Interstellar and Our Future with the Robots
The challenge of AI means we must be willing to look beyond ourselves
People are scared of AI. In the US 41% of people expect that new advancements, like OpenAI’s GPT models, will bring more harm than good to society while only 9% believe it will bring more good. A full 55% now believe that AI could one day post a risk to humanity’s existence.
These fears were crystallised in a paper put out this week, signed by Elon Musk, Steve Wozniak, and Yuval Noah Harari amongst many others, that recommended a 6 month moratorium on the development of more advanced ML models. This recommendations included a call to enforce such a moratorium by government coercion if the major players like Microsoft and Google did not willingly comply.
This new technology is scary. Similar perhaps to the theory of evolution in its day the capabilities of these new AI models bring into question many of the assumptions that we have about what it means to be human. They also have the added dimension that when applied they really could supplant or threaten to destabilise many aspects of our day-to-day life rather than simply harming our self-image.
We are scared of the AI because we fear that it will be more intelligent than us. If it is then it will replace our jobs and who-knows-what-else about the other things that today constitute our lives. If all this is replaced then what role do we have to play in the future? Luckily, there are alternative visions of a future with AI.
Interstellar is one of my favourite movies. It touches on themes of humanity, love, and transcendence1 all in a well edited, powerfully scored, painstakingly crafted, beautifully shot package.
One of the films side themes is the interplay between the robots Tars and Case and the humans2. There are perhaps 15 minutes of dialogue in the whole film where the robots take part yet these clips are a window into what a positive relationship between humans and their AI companions could look like. We see both that these AIs can be unbelievably useful but also that they form real relationships. When the the robot Tars shows up for the first time our protagonist, Cooper, is afraid that his 'brain’ has been fried. By the end of the film, after much love and loss, he carefully rebuilds Tars by hand.
One clip in particular sticks with me because it implies something about what humans bring to this relationship.
Cooper and Brand’s primary spaceship has been damaged while they look on from a landing vehicle. The ship starts to spin out of control and it seems like all hope of completing their mission has vanished. Then Cooper starts to move the lander towards the ship.
Case (AI): Cooper there’s no point using your fuel
Cooper: Analyse the Endurance’s spin…
Case: Endurance rotation is 67-68 RPM
Cooper: Ok get ready to match our spin with the retro thrusters
Case: It’s not possible
Cooper: No, it’s necessary
Perhaps through statistical interpolation an AI system can come up with a world model that ‘beats’ a human’s every time. Certainly in the world of Interstellar it seems obvious that an AI would be the right agent to try docking with the ship when the forces concerned are more than a human body or brain can bear. Yet, in the same situation it is only a human would be able to break that same world model against all possible odds when it is necessary to do so.
This ability to step beyond the bounds of what is known is a recurrent theme of the human story yet it is not something that comes naturally to most of us. If we can get beyond the bounds of our worldviews it is always because there is an other that comes from outside our model that breaks through to use. This other might be a family, a community or a God. No matter, the case it is this other that pulls us into the new world. Unfortunately though our default perspective is one that is self-absorbed3 and stagnant. Increasingly it seems we have less and less that we value to help us fight back against this default4.
Let us not lose sight the thing that makes us human. If we are willing to step out beyond ourselves, to live for others, then maybe we will be able to see a path past our fear of AI. In all likelihood our robots will thank us for it.
Mood
As the linked article the ending of the film is poetic but the ending leaves something to be desired. The film searches for a source of transcendence but its final solution is not quite enough to break us out of our immanent frame.
Alongside the depiction of AI in Her it may be one of the best visions for how we could build a beautiful future with our AIs together. If we are going to take the plunge, then it’s something to strive for.
‘There is no experience you've had that you were not at the absolute center of’ from This Is Water which has been on my mind since I referenced it in my last essay.