Ex Machina has to be my favorite science-fiction movie of recent times. It handles the subject of AI and Machine Learning in quite a sensible and sensitive way. The story begins with a software programmer who’s won a contest to go hang out with the CEO of his company for a week. Upon reaching what seems like a high-security black-ops location, he is told by the reclusive CEO, Nathan, about the real purpose of why he’s there. He is initially in awe of the CEO who’s created an AI that is quite advanced and human-like. In fact, the CEO has brought the programmer over for the purpose of what he initially reveals as conducting the Turing test. A Turing test that would have to be quite advanced in its own since the AI in question has quite a developed consciousness.
The movie has a few layers that are peeled quite well in the quintessential three acts of a movie narrative. There are three distinct character arcs, the one of the programmer, one of the CEO and the one of the AI. These are also the only three important characters in the movie with almost equal speaking parts. As the beginning of the story, we are led to believe that the CEO is evil, his AI creations are the victims the programmer is the potential savior.
The CEO is clearly a genius who wants to steal fire from the gods, and create an AI that is most honestly human in it’s consciousness; in it’s natural inclinations to enjoy it’s own beauty and that of the world around it, seeking love and protection, and ultimately freedom from any shackles. An AI that aspires to the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, if you may. And it’s the shackles that prove to be the CEO’s undoing. While he constantly challenges the programmer’s insecurity and use of formal deterministic methods for the task at hand, he himself seems deeply insecure about how he can control the intelligence of his AI’s. In fact, there is almost a patriarchal streak in his method. He has created only female AI’s, all with great care towards the female aesthetic, and even has a version that serves as his maid and lover and does not speak (back). The AI the programmer has been brought to experiment with seems to have a specific use case that the CEO wants to test. He reveals this only in the end.
The programmer is intelligent and is keen to figure out why he is there. He is torn between understanding the intentions of the CEO, who seems to be controlling every aspect of the experiment, and the AI, who seems to be working hard to gain his trust and confounding the task of testing her. He becomes increasingly distrustful of the CEO and overly trusting of the AI, who he begins to develop feelings for. He also finds out about the other failed AIs and the maid and realizes he has not been told the complete truth about the experiment. He plans to rescue the AI and lock the CEO in his own prison. But things do not go as planned.
The AI can be considered the main protagonist of the story although she is mostly behind a glass wall. We know as much about her as does the programmer and as is revealed by the CEO progressively. She comes across as pensive and unhappy at first but hopeful upon meeting the programmer. It’s hard to distinguish her as an AI except for the electronic sounds that she makes when she moves (a clever device by the film-makers). The conversations between her and the programmer are initially about friendship but progress towards love. Not very different from a bar conversation except without the flippancy (since the setting is an experiment) and with a glass barrier preventing any physical exchange of emotions. Very similar perhaps to a modern day web chat conversation in which you sometimes cannot determine whether you’re talking to a human or a bot. The AI seems truly desirous of the human qualities of love and admiring beauty. She also dwells on the subject of good and evil and tries to create a frame of reference for herself with the programmer being good and the CEO being evil. She seems to want to break out of the shackles the CEO has created and be with the programmer. She colludes with him to escape the facility. Little do both of them know that the CEO is aware of their plans. And programmer is not aware of her true intentions.
And then it’s revealed that the CEO wanted to study exactly that. An AI’s ability to utilize the emotions of friendship and love to escape her circumstances and ultimately become sentient and self-sufficient. The programmer realizes he had been unwittingly baited merely for his online profile (single, lonely male with no family and a love for programming) and not to collaborate with the CEO on his AI projects. We see now that the CEO does not really have an evil side but is as afraid as anybody to open the Pandora’s Box but wants to push the envelope as geniuses do. But as a result of the multiple dimensions of the experiment, things do not go as planned for anyone but the AI. The AI escapes with the programmers help but in a Frankensteinian turn ends up killing her creator and locking in the programmer (understandably to avoid another having another captor) to go out to the world she’s been waiting to explore. Not as a monster but as a sentient creature dressed as a human. The movie’s ending leaves us to imagine what the possibilities might be. I must admit, I want her to become the CEO of the company and mass create AI’s to rule the world. Despite the negative aspects of the film, I found it to be a really sensitive handling of the subject. People are quick to either be in awe of AI or be afraid of it. And we have geniuses working in the field of AI pushing the boundaries of what is possible. So the movie is a reflection of the current state of affairs with AI. I am hopeful and the movie was that AI’s can be a force for good and a reflection of the good attributes of humankind, of kindness, empathy and unconditional love. Let us not be afraid and embrace a future where technology will help us be more human than we are now.
