2001: A Space Odyssey was a peculiar movie that not only incorporated AI, but also space travel, mysticism, and surrealism. However, for the purpose of this blog post, the AI will be the main focus.
HAL 9000 is a computer built to pilot and essentially control the ship on its way to Jupiter. HAL is supposedly programmed to speak as if he has emotions. And at first, this is what it appeared like to me as well. HAL's speech indicates no real emotion. He questions and answers matter-of-factly, and even when he compliments Dave's drawings, he doesn't express much other than that he believes Dave has improved.
So, at the start, I believed HAL to be simply a computer, a machine put in place to help manage a ship with only two conscious crew members. But then I realized something. The newscaster at the beginning says some people say HAL only "mimics" emotions. And that's exactly what he was doing. Neither Dave nor Frank expressed much emotion throughout the entire movie. Even when HAL informed him of a potential failure of an important part of the ship, Dave remained completely monotone. HAL was imitating them. He saw the way they spoke to each other and to him and copied it perfectly. That's how he learned.
The one time any of the human characters showed a lot of emotion was when Dave realized he'd been locked out of the ship by HAL without his helmet. This emotion and willingness to go to great lengths to survive were not something HAL anticipated. Brian Christian talks about entropy in one passage in his book. Although he is talking more about compression both in humans and in computer files, I think the word itself is interesting. HAL did not understand entropy. Dave acted in an unpredictable way when he used the airlock to gain reentry into the ship despite not have his space helmet with him. HAL is surprised when Dave is back on the ship and almost immediately begins to bargain with him. It was at this moment that I realized HAL was a lot more than a computer. He says, "I am afraid," when Dave begins taking parts of his memory core out. HAL calls it his mind and says, "My mind is going. I can feel it," until finally he no longer remembers what has just transpired. It is at this moment that HAL is no longer artificial intelligence. He is merely a computer who takes orders. It's almost sad.
Rachel, I really like your post! I think it displays the one key difference between humans and computers that most people overlook but that is actually extremely important. AI technology does not possess emotion, and it is impossible for it to possess emotions. You can program many things into a computer- facts, data, etc- but you cannot under any circumstances program emotions. While I'm sure computers could mimic emotions extremely well, they can never actually possess them.
ReplyDeleteI can't help but wonder how differently this movie could have gone. You mentioned how the people in the ship barely expressed emotions, but what if they had? It's easy for HAL to disregard human emotion if he hasn't learned it. What if the humans had spent some time with him or maybe even allowed him to see interactions from videos? I wonder if that could have changed the outcome. Humans are taught entropy, you know? We are taught not to expect things in patterns all the time. If we don't comprehend that, it's deemed a disability, such as learning disabilities or even mental illnesses that can't comprehend unexpected changes like OCD. Maybe if they had spent more time with him, it could have been available in that instance. Or maybe I'm being too hopeful because what happened to HAL kinda sounds sad :(
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