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Theresa
Lux Mihi Deus
Joined: 17 Jun 2001
Posts: 27256
Location: United States of America
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 Thu Aug 12, 2004 10:16 pm I, Robot |
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The book is fantastic,  Has anyone seen the movie? Is Will Smith's character a cop, or a reporter? (saw a badge, am thinking cop).
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Founder
Dominion Leader
Joined: 21 Jun 2004
Posts: 12755
Location: Gamma Quadrant
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 10:18 pm |
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He is a cop.
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 10:22 pm |
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I saw the movie. I am particularly distraught by the "Suggested by Isaac Asimov's novel". I haven't read the book itself, but movies that take the same name and then say "Suggested by" don't meant to stick to the plot.
Still, the movie itself is pretty good. A little heavy on the CGI, and unfortunately it doesn't make me feel like I'm too far into the future. But it has enough action to keep one awake, and the story itself is okay. Unfortunately, any humour intentionally attempted by Will Smith comes out forced. Luckily there's enough natural humour to move the story along.
I'd recommend it if you're going out to the theatres, but it is not something that I would make a special trip out to see.
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Theresa
Lux Mihi Deus
Joined: 17 Jun 2001
Posts: 27256
Location: United States of America
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 10:33 pm |
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In the book, the robots aren't so bad. But what I've seen from the clips of the movie, they aren't the most pleasant folk. There is no cop in the book, only a reporter, and the lady in charge of US Robots is very old, and being interviewed. It's set in the 1990's-2000 era.
The stupidity of mankind in the book is scary.
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Some of us fall by the wayside
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:04 pm |
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Well, the movie is set in the future, in Chicago. The only notable old lady is Spooner (Will Smith's) grandmother, who we occasionally see Smith go to in order to pass the time, and at the beginning establish some of his character background.
Also, the creator of the robots, who eventually commits suicide, Dr. Alfred Lanning, is played by James Cromwell. Cromwell played Zefram Cochrane in Star Trek: First Contact.
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Founder
Dominion Leader
Joined: 21 Jun 2004
Posts: 12755
Location: Gamma Quadrant
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:05 pm |
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I can't even remember why he commited suicide.
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:11 pm |
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| Founder wrote: | | I can't even remember why he commited suicide. |
SPOILER BELOW
| Quote: | | We find out at the very end of the movie that it was the only way he could get a message to Spooner, because the criminal mastermind behind the robot revolution (the VICKI computer) was keeping him isolated. But committing suicide in a public way would necessitate a police investigation, and Spooner, a police officer, had a particular dislike and suspicion of robots, so he would be put on the case and follow the clues laid out beforehand by Lanning. |
[Mod Edit] Just highlight the text if you want to see the spoiler.
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Theresa
Lux Mihi Deus
Joined: 17 Jun 2001
Posts: 27256
Location: United States of America
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:11 pm |
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Lanning is in the book. The main character is the robopsychiatrist.
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Some of us fall by the wayside
And some of us soar to the stars
And some of us sail through our troubles
And some have to live with our scars
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:12 pm |
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| Theresa wrote: | | Lanning is in the book. The main character is the robopsychiatrist. |
Well, there is a woman who works closely with Spooner in the movie who is the psychiatrist at the company. She initially doubts that any robots could disobey the three laws of robotics, but must accept the proof eventually and aid Spooner and Sonny, a robot who can choose not to obey the three laws, a robot created by Dr. Lanning.
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Founder
Dominion Leader
Joined: 21 Jun 2004
Posts: 12755
Location: Gamma Quadrant
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:13 pm |
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| Hitchhiker wrote: | | Founder wrote: | | I can't even remember why he commited suicide. |
SPOILER BELOW
We find out at the very end of the movie that it was the only way he could get a message to Spooner, because the criminal mastermind behind the robot revolution (the VICKI computer) was keeping him isolated. But committing suicide in a public way would necessitate a police investigation, and Spooner, a police officer, had a particular dislike and suspicion of robots, so he would be put on the case and follow the clues laid out beforehand by Lanning. |
Now I remember. Thanks for reminding me.