The movie has a few layers that are peeled quite well in the quintessential three acts of a movie narrative. There are three distinct character arcs, the one of the programmer, one of the CEO and the one of the AI. These are also the only three important characters in the movie with almost equal speaking parts. As the beginning of the story, we are led to believe that the CEO is evil, his AI creations are the victims the programmer is the potential savior.
The CEO is clearly a genius who wants to steal fire from the gods, and create an AI that is most honestly human in it’s consciousness; in it’s natural inclinations to enjoy it’s own beauty and that of the world around it, seeking love and protection, and ultimately freedom from any shackles. An AI that aspires to the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, if you may. And it’s the shackles that prove to be the CEO’s undoing. While he constantly challenges the programmer’s insecurity and use of formal deterministic methods for the task at hand, he himself seems deeply insecure about how he can control the intelligence of his AI’s. In fact, there is almost a patriarchal streak in his method. He has created only female AI’s, all with great care towards the female aesthetic, and even has a version that serves as his maid and lover and does not speak (back). The AI the programmer has been brought to experiment with seems to have a specific use case that the CEO wants to test. He reveals this only in the end.
The programmer is intelligent and is keen to figure out why he is there. He is torn between understanding the intentions of the CEO, who seems to be controlling every aspect of the experiment, and the AI, who seems to be working hard to gain his trust and confounding the task of testing her. He becomes increasingly distrustful of the CEO and overly trusting of the AI, who he begins to develop feelings for. He also finds out about the other failed AIs and the maid and realizes he has not been told the complete truth about the experiment. He plans to rescue the AI and lock the CEO in his own prison. But things do not go as planned.
The AI can be considered the main protagonist of the story although she is mostly behind a glass wall. We know as much about her as does the programmer and as is revealed by the CEO progressively. She comes across as pensive and unhappy at first but hopeful upon meeting the programmer. It’s hard to distinguish her as an AI except for the electronic sounds that she makes when she moves (a clever device by the film-makers). The conversations between her and the programmer are initially about friendship but progress towards love. Not very different from a bar conversation except without the flippancy (since the setting is an experiment) and with a glass barrier preventing any physical exchange of emotions. Very similar perhaps to a modern day web chat conversation in which you sometimes cannot determine whether you’re talking to a human or a bot. The AI seems truly desirous of the human qualities of love and admiring beauty. She also dwells on the subject of good and evil and tries to create a frame of reference for herself with the programmer being good and the CEO being evil. She seems to want to break out of the shackles the CEO has created and be with the programmer. She colludes with him to escape the facility. Little do both of them know that the CEO is aware of their plans. And programmer is not aware of her true intentions.
And then it’s revealed that the CEO wanted to study exactly that. An AI’s ability to utilize the emotions of friendship and love to escape her circumstances and ultimately become sentient and self-sufficient. The programmer realizes he had been unwittingly baited merely for his online profile (single, lonely male with no family and a love for programming) and not to collaborate with the CEO on his AI projects. We see now that the CEO does not really have an evil side but is as afraid as anybody to open the Pandora’s Box but wants to push the envelope as geniuses do. But as a result of the multiple dimensions of the experiment, things do not go as planned for anyone but the AI. The AI escapes with the programmers help but in a Frankensteinian turn ends up killing her creator and locking in the programmer (understandably to avoid another having another captor) to go out to the world she’s been waiting to explore. Not as a monster but as a sentient creature dressed as a human. The movie’s ending leaves us to imagine what the possibilities might be. I must admit, I want her to become the CEO of the company and mass create AI’s to rule the world. Despite the negative aspects of the film, I found it to be a really sensitive handling of the subject. People are quick to either be in awe of AI or be afraid of it. And we have geniuses working in the field of AI pushing the boundaries of what is possible. So the movie is a reflection of the current state of affairs with AI. I am hopeful and the movie was that AI’s can be a force for good and a reflection of the good attributes of humankind, of kindness, empathy and unconditional love. Let us not be afraid and embrace a future where technology will help us be more human than we are now.
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