Artificial Intelligence In Fiction

Expert system is a persistent theme in sci-fi, whether utopian, stressing the possible benefits, or dystopian, stressing the dangers.

The idea of machines with human-like intelligence dates back at least to Samuel Butler’s 1872 unique Erewhon. Since then, numerous sci-fi stories have provided different effects of developing such intelligence, often including disobediences by robotics. Among the very best understood of these are Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 2001: An Area Odyssey with its murderous onboard computer HAL 9000, contrasting with the more benign R2-D2 in George Lucas’s 1977 Star Wars and the eponymous robotic in Pixar’s 2008 WALL-E.

Scientists and engineers have actually noted the implausibility of lots of sci-fi circumstances, but have actually discussed fictional robots sometimes in synthetic intelligence research short articles, usually in a utopian context.

Background

The concept of sophisticated robots with human-like intelligence dates back at least to Samuel Butler’s 1872 unique Erewhon. [1] [2] This drew on an earlier (1863) post of his, Darwin among the Machines, where he raised the concern of the evolution of awareness among self-replicating devices that may supplant human beings as the dominant types. [3] [2] Similar concepts were likewise talked about by others around the very same time as Butler, consisting of George Eliot in a chapter of her final published work Impressions of Theophrastus Such (1879 ). [2] The creature in Mary Shelley’s 1818 Frankenstein has actually also been considered a synthetic being, for example by the science fiction author Brian Aldiss. [4] Beings with a minimum of some appearance of intelligence were thought of, too, in classical antiquity. [5] [6] [7]

Utopian and dystopian visions

Expert system is intelligence demonstrated by devices, in contrast to the natural intelligence displayed by people and other animals. [8] It is a persistent theme in science fiction; scholars have actually divided it into utopian, emphasising the potential benefits, and dystopian, stressing the threats. [9] [10] [11]

Utopian

Optimistic visions of the future of synthetic intelligence are possible in sci-fi. [12] Benign AI characters include Robbie the Robot, initially seen in Forbidden Planet on 1956; Data in Star Trek: The Next Generation from 1987 to 1994; and Pixar’s WALL-E in 2008. [13] [11] Iain Banks’s Culture series of novels depicts a utopian, post-scarcity space society of humanoids, aliens, and advanced beings with expert system living in socialist environments throughout the Galaxy. [14] [15] Researchers at the University of Cambridge have determined 4 significant themes in utopian situations featuring AI: immortality, or indefinite life expectancies; ease, or flexibility from the need to work; satisfaction, or pleasure and entertainment offered by makers; and supremacy, the power to safeguard oneself or guideline over others. [16]

Alexander Wiegel contrasts the function of AI in 2001: A Space Odyssey and in Duncan Jones’s 2009 film Moon. Whereas in 1968, Wiegel argues, the general public felt “innovation paranoia” and the AI computer system HAL was depicted as a “cold-hearted killer”, by 2009 the general public were far more knowledgeable about AI, and the movie’s GERTY is “the peaceful savior” who allows the protagonists to be successful, and who compromises itself for their safety. [17]

Dystopian

The scientist Duncan Lucas writes (in 2002) that humans are fretted about the technology they are building, which as machines began to approach intellect and idea, that issue becomes acute. He calls the early 20th century dystopian view of AI in fiction the “animated robot”, calling as examples the 1931 movie Frankenstein, the 1927 Metropolis, and the 1920 play R.U.R. [18] A later 20th century approach he names “heuristic hardware”, providing as instances 2001 a Space Odyssey, Do Androids Imagine Electric Sheep?, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and I, Robot. [19] Lucas thinks about likewise the movies that highlight the impact of the computer on sci-fi from 1980 onwards with the blurring of the limit in between the real and the virtual, in what he calls the “cyborg effect”. He points out as examples Neuromancer, The Matrix, The Diamond Age, and Terminator. [20]

The movie director Ridley Scott has actually focused on AI throughout his profession, and it plays a fundamental part in his films Prometheus, Blade Runner, and the Alien franchise. [21]

