2001: A Space Odyssey

"This science fiction classic, exploring advanced AI and humanity's future, fits Lex Fridman's interest in the philosophical implications of artificial intelligence and space exploration."

"I’ll have to be careful not to spoil it. Basically, it’s about a space mission and a computer that goes bad. The book looks at humanity’s future, but it starts off right at the dawn of humanity. That’s one of the things I really like about it because, as we’ve seen in all these other books, developments in AI are now prompting us to ask questions about who we are as humans and where we’ve come from. One of the dangers from some of the current discussions about AI and ethics is that it would be easy to think that we can just look at where we are now. It’s too easy to think that we’re in a very good position and have made a lot of progress, so let’s just progress a bit further. What we need to do is to keep in view a long historical sweep about where we’ve come from and who we are as humans. 2001 starts off in the cradle of humanity in Africa, with a group of early humans including one named Moon Watcher. The events of the book span that historical dawn of humanity to what’s happening to the characters in the book in the current day. I think we do need to have some sense of what we’re doing with AI and technology and what significance it has for the whole of humanity, not just to focus on the small issues that arise with specific uses of it. In the novel, the spaceship’s computer HAL 9000 ‘goes bad’. The way in which the story unfolds is a really powerful way of raising all the issues that are being talked about now in relation to AI. I find the book, especially by being set in space, produces a striking depiction of the central ethical questions about our relationship with AI. “Arthur C Clarke raises all the issues that are being talked about now in relation to AI” The astronaut David Bowman ends up being alive on his own in a spacecraft with a two-hour delay in radio signals back to earth, with a computer that’s not on his side. One of the things that just about everybody I know working in AI in ethics at the moment is talking about is that we need to retain ultimate human control of AI. The book raises exactly that issue. So, David Bowman has to try and turn the computer off and has to go through some sneaky steps to try and do that. He has to really grapple with the question of whether he should be doing this, because the computer is arguing back with him as it gradually loses power. Bowman has to make all these decisions entirely on his own. So, the notion of a spacecraft out in space, with the astronaut having to go outside the craft to mend things, is, as many people have commented, an analogy for a foetus with an umbilical cord attached to the mothership. For me, it focuses all these questions about who are we as humans and the idea that we might be tethered somehow to this ship that is shutting down, completely in the hands of AI, going off into this uncertain future. Clarke doesn’t go into much detail about these questions but the novel raises them all. For example, for training, the astronauts have to go through a period of hibernation and they are woken up by a computer. There you are, completely and utterly dependent on a computer. What would that be like? What would that mean? It’s really scary. Yes, you’re quite right. That’s why I’ve recommended these books as a whole because they provide a balanced overview. I might also say that I’m really terrible at watching frightening films. So, other people might not be quite so scared by this scenario as me. But also, remember, that we’re already handing a lot over to machines, perhaps more than we have bargained for. Well, I’m fairly worried that we’re already doing things to ourselves that are problematic. There are many indications that how people are using technology is changing how children develop and even changing how our brains develop. It sounds very judgemental, but one thing that I increasingly notice is parents walking along with their children in a pushchair and the adults are just on their smart phones. They should be interacting with their children. If this is a widespread phenomenon, it’s going to have an impact on child development. “There are many indications that how people are using technology is changing how children develop” Somebody told me at the weekend about going to a zoo and seeing a two year old child seeing a lion behind glass and the two year old child in the buggy went up to the glass with its finger and tried to swipe left. It is frightening that the kid thinks it’s something on a screen that you could just get rid of, when it’s an actual real lion. I’m not completely sure if this story is true or not, but it could well be and it illustrates the issues. Those are things that we really need to talk about and that just shouldn’t be left in the hands of a few techy people. These are things that everybody should be having conversations about. Yes. That’s why I picked some of these books: so that people who maybe didn’t really know much about this or are not tech experts can read them and get a quite a good understanding of what’s going on and join in the conversation. One of the things I strongly feel is that in a sense it’s not simply about ethics. It’s not simply about developing a professional code of ethics and that will sort this all out. We need to ask these basic questions about how we should live and why we want to do things in the world. Going back to the point I made at the beginning of the interview, why would you want to have music written and played by a robot? You don’t want that; you want to go into your garage or wherever and play it yourself. Yes, you might do that, but that’s a question we need to ask. When I listen to Radio 3, it’s not just playing the music but a lot of it is talking about the composers’ lives. That’s part and parcel of why we find it interesting. I was listening to the St Matthew Passion on YouTube while I was working this morning and somebody had written a comment mentioning a merchant who was in business in Leipzig in 1727 who had stumbled into a church and found Bach conducting the choir and orchestra and felt himself in heaven. That is an aspect of why we find it all interesting. So, it may be that we’re going to go down the route of preferring AI compositions and creations, but maybe not. It’s certainly something that we need to be thinking about."