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Gondor Girl
Princess of Ithilien
Joined: 27 Sep 2003
Posts: 3966
Location: Henneth Anun, Ithilien
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:35 pm |
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Ahhh.. man that was a great movie. One of the best parts of it was imagining having technology that near in the future. It's unlikely, but it's still nice to imagine. And did anyone else think that parking lot was awesome? Talk about finding a parking space instantly.
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:40 pm |
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| Gondor Girl wrote: | | Ahhh.. man that was a great movie. One of the best parts of it was imagining having technology that near in the future. It's unlikely, but it's still nice to imagine. And did anyone else think that parking lot was awesome? Talk about finding a parking space instantly. |
I preferred the parking lot in that episode of Dilbert where they all go to the mall. Dilbert tries a hi-tech way of finding a parking space, but keeps on passing empty ones which are subsequently filled. He ends up parking them in an elevator full of people.
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Gondor Girl
Princess of Ithilien
Joined: 27 Sep 2003
Posts: 3966
Location: Henneth Anun, Ithilien
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| Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:56 pm |
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lol. I don't really watch Dilbert. What was the high tech way of parking Dilbert was attempting to do?
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Gondor! Gondor, between the mountains and the sea
West wind blew there; the light upon the Silver Tree
Fell like bright rain in the gardens of the Kings of old
O proud walls! White towers! O winged crown and throne of gold...
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Sevenofninenz
Commodore
Joined: 02 Jul 2004
Posts: 2441
Location: New Zealand Penal Colony
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| Fri Aug 13, 2004 3:38 am |
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Aparently the movie is nothing like the book.
Is it true Will Smith is naked in this movie???
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Fri Aug 13, 2004 11:04 am |
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| Sevenofninenz wrote: | Aparently the movie is nothing like the book.
Is it true Will Smith is naked in this movie??? |
The movie seems very deviant, yes.
Not explicitly, but very nearly.
And the hi-tech Dilbert parking method was some sort of visor he wore which would create a wireframe model of the parking lot and identify empty parking spaces . . . needless to say, it didn't work.
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Oliver
Thought Maker
Joined: 28 Feb 2004
Posts: 6096
Location: Antwerp, Belgium
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| Fri Aug 13, 2004 1:35 pm |
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| Sevenofninenz wrote: | Aparently the movie is nothing like the book.
Is it true Will Smith is naked in this movie??? |
There are two versions of I, Robot. One for the US audience and the other for the rest.
The US audience get to see Will Smith taking a shower and you don't see anything. In the non-US version, which I saw a few days ago, you get to see Will Smith taking a shower and you see something (if you get what I mean).
The makers had to digitally edit that part out and that's partly what made the movie so very expensive.
Those robots were indeed very cool. I remember when I took robotics classes a few years ago, my professor kept saying: "First try to make a robot walk like a human, then do the rest..." In the movie, we get to see the robots do very human-like movements and even run. Very cool.
As for the AI part, I don't believe we can get robots with artificial intelligence within the next 50 years; at least not at that level. Our computers are getting better and faster, true, but AI remains a large leap...
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Sevenofninenz
Commodore
Joined: 02 Jul 2004
Posts: 2441
Location: New Zealand Penal Colony
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| Fri Aug 13, 2004 5:13 pm |
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YAY - I don't live in The US!!!!
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Founder
Dominion Leader
Joined: 21 Jun 2004
Posts: 12755
Location: Gamma Quadrant
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| Fri Aug 13, 2004 6:02 pm |
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| Quote: | | As for the AI part, I don't believe we can get robots with artificial intelligence within the next 50 years; at least not at that level. Our computers are getting better and faster, true, but AI remains a large leap... |
Not exactly. It isn't as far away as you think.
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Sat Aug 14, 2004 12:31 am |
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| Founder wrote: | | Quote: | | As for the AI part, I don't believe we can get robots with artificial intelligence within the next 50 years; at least not at that level. Our computers are getting better and faster, true, but AI remains a large leap... |
Not exactly. It isn't as far away as you think. |
Indeed. We already have AI, just at a rudimentary level. Remember that we built a computer to play chess, and it won!
