AI - Even Better than the Real Thing?
The idea of man-made machines becoming the dominant species on earth would once have been laughable. The word 'robot' comes from the Czech 'robota', meaning drudgery - our silicon servants were originally meant to be nothing more than slaves, taking care of life's monotonous tasks.
Now though, technological advances have changed science fiction to fact. Computers outplay chess grandmasters and robots can moonwalk as smoothly as humans (Honda's 'Asimo' machine, named after the sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov, provides 'living' proof).
In the popular arts, we have now become used to visions of bleak, not brave, new worlds, where humankind is superseded by its own technology. It's the Frankenstein factor: humanity recreates itself in its own image, and in turn is thwarted by its creation.
If Spielberg's AI is to be trusted, after successfully simulating the mind, robotics will attempt to reproduce the human heart. The film's tagline suggests of the android David, 'His love is real but he is not.' Surely, if a computer can feel the need for a mother's love, it must be human?
The main issue, however, is less about AI and more about ID. David is a 'pure' representation of all that humanity has left behind. As with many of Spielberg's child heroes, he's an innocent who marvels at the beauty of the universe, who dares to dream and 'to love and be loved in return'. In comparison, humans are detached, brutish, ignorant. David is not just real - he's even better than the real thing.
Although the future world of AI is ravaged by ecological disaster (the World Trade Center rises eerily above a flooded Manhattan), the trouble for Spielberg really lies in the fact that instead of machines becoming more like humans, we are becoming more like machines. And we are losing touch with our divine imprint along the way.
It seems ironic that so many of our human visions of the future include alienation from - and war against - the things we have created. Echoes of the biblical story resound, of course; although in this case we have become alienated from our own creator.
Crucially, God did not create us to be slaves nor playthings. We are children and heirs apparent - made in his image, not cloned or artificial.
And we're real - which should really make us wonder.
Jason Gardner
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