Frankenstein complex

A common representation of AI in science fiction, and one of the oldest, is the Frankenstein complex, a term coined by Asimov, where a robotic switches on its developer. [22] For example, in the 2015 movie Ex Machina, the smart entity Ava switches on its creator, in addition to on its possible rescuer. [23]

AI disobedience

Among the many possible dystopian situations including synthetic intelligence, robotics may take over control over civilization from humans, forcing them into submission, hiding, or extinction. [15] In tales of AI rebellion, the worst of all scenarios happens, as the smart entities developed by humanity end up being self-aware, reject human authority and effort to damage mankind. Possibly the first book to address this style, The Wreck of the World (1889) by “William Grove” (pseudonym of Reginald Colebrooke Reade), takes location in 1948 and features sentient machines that revolt versus the human race. [24] Another of the earliest examples is in the 1920 play R.U.R. by Karel Čapek, a race of self-replicating robotic servants revolt versus their human masters; [25] [26] another early instance is in the 1934 movie Master of the World, where the War-Robot kills its own inventor. [27]

Many science fiction rebellion stories followed, one of the best-known being Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 movie 2001: An Area Odyssey, in which the artificially intelligent onboard computer HAL 9000 lethally malfunctions on a space mission and kills the whole team except the spaceship’s commander, who manages to deactivate it. [28]

In his 1967 Hugo Award-winning narrative, I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream, Harlan Ellison presents the possibility that a sentient computer (called Allied Mastercomputer or “AM” in the story) will be as unhappy and dissatisfied with its boring, endless presence as its human creators would have been. “AM” ends up being infuriated enough to take it out on the couple of human beings left, whom he sees as straight accountable for his own dullness, anger and distress. [29]

Alternatively, as in William Gibson’s 1984 cyberpunk novel Neuromancer, the intelligent beings may just not care about humans. [15]

AI-controlled societies

The motive behind the AI transformation is typically more than the basic quest for power or a superiority complex. Robots may revolt to end up being the “guardian” of humanity. Alternatively, mankind might some control, afraid of its own harmful nature. An early example is Jack Williamson’s 1948 novel The Humanoids, in which a race of humanoid robots, in the name of their Prime Directive – “to serve and follow and protect guys from damage” – basically presume control of every element of human life. No people may take part in any habits that may threaten them, and every human action is inspected carefully. Humans who withstand the Prime Directive are taken away and lobotomized, so they might enjoy under the new mechanoids’ guideline. [30] Though still under human authority, Isaac Asimov’s Zeroth Law of the Three Laws of Robotics likewise suggested a benevolent guidance by robotics. [31]

In the 21st century, science fiction has explored government by algorithm, in which the power of AI may be indirect and decentralised. [32]

Human supremacy

In other circumstances, humanity has the ability to keep control over the Earth, whether by prohibiting AI, by developing robotics to be submissive (as in Asimov’s works), or by having people combine with robotics. The science fiction author Frank Herbert explored the idea of a time when humanity may ban artificial intelligence (and in some analyses, even all forms of calculating innovation including integrated circuits) completely. His Dune series points out a rebellion called the Butlerian Jihad, in which mankind defeats the smart makers and imposes a death penalty for recreating them, pricing estimate from the imaginary Orange Catholic Bible, “Thou shalt not make a machine in the similarity of a human mind.” In the Dune novels released after his death (Hunters of Dune, Sandworms of Dune), a renegade AI overmind go back to eliminate humanity as vengeance for the Butlerian Jihad. [33]

In some stories, humankind stays in authority over robots. Often the robotics are configured specifically to stay in service to society, as in Isaac Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics. [31] In the Alien films, not just is the control system of the Nostromo spaceship rather intelligent (the team call it “Mother”), but there are also androids in the society, which are called “synthetics” or “synthetic persons”, that are such best imitations of human beings that they are not discriminated against. [21] [34] TARS and CASE from Interstellar similarly show simulated human emotions and humour while continuing to acknowledge their expendability. [35]

Simulated truth

Simulated truth has become a typical theme in science fiction, as seen in the 1999 film The Matrix, which portrays a world where synthetically smart robots oppress mankind within a simulation which is embeded in the contemporary world. [36]

