Just a Love Machine...

[newnumber6]

So, last night I was watching "A.I.: Artificial Intelligence" on TV. I hadn't seen it before. Overall, I quite liked it... occasionally drifted too much into being too much about looking great, for my tastes. Maybe a bit too long. And I hated hated hated hated hated hated the ending. If they ended it maybe 5-10 minutes early, it'd have been great, but I hated what they did with it and will have to mentally edit in my own ending to be at all satisfied with the movie.

Anyway, the movie brought back to mind a few issues about artificial life. See, I've occasionally been in (though philosophy class or just online chit-chat) or passively observed debates about the issue. Specifically, whether it's indeed possible for machines (way down the line, not now) to think, even if they seem to, and whether, even if they think, should they be afforded rights. To me the answer to both is clearly yes - it's not even a question, it's like asking, 'Hey, is murder wrong?'. Yet I continually see the other point of view... that it's not 'real' thought, or that even if it is, we only have a moral duty to be kind to people who are 'like us' (I've heard this last bit in discussions about how to treat aliens too, and that's just bizarre).

The other, slightly newer issue brought up by the movie: Could one love an artificial life form? I think I probably could, so long as they seemed sufficiently humanish (or, in a more abstract 'love for a friend' way, even if they were radically different in appearance or behaviour). But then I'm a freak who has, at times, fallen in love with fictional characters while being fully aware they're entirely fictional, so I recognize that it may not be normal.


So, in general, I was just curious about the views of people reading this on the issue. Maybe it's in part self-selecting, because probably a high percentage of my friends list is a fan of SF or comics and so are routinely exposed to artificial characters who are treated as human.

Comments

[angelophile.livejournal.com]

You summed up my opinon on it as well. Was really enjoying the film, it got to the end and I though, great! Except, that wasn't the end. Suddenly we go into a sickeningly sentimental crap alien movie.

The 'death' below the sea was where the movie should have ended. i suspect in Kubrik's original draft it -did- end there. But the idea of leaving the film with a downbeat ending probably offended Spielberg.

[newnumber6.livejournal.com]

Well, the under the sea ending is one valid ending, and I would have been perfectly happy with the film if it ended there. That's not quite my problem with it, though. I kind of liked the 'aliens' (who I felt were clearly just robots created by robots created by robots, over thousands of generations) in general... I didn't need them, but I thought they had a place in the film. My problem was with the whole out of the blue, contrived, 'but only for a single day!' crap. If they ended the movie saying they couldn't bring her back, fine. If they ended it bringing her back, fine... maybe not as poignant, but I can enjoy that as a happy ending that works fine. Hell, even if they ended it with the advanced mechas creating a robo-Mommy for David, deluding him but keeping him happy. But the nonsensical 'only for a single day, and then never again' thing bugged the crap out of me. It comes out of nowhere and its only purpose is to give the exact ending they wanted for the movie, even though it didn't flow from the rest of the plot.

[angelophile.livejournal.com]

True. I could have lived without the terrible cuddly aliens entirely, who were seemingly just added as 'angels' to take the bot to 'heaven'.