The problem with robots is actually more on the physical side, relating mostly to mobility. The robots we have now are slow and clumsy, because unlike humans where walking is a learned and automatic behaviour, robots use their rudimentary AI to carefully calculate each step. Ironically . . . the more advanced the AI, the longer it takes to calculate, just like with humans. Children will just walk to their destination. Some adults will quickly decide which route is quicker, which one is less frequently travelled, et cetera.
So we need robots that learn behaviours just like humans, and then we will have made a true advance in AI. Already robots can emulate human behaviours that they pick up from humans around them . . . but this emulation is very simplistic and obvious.
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Oliver
Thought Maker
Joined: 28 Feb 2004
Posts: 6096
Location: Antwerp, Belgium
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| Sat Aug 14, 2004 1:23 am |
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| Hitchhiker wrote: | | Indeed. We already have AI, just at a rudimentary level. Remember that we built a computer to play chess, and it won! |
But do you remember how it won? I believe the program was called Deep Blue, well, it calculated ever possible outcome and just took the best route to victory. That's not AI working, it's plain logic.
Computers are very logical but artificial intelligence at the level that humans have it is still far away. Do we have computers that can think by themselves? Computers that can make a moral decision? Right now we're not even close. We don't even have a perfect spellings and/or grammar checker on our computers. It can take out words it doesn't know but how about names? If a text with names is read by humans, we automatically know that it's a name. Computers don't know that. Checking grammar still isn't working well.
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Sat Aug 14, 2004 2:07 am |
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Yeah, okay, the chess thing was a bad example.
One of the reasons that we can't build AI is because we don't know how intelligence works in the first place. The brain is the most complicated part of our body, and we still haven't unravelled its mysteries.
Plus, everyone wants AI that can be developed and ready to go. The point of AI is that you would start off with a simplistic, child-like robot--a stupid one. And by watching human behaviour and emulating it, it would start to develop on its own. Obviously this process would be too slow to benefit everyone commercially--so not only do scientists have to figure out how to build AI, they have to make it commercially viable. Just like nuclear fusion--if we really wanted to, we could use it, but it would be prohibitively expensive.
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Founder
Dominion Leader
Joined: 21 Jun 2004
Posts: 12755
Location: Gamma Quadrant
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| Sat Aug 14, 2004 2:20 am |
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I don't think we should build robots. After Matrix, I,Robot, Terminator, and many many more Im hella paranoid. They will rise up. See what you just said Hitchhiker is the reason they do. We shouldn't give robots intelligence. Because then they will want to grow and be more. We won't let it happen and then they kill us. 
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lionhead
Rear Admiral
Joined: 26 May 2004
Posts: 4020
Location: The Delta Quadrant (or not...)
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| Sat Aug 14, 2004 2:34 am |
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I do think we should build robots. I would love a good fight. Finally an enemy we can all identify and kill without feeling the loss of a life. All humans uniting for their right too live. If we would fight robots i'm right on the front line, lets kick some metal ass! But i rather fight the 'I Robot' robots that the ones from terminator or the matrix.....They already killed most of the human race ya know.
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Never explain comedy or satire or the ironic comment. Those who get it, get it. Those who don't, never will. -Michael Moore
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Founder
Dominion Leader
Joined: 21 Jun 2004
Posts: 12755
Location: Gamma Quadrant
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| Sat Aug 14, 2004 2:39 am |
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Dude? you're kidding right? It may seem like "fun" to fight in a robot/human war but we would get our asses handed to us. For some reason we always seem to build them with super strength.....
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lionhead
Rear Admiral
Joined: 26 May 2004
Posts: 4020
Location: The Delta Quadrant (or not...)
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| Sun Aug 15, 2004 3:27 am |
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No, i'm dead seious or do you want this theater that is oging or right now too continue? You cna choose, fighting you're own and never stop doing it or fight a common enemy for the whole human race and have a chance of survival.
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Never explain comedy or satire or the ironic comment. Those who get it, get it. Those who don't, never will. -Michael Moore
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