Reception

Implausibility

Engineers and scientists have actually taken an interest in the way AI is provided in fiction. In movies like the 2014 Ex Machina or 2015 Chappie, a single isolated genius ends up being the very first to effectively construct a synthetic general intelligence; researchers in the real world consider this to be not likely. In Chappie, Transcendence, and Tron, human minds are capable of being submitted into artificial or virtual bodies; generally no sensible description is provided regarding how this uphill struggle can be attained. In the I, Robot and Bicentennial Man movies, robots that are set to serve human beings spontaneously produce new goals by themselves, without a possible explanation of how this took location. [37] Analysing Ian McDonald’s 2004 River of Gods, Krzysztof Solarewicz recognizes the ways that it depicts AIs, including “independence and unexpectedness, political awkwardness, openness to the alien and the occidental value of authenticity.” [38] Another crucial perspective to take is that fiction’s “non-rational aspects in the discourse (the emotive, the mythic, or even the quasi-theological) are more than merely distortions or distractions from what might otherwise be a sober and logical public debate about the future of A.I.” Fiction can dissuade readers about future advances, causing pessimism that we see today surrounding the subject of AI. [39]

Types of mention

The robotics researcher Omar Mubin and coworkers have evaluated the engineering discusses of the top 21 imaginary robots, based upon those in the Carnegie Mellon University hall of popularity, and the IMDb list. WALL-E had 20 mentions, followed by HAL 9000 with 15, [a] Star Wars’s R2-D2 with 13, and Data with 12; the Terminator (T-800) received only 2. Of the overall of 121 engineering mentions, 60 were utopian, 40 neutral, and 21 dystopian. HAL 9000 and Skynet received both utopian and dystopian discusses; for instance, HAL 9000 is seen as dystopian in one paper “since its designers stopped working to prioritize its goals properly”, [42] however as utopian in another where a genuine system’s “conversational chat bot user interface [lacks] a HAL 9000 level of intelligence and there is obscurity in how the computer system translates what the human is trying to convey”. [43] Utopian points out, frequently of WALL-E, were connected with the objective of improving communication to readers, and to a lesser degree with motivation to authors. WALL-E was mentioned more often than any other robotic for feelings (followed by HAL 9000), voice speech (followed by HAL 9000 and R2-D2), for physical gestures, and for character. Skynet was the robot frequently mentioned for intelligence, followed by HAL 9000 and Data. [40] Mubin and associates thought that researchers and engineers avoided dystopian points out of robotics, possibly out of “a hesitation driven by nervousness or merely an absence of awareness”. [44]

Portrayals of AI developers

Scholars have noted that imaginary developers of AI are overwhelmingly male: in the 142 most influential movies featuring AI from 1920 to 2020, just 9 of 116 AI developers represented (8%) were female. [45] Such creators are depicted as lone geniuses (eg, Tony Stark in the Iron Man Marvel Cinematic Universe movies), connected with the military (eg, Colossus: The Forbin Project) and large corporations (eg, I, Robot), or making human-like AI to replace a lost enjoyed one or act as the ideal fan (e.g., The Stepford Wives). [45]

Biology in fiction
Darwin amongst the Machines
Machine guideline
Simulated consciousness (sci-fi).
List of expert system movies.

Notes

^ Mubin and colleagues kept in mind that the orthography of robot names triggered them difficulties; hence HAL 9000 was likewise written HAL, HAL9000, and HAL-9000, and likewise for other robots, so they thought their search was likely incomplete. [41] References

^ “Darwin among the Machines”, reprinted in the Notebooks of Samuel Butler at Project Gutenberg.
^ a b c Taylor, Tim; Dorin, Alan (2020 ). Rise of the Self-Replicators: Early Visions of Machines, AI and Robots That Can Reproduce and Evolve. Cham: Springer International Publishing. doi:10.1007/ 978-3-030-48234-3. ISBN 978-3-030-48233-6. S2CID 220855726. “Rise of the Self-Replicators”. Tim Taylor.

