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Posted: |
Jan 19, 2021 - 11:55 AM
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By: |
jackfu
(Member)
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Great movie, terrible book in which by the end you're rooting for Colossus. A "true" adaption of the novel and/or two unnecessary sequels would be quite unappetizing.
I liked the movie, despite some plodding on personal levels - I find the premise fascinatingly terrifying. I have not read the books, and I won't (! non-fiction guy now...), but I am curious about how the author saw this play out. Would the humans find a way to defeat Colossus? Would they out-think it? Would Colossus change? Would Colossus be a benefactor or a tyrant? Would Colossus convince mankind of its wisdom? Would Colossus develop the very ego its creators sought to bypass?
I think Colossus did develop that ego with the way it spoke of itself in the first person and did become a tyrant - with the stated goal of freeing mankind to pursue more prosperous lives. Yet its means to that end were quite harsh ("Obey me and live or disobey and die"). It was a little too human in its thinking.
Now, once its goal of world control and world peace was accomplished and those whom sought to fight it were eliminated, could those that remained have found Colossus to be a beneficent dictator?
Seems to me a computer might use more subtle means to gain control - that is thinking from a modern perspective vs the cold-war thinking that went into the Colossus tomes.
I'm fairly rusty on the books but yes, IMO, with each succeeding book, things got more convoluted, especially time-wise. The Fall of Colossus, in which the newer, more powerful unit has replaced the old one, and Forbin’s wife begins receiving communications from Martians offering to help by requesting how/what data is input into Colossus and then providing a mathematical problem to input which causes Colossus to malfunction. The twist is that Colossus had been warning Forbin about the Martians and was apparently preparing to stop them from invading but was shut down before it could do so.
Colossus and the Crab involved reactivating the old Colossus to help stop the Martians from taking much of Earth’s air supply via a collector. Forbin uses old battleships to destroy the collector and humanity is saved – sort of. Colossus winds up negotiating a compromise with the Martians to siphon off Earth’s air more slowly and humanity will be moved to Mars to avoid destruction from the impending change of the Sun to a red giant.
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Posted: |
Jan 20, 2021 - 10:02 AM
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By: |
Warlok
(Member)
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Thanks!
I would pursue the two tracks somewhat equally and often in conflict with each other: the drive to destroy Colossus, and the attempt to reason with Colossus. There would be friction in real-time between them... and possibly even those who conclude that Colossus is actually a logical necessary thing.
You'd have to find people who could make honest arguments from each perspective. A.I. ethicists, programmers, hackers, humanists, and libertarians (pure philosophy libertarians, not political). And you'd also have a time of conflict between these intellectuals and normal pillars of power, as suddenly these people are the best hope of the species.
One more ponderance... as efforts to thwart Colossus unfold, does Colossus indeed adopt a more Skynet stance? It would not be the action that is absorbing (though yes it could be dramatic)... it would be the thought process involved in arriving at such a conclusion that would be.
Sorry - one more: would mankind attempt to craft another Colossus, but one fundamentally opposed to Colossus? As Person Of Interest positted, one God to fight another God. And could such a being be crafted? Could mankind actually guarantee a liberal beneficence in an artificial being? That might be a mighty struggle in itself.
Fascinating stuff.
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This still works. I noticed they somehow managed not to look too, too dated. Maybe it's because they limited the number of sets, or they didn't try to think up futuristic sets or costumes.
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Was Paul Frees the voice of the computer?
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