New CPP: Artificial intelligence

HOMEWORK for this week (for wk 3 class): For this week, please watch excerpts from two films which depict various potential futures related to artificial intelligence, and write a response in relation to these. The films both seek to examine the various aspects of how artificial intelligence might begin to take on human-like qualities, and various problems to which this could lead. These are two visions of artificial intelligence, 15 years apart, 23 and 10 years from our own. VIEWING: 1. Transcendence, dir. Wally Pfister, 2014. Watch from :30 until about 1:50. https://putlockers(dot)vg/movie/transcendence-2014_U3AyZHdCWld0akU9/watch.html This film, as mentioned in class, has Johnny Depp playing the lead, but he is thankfully mostly off-screen in the sections we are watching. As mentioned, I am deeply reluctant to show any film that has Depp in it. Depp lost a libel case against a British newspaper in British court for claims made by his ex-wife, Amber Heard, that he was abusive and beat her. Depp then won a similar case in a US court. I do not want to in any way endorse Depp or his behavior, but only to present the themes addressed in the film, which was neither written nor directed by him, for discussion. If you do not feel able to watch the film, please contact me an we can come up with an alternate way of fulfilling the assignment. For more on the Depp vs Heard cases, in both the US and UK, see https://www(dot)theguardian(dot)com/law/2022/jun/02/johnny-depp-amber-heard-libel-outcomes-differ-us-uk There is no need to watch the very start or end of the film. The part of the film in which we pick up viewing is when Will, one of the world's leading artificial intelligence researchers, has been poisoned by a terrorist group, and as he is dying, he and his wife seek to upload as much of him as they can to the new AI system they have been building. We enter the film as the process is about to end, Will the person dies, and Will the AI comes to life inside the computer as a simulation. We mostly follow his wife and others then dealing with the fallout of the situation. 2. AI: Artificial Intelligence, dir. Stanley Kubrick with Steven Spielberg, 2001. Watch from start until 1:05. https://putlockers(dot)vg/movie/ai-artificial-intelligence-2001_TW50d0lhMDNwbVE9/ Speilberg finished directing the film after his friend Stanley Kubrick died while working on this film. The middle part was mostly Speilberg, based on Kubrick's notes, the start and end, especially the start, were mostly already filmed by Kubrick. The movie gets better again starting around 1:30, but if you watch any of the rest of the film that's completely optional. The film is about an artificially intelligent robot child and the family which adopts him after their biological son ends up in a coma after an accident. RESPONSE INSTRUCTIONS: Please write your first response by hitting 'reply-all' to this email (not 'reply'), if possible, by 11pm EST the night before class. No late responses are accepted (and responses that are not in my inbox by the morning before class when I read them are officially 'late'). Please let me know if you need an extension beforehand. Responses should be in the body of your email, not attachment. Please sign them with your name, as it is often not clear from your email. Responses are informal writing, though good spelling and grammar is always nice. Responses should be 2-3 chunky paragraphs in length for undergrads and 3-4 for grad students. Responses should show 1) that you did the work, and 2) that you are thinking about the work. It is fine to say 'I'm not sure what x means, but I think it could mean y, perhaps because of z?'. That shows me you're thinking! Your responses can speak to points made by others during the week, but only if you do so in a way that shows you did the work. I always include 'response questions', they are food for thought, but you don't have to respond directly to any of them. I sometimes will also include some background to help situate the materials for the week, you don't have to respond to that either, but should read it. RESPONSE QUESTIONS: How do these films portray artificial intelligence, and the issues relevant to it? Why do you think artificial intelligence is portrayed in these ways? Do you think alternative futures like these may one day be possible? What sorts of warnings do you think the filmmakers were trying to make us consider? Do you think these are important warnings? Do you think they have a good sense of what issues may be relevant to us in the future? Or do you think they are still posing these questions in naive ways? Do they seem more about the time in which they were made, or do they still speak potentially to aspects of the future that remain relevant? Do you see any potential links to the concerns presented in The Social Dilemma? How might you make these films differently? What sorts of issues do you think they do not consider, but should?