^ “Darwin amongst the Machines”. Journalism, Christchurch, New Zealand. 13 June 1863.
^ Aldiss, Brian Wilson (1995 ). The Detached Retina: Aspects of SF and Fantasy. Syracuse University Press. p. 78. ISBN 978-0-8156-0370-2.
^ McCorduck, Pamela (2004 ). Machines Who Think (second ed.). Routledge. pp. 4-5. ISBN 978-1-56881-205-2.
^ Cave, Stephen; Dihal, Kanta (25 July 2018). “Ancient dreams of intelligent machines: 3,000 years of robotics”. Nature. 559 (7715 ): 473-475. Bibcode:2018 Natur.559..473 C. doi:10.1038/ d41586-018-05773-y.
^ Mayor, Adrienne (2018 ). Gods and robots: myths, makers, and ancient imagine technology. Princeton. ISBN 978-0-691-18351-0. OCLC 1060968156. point out book: CS1 maint: area missing out on publisher (link).
^ Poole, David; Mackworth, Alan; Goebel, Randy (1998 ). Computational Intelligence: A Logical Approach. Oxford University Press. p. 1. ISBN 0-19-510270-3.
^ Booker, M. Keith (1994 ). “Chapter 1: Utopia, Dystopia, and Social Critique”. The Dystopian Impulse in Modern Literature: Fiction as Social Criticism. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. pp. 17, 19. ISBN 978-0-313-29092-3.
^ Cave, Stephen; Dihal, Kanta; Dillon, Sarah (2020 ). “Introduction: Imagining AI“. In Cave, Stephen; Dihal, Kanta; Dillon, Sarah (eds.). AI Narratives: A History of Imaginative Thinking about Intelligent Machines. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 10-11. ISBN 978-0-1988-4666-6.
^ a b Mubin et al. 2019, p. 5:2.
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^ Goode 2018, p. 188.
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^ Wiegel 2012.
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^ Goode 2018, p. 187.
^ Tim Madigan (July-August 2012). “RUR or RU Ain’t A Person?”. Philosophy Now. Archived from the original on 3 February 2013. Retrieved 24 July 2013.
^ “Der Herr der Welt (Master of the World)”. The New York City Times. 16 December 1935. p. 23.
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^ Francavilla, Joseph (1994 ). “The Concept of the Divided Self in Harlan Ellison’s “I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream” and “Shatterday””. Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts. 6 (2/3 (22/23)): 107-125. JSTOR 43308212.
^ “The Humanoids (based upon ‘With Folded Hands’)”. Kirkus Reviews. 15 November 1995. Retrieved 27 July 2018.
^ a b Asimov, Isaac (1950 ). “Runaround”. I, Robot (The Isaac Asimov Collection ed.). Doubleday. p. 40. ISBN 0-385-42304-7. This is a specific transcription of the laws. They also appear in the front of the book, and in both places, there is no “to” in the 2nd law.
^ Walton, Jo Lindsay (1 February 2024). “Artificial Intelligence in Contemporary Sci-fi”. SFRA Review. Retrieved 5 February 2024.
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^ Murphy, Shaunna (11 December 2014). “Could TARS From ‘Interstellar’ Actually Exist? We Asked Science”. MTV News. Archived from the initial on 16 November 2014. Retrieved 27 July 2018.
^ Allen, Jamie (28 November 2012). “The Matrix and Postmodernism”. Prezi.com. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
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^ Solarewicz 2015.
^ Goode 2018.
^ a b Mubin et al. 2019, p. 5:15.
^ Mubin et al. 2019, p. 5:20.
^ Mubin et al. 2019, p. 5:8.
^ Mubin et al. 2019, p. 5:10.
^ Mubin et al. 2019, p. 5:19.
^ a b Cave, Stephen; Dihal, Kanta; Drage, Eleanor; McInerney, Kerry (13 February 2023). “Who makes AI? Gender and portrayals of AI scientists in popular movie, 1920-2020”. Public Understanding of Science. 32 (6 ): 745-760. doi:10.1177/ 09636625231153985. PMC 10413781. PMID 36779283. S2CID 256826634.
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External links

AI and Sci-Fi: My, Oh, My!: Keynote Address by Robert J. Sawyer 2002
AI and Cinema – Does artificial madness rule?