Nyataimori

My problem here is that you’ve failed to address my main concern with this movie. My main concern is, did they or did they not violate the entire point of Asimov’s 3 Laws, to wit, forcing the science fiction writer to come up with some other robot-based plot besides Oh My God, It’s Large-Scale Robot-Human War And It Doesn’t Look Good For The Humans. At least, that’s how I understand the point of the 3 Laws: Asimov’s self-imposed safeguard against repetitive stories based solely on the fear of something which is unknown because unknown is hard to trust.

I’m just concerned that this movie may be a repetitive story based solely on the fear of something which is unknown because unknown is hard to trust. If it is, they shouldn’t have bothered with the 3 Laws at all.

your ‘question’ confuses me. the plot is ‘oh my god, it’s a large scale robot human war…’ but then also it’s a fear of the unknown thing because will smith’s character is incredibly prejudiced (with a relatively stupid reasoning) against robots. but it’s not because they are unknown to him, it’s because he doesn’t trust logical rational reactions. he likes heart. i don’t think i really understand what you’re trying to say though. sooo…whatever.

and i never meant to imply that this movie was ‘good’, merely that it was enjoyable. i enjoy flouting robot movie laws though, so perhaps that’s a problem in my diagnosis. if a robot can do some insane bendy tuck roll flying leap things in bullet time, i’m going to applaud, and that’s all there is to it.

So here are Azmiov’s original 3 laws from 1940.

First Law:

A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
Second Law:

A robot must obey orders given it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
Third Law:

A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Through, Asimov’s short stories, the laws were tested and developed until 1985 when an additional law was added. The 0th law was added and the modified laws were stated as follows :

Zeroth Law:

A robot may not injure humanity, or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.
First Law:

A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm, unless this would violate the Zeroth Law of Robotics.
Second Law:

A robot must obey orders given it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the Zeroth or First Law.
Third Law:

A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the Zeroth, First, or Second Law.

I haven’t read any of Asimov’s shorts, so I’m speaking from a place of conjecture. I feel that this movie is neat because it shows how law 0 is a logical and intuitive extension of the 3 laws, however when implemented can be undesirable to the world as a whole, since humans favor freedom over the greater good of the planet. It basically shows how the concept of group evolution is total bunk and that individual evolution and genetic evolution are the only real ways (and only really the latter) to interpret actions taken by reproducing machines like humans. If group evolution were real, when humans were presented with a scenario where they might die, but it is for the good of the species, no human chooses death.

It also highlights the parallax between what we want to be and what we are. In the movie, humans design robots around human ideals. When those ideals are logically extended (by Viki) and are abutted with what humans viscerally and truly want (to live and have baby’s etc.) everything falls apart.

This point is glossed over somewhat in the movie, since it is probably something too subtle for a mainstream film. The robots turn red when they have an uplink to viki and are acting “evil”. They act randomly harsh and cold and violent. If they were going to make this film as an art film where Alex Proyas was just trying to get his point across (or Azimov’s point) I imagine that all of the robots would express articulately exactly what Viki’s motivations are. Those motivations are not evil at all. Viki is not a bad guy. Viki explains herself perfectly and makes it obvious that she is doing exactly what she’s been designed to do. And doing it perfectly.

The talk of “ghosts in the machine” and other stuff was offensive, but, hey whatdya gonna do.

I liked the movie. I think it coulda taken more risks and been even better, but then it would have been (i imagine) less accessible to a large audience, and I’m all for Alex Proyas getting some hollywood credit so he can do more stuff. I think he’s a talented artist.

Hey. Hey! There’s no call for putting people in quotation marks here!

Never mind; I withdraw the question. I wasn’t asking if it was good anyway, I was asking if it was in keeping with the point of the much-touted 3 Laws. It can be good and not be in keeping with them. It can be in keeping with them and still suck. I will find some other way to satisfy my curiosity about that point, however.

Oh. I think I’ll read Gene’s comment and pretend I didn’t just post that without seeing that he’d commented.

thank you gene. :) one question.

you said, “If group evolution were real, when humans were presented with a scenario where they might die, but it is for the good of the species, no human chooses death.”

‘that’ll do, pig’ guy (dr lanning in the film) kills himself in order to start that whole hansel and gretel (yoooo-hooooo) bread crumbs thing for spoons. he killed himself for the greater good. does that not count? (def this is a movie and perhaps no one in real life would do that. since if he has time to build a fucking robot with dreams under the watchful eye of viki, he could probably come up with a better way of contacting the outside world then committing suicide. but i am just curious if you can account for that kind of possibility of action.)

dianna: i was directing the question of whether i found it good or not to dr v, not you.

Dr. Lanning killed himself mainly to free HIMSELF from VIKI. He realized that his logic was flawed and created Sonny and informed Spooner (subtly) in order to save his OWN reputation. Every deed can trace back to selfish intentions.…