Watching Tron (1982)

Part of my research for this essay question involves looking at movies which contain artificial intelligence, I have just watched Tron, having seen its sequel Tron Legacy I wanted to understand the original before using any part of it in my film analysis. 

THE MOVIE 

Tron (1982) contained a few points I am planning on including in my essay, it has an artificial intelligence that has been given a certain amount of power and as the movie progresses we see how that having even a little bit of a leash from humans the artificial intelligence is quick enough to realise its superiority from humans. 
Considering that it was made in 1982 it is revolutionary in its ideas compared to the time, most of the characters were very aware of digital technologies advancement (rather than the characters in Terminator who flat out deny any possibility that an A.I can potentially run the world). 

Dr Walter Gibbs: [laughs] You've got to expect some static. After all, computers are just machines; they can't think. 

Alan: Some programs will be thinking soon. 

Dr Walter Gibbs: Won't that be grand? Computers and the programs will start thinking and the people will stop.

It shows that people were fearful of A.I even back then and how it was quick to use humans secrets against it (how technology these days obtains cookies from us, the internet knows all about our habits). But also it has a contrast, where a programme named "Tron" is the main hero who aids the user "Flynn" in defeating the A.I, Tron is representative of an obedient robot who is under a humans control who is all good and aids the hero to his goal. 

Although Tron is seen as a hero, he has been programmed to protect the computer so he has no real free will involved and can in some lights be regarded as a slave to the humans as he shares the want to destroy the A.I "MCP" master computer programme so that he and his other programmes can return to working for their users. 

Does this reflect humans need for control? I would probably argue yes. I would also argue that this movie again shows that robots are only ever portrayed as good when they are obedient to their masters - Humans. 

Triangulation and Harvard Referencing practice.

All three manifestos contain strong opinions on the current state of the creative industry. They all have the mindset that marketing and advertising is beginning to overrule creative industry and people are creating work for the sake of it, not for the passion of it. Ken Garland addresses this in his manifesto First Things First, where he claims that the creatives like him are “increasingly uncomfortable with this new level of design” (Garland, K. 1964). This manifesto was then reviewed and revamped by the Adbusters who shared the same distain for the direction in which creatives are being pushed claiming that society was “applauding the work of those who have flogged their skill and imagination” (Adbusters, 2000). It is shocking that the industry has still progressed in the same direction to fit with society “our culture is corporate culture”(Kalman,T. 1998).

This recent McDonalds advertisement only proves all of the manifestos accusations to be right. The corporate culture is trying to latch onto socialist trends and movements, this picture in particular latching onto feminism movement where it is often suggested women are used to sell a product and to be ogled at like meat. Instead of a woman, a big mac is placed there to suggest that it is more enjoyable than a woman but also mocks that culture. It is clear to see that Kalman was correct when he said that creatives have “been freed from ideas, individual passion and relegated to a role of corporate servitude” (Kalman, T. 1998). This concept is creatively lazy and lacking in imagination and even the colour palette is very much a “high pitched scream of consumer selling” (Adbusters,2000)

Reflecting on the current state of our industry I still believe that all three manifestos are relevant in this time and age. Especially in their demands from the creative industry “We are proposing a reversal of priorities in favor of the more useful” (Adbusters,2000), it is still the case that fellow creatives are letting themselves be abused by the consumerism society. Even back in 1964, the 22 creatives who signed Ken Garlands manifeso all agreed that consumerism was the beast that the creative industry would some day have to face and stand up to “consumerism is uncontested, it must be challenged” (Garland,K. 1964).

Out of all three manifestos Kalmans ‘fuck committees’ offered the most advice and encouragement of how to defeat consumerism. His manifesto also addressed how other industries and other designers which were allowing for this corruption in creativity “Film studios out films in front of focus groups to determine whether an ending will please target audiences. All cars look the same. Architectural decisions are made by accountants. Ads are stupid. Theater is dead.” (Kalman,T.1998). He keeps his manifesto blunt and asking the readers questions, why have we allowed this to happen? However out of all three manifestos Kalman offers some advice to designers who do want to make the change in the industry. He advices them to “find cracks in the wall”(Kalman,T. 1998) where opportunities can be seized. He also encourages designers to find eccentric businesspeople “there are very few lunatic entrapeneurs who will understand  

that culture and design are not about fatter wallets, but about creating a future” (Kalman, T. 1998). All of the manifestos are united in their belief that designers still have the power to make change and that creating a future where consumerism is not a beast is possible.

Adbusters. (2000). First Things First 2000 . Available: http://www.manifestoproject.it/adbusters/. Last accessed 15th Apr 2016

Garland, K. (1964). First Things First. Available: http://www.manifestoproject.it/ken-garland/. Last accessed 15th Apr 2016

Kalman, T. (1998). Fuck Committees . Available: http://www.manifestoproject.it/fuck-committees/. Last accessed 15th Apr 2016 .

