialogia. Kirjoittajat tarkastelevat elokuvia yhtäältä tekijälähtöisesti, keskittyen niiden tulevaisuuskuviin sisältyviin kysymyksiin, varoituksiin ja uhkakuviin sekä toisaalta tarkastelemalla keinoälytematiikkaa suhteessa elokuvien omaan historialliseen kontekstiin.Keinoälytematiikan kautta elokuvantekijät ovat käsitelleet laajoja kysymyksiä, jotka liittyvät ihmisyyden eri puoliin, kuten tiedonjanoon ja uteliaisuuteen, ihmislajin ekspansiivisuuteen, taloudelliseen hyödyn tavoitteluun, väkivaltaisuuteen ja sosiaalisiin valtasuhteisiin. Samalla elokuvat esittävät kysymyksiä koneiden ja ihmisten rajojen hämärtymisestä, toiseuden kokemuksista sekä keinoälyyn liitetyistä pelon, pyhyyden ja kiehtovuuden ja ylevän teemoista.In space, even the machine doesn't hear your scream. The human-AI dialogue in three science fiction films of 1968-1979Grönholm and Kärki research three science fiction films: 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968), Dark Star (John Carpenter, 1974), and Alien (Ridley Scott, 1979). They all contain the interaction of the intelligent machine and human as one of their central themes. In particular, the authors analyse the closed communities of the space ships, focusing on the relations and dialogue between the human crew and the Artificial Intelligence (AI). Special emphasis is given to the intentions of the filmmakers – both directors and screenplay writers – and how the questions, warnings and threats about the future were envisioned in each film. On the other hand, the theme of AI itself is also historically contextualized.Furthermore, the authors consider the wider questions these films ask about the nature of humanity: thirst for knowledge, curiosity, expansion of our species, reach for profit, violence, and social hierarchies. Simultaneously, these films also seem to ask questions about the blurring of the boundaries between the human and machine, experiences of otherness, and feelings of fear, sacral, fascination, and sublime that are associated with the AI.

Stalker

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jon Hoel
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Science Fiction Films ◽  
Literary Influences ◽  
The Many ◽  
Film Viewing

This book examines Andrei Tarkovsky’s film Stalker, one of the most powerful science-fiction films ever made, with the goal of unraveling the film’s many intricacies, from its difficult production and inspecting its many cinematic elements. Included are examinations of composition and cinematography, the many philosophies, poetic and literary influences, and the enormity of its influence across the following generations. The film juxtaposes its speculative elements with a gripping tale of human fragility and introspection. It is as much a movie about the complexity of the human as it is the mysteriousness of the film’s labyrinthine landscape: the ambiguous Zone and its epicenter, the Room of Desire. Stalker challenges us to engage with film in a different way: taking the sensuous and the analytical viewers to task and presenting a narrative that is both deeply pessimistic and yet profoundly hopeful and embedded in a framework of the deepest and most sincere form of faith. The resulting experience is a film viewing unlike any the viewer has experienced before, irrevocably altering cinema forever.

Scientific Prometheanism and the Boundaries of Knowledge: Whither Goes AI?

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 330-343
Author(s):  
Tianhu Hao
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Paradise Lost ◽  
Essential Feature ◽  
The Real ◽  
Science Fiction Films ◽  
Contemporary Film ◽  
Epistemological Framework

This article discusses John Milton’sParadise Lost, Mary Shelley’sFrankenstein, and the contemporary filmEx Machinaas a coherent group concerning the boundaries of knowledge and the perils of scientific Prometheanism. The development of AI (Artificial Intelligence) should be delimited and contained, if not curtailed or banned, and scientists ought to proceed in a responsible and cautious manner. An obsessive or excessive pursuit of knowledge, aiming to equal God and create humanoid beings, constitutes the essential feature of scientific Prometheanism, which can end in catastrophic destruction. BothFrankensteinandEx Machinastringently critique scientific Prometheanism as one aspect of modernity, and expose the real dangers that AIs pose to the very existence of humanity and civilization. InParadise Lost, Milton provides the epistemological framework forFrankensteinandEx Machina. The article concludes that the union of science and arts in science fiction (films) can be very productive.

scholarly journals Animal Representation in Recent Anglophone Science Fiction: Uplifting and Anthropomorphism in Nnedi Okorafor’s "Lagoon" and Adam Roberts’s "Bête"

Oceánide ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 78-83
Author(s):  
Rosa María Moreno Redondo
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Animal Studies ◽  
Animal Cognition ◽  
First Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Animal Intelligence ◽  
Use Of Technology ◽  
Human Animal

Science fiction in the last decades has often empowered machines and provided humans with enhanced characteristics through the use of technology (the limits of artificial intelligence and transhumanism are frequent themes in recent narratives), but animal empowerment has also been present through the concept of uplifting, understood as the augmentation of animal intelligence through technology. Uplifting implies providing animals with the capacity to speak and reason like humans. However, it could be argued that such implementation fails to acknowledge animal cognition in favour of anthropomorphized schemes of thought. Humankind’s lack of recognition of different animal types of communication has been portrayed in fiction and often implies the adaptation of the animal Other to human needs and expectations, creating a post-animal that communicates its needs to the reader through borrowed words. The main objective of this article is to analyze the use of uplifting as a strategy to give voice to animals in two science fiction novels written in English, both published in the twenty-first century: Lagoon (2014) by Nigerian-American Nnedi Okorafor and Bête (2014) by British author Adam Roberts. This article examines, from ecocritical and human-animal studies (HAS) perspectives, the differencesand similarities in the exploration of the theme in both novels, which are often related to humankind’s willingness or refusal to regard the Other as equal.

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