Ghosts in the machine: Draft Essay Notes and feedback

Introduction 

For as long as mankind has existed we have been an apex predator, with the power and intelligence to shape the world to our own unique preferences and to bend the will of almost every mammal that lived alongside us. We have been thus far unchallenged in our position on earth but a natural part of evolution leads us to develop ideas of what beings could possibly over throw us/what beings could possibly challenge our position. These intrigues manifest themselves in a variety of ways such as science fiction novels, art pieces (?) and films alike but the medium in particular I will be focusing on is science fiction films and how they are used to represent and grow these ideas. Specifically I will be looking at how we have created a villain, an obsession, within something that has only in the last few years come to exist - Artificial Intelligence, or in other words Robots. 

(needs to have a nice opening quote at the start or quote with fact embedded, 2 establishing quotes needed, one factual, one fictional?) 

Main Arguments 

There was a time where robots were more of a futuristic fancy than an actual threat, they started off as a novel idea to include within movies, often under guise of a soft villain or dumb service machine aiding the hero (include examples from Metropolis where the maria-bot sets out to destroy the city under the disguise of being human ‘There can be no understanding between the hand and the brain unless the heart acts as mediator.’). Address how Metropolis is regarded as one of the most influential films in the science fiction genre. It was a template for robots to come, with the maria bot as a villain under a humans control. (implant some quotes from time-out website). Maria was the inspiration for both bladerunner and c3PO and how the two differentiate (c3PO completely subservient, bladerunner not so much). 

 humans haven't always acknowledged or accepted A.I as the natural evolution of our species  but slowly with the development of real-life technology robots inclusion within films starts to change as we realised the potential in robots. The influences of things like wars inspired the idea for a war machine such as terminator (films like Terminator and I Robot back this up, where Humans rally against the robots and assert their authority in the movies). 
How there was a mid range film (A.I Aritifical Intelligence 2001) where the robots weren't the bad guys but they were rallied against anyways but still outlived the humans ultimately. 
But as modern technology has developed (siri, hospital A.I, online services) that we are gradually coming towards a realisation that our creations might surpass us/ our abilities and this is shown through recent movies such as Ex Machina and Her where the viewer is left having to acknowledge that the A.I has overpowered the humans and is left as both the protagonist and antagonist at the end of the film. The inclusion of the idea of consciousness will be something i will interlink into the essay, our humanisation of robots (and their appearance) over the years but also how they are always represented as slaves (c3po, A.I, I Robot) 


Address how to some extent robots are wish fulfilment for Humans, how we like the idea of being able to control something (possibly) immortal to carry on our ways. Talk about the enslavement of robots in movies and how in the digital age we are experimenting with various forms of A.I and how we are ironically slaves to the machine (POINT TO COME BACK TO). 

Talk about the mid way point briefly in the film (A.I) where the robots are aware of what they are made to do but not necessarily wanting to obey, then the next natural step would be a robot that doesn't want to obey those rules, talk about the IROBOT adaptation and use factual quotes about the red queen hypothesis and ask whether humans are starting to question our position in the world. 

Concluding 

The representation of A.I in science fiction is slowly manifesting itself into two representations that each related themselves to the current reality and society we are living in, These two representations are 
a conscious non physical form, something that is entirely possible within our lifetime (technically it is online now but has no control over anything as of yet) 
and a physical robot that wants to blend in with humans but be free of a human mindset. 

The physical robot is representative of our acceptance and celebration of a technological evolution within society and the inclusion of technology in our lives. The physical robot is used within science fiction to occasionally narrates the threat of becoming to self reliant on convenience and that if something has a conscious it should be treated as such. We often beat the physical robot in science fiction which creates hope for the human race and hope that robots are not the evolution of humans.

The conscious non physical A.I is representative of our own fear of the unknown, something we have created that we cannot control. It is used within science fiction to narrate and remind us to not to abuse technology and not to trust technology. We often struggle to beat the A.I in science fiction because it is hard (but not impossible) to stop something that isn't physically manifested (iRobot, Resident Evil, Skynet - terminator) and that controls our actions/lives/ other robots. This creates mistrust in the development of Robotics/A.I and alludes to A.I becoming the evolution of humanity. 

These two representations together create a balance in the science fiction world and a balanced response to modern technology. The one celebrates our advancements and reminds us we are in charge and the other shows the brilliance of A.I and reminds us that we shouldn't rely too heavily on something we cannot guarantee complete control over. 



In some regards yes, the next evolution for humans is expanding our life cycles whilst also finding a way to control the amount of pollution that a human emits over a life time. Some would argue that the natural progression of this would be to advance Artificial intelligence to a point where our memories could continue on in a robotic form. Presuming of course that A.I hasn't gotten to a point where it no longer needs us. This worry manifests itself in more recent films such as "her" and "ex machine" where robots that were designed to fit in amongst society to improve our lives become higher beings with intelligence to understand they will outlast the human life. 

In some regards no, Humans are still very much the apex predator and it would be unnatural to continue our evolution through use of mechanical beings. With all these science fiction films out there shows that people ARE aware of the consequences of enslaving anything with a mind. It might be fine to poke fun at siri from time to time but developing a more advanced A.I means that we rely more and more on something that we cannot see, and only believe we can control. Technology is in some ways unpredictable, as much as we try to control it and are under the impression we can there will always be "ghosts in the machine".