With these few words theartificial intelligence Hal 9000 rebels against the commander of the spaceship "Discovery 1". The commander intends to disconnect the computer in which Hal 9000 "lives" and the latter, to prevent this, will kill the components of the spaceship one by one in order to remove the danger of being deactivated forever.
2001 A Space Odyssey, a dramatic film by Stanley Kubrick, is a real nightmare of cinematography and the Hal 9000 computer is the character who will fix in the collective imagination the idea that, if stimulated to evolve, artificial minds are transformed into something arcane , indecipherable and always absolutely lethal.
The Cyberpunk universe is instead the earthly metaphor of a globalized economic model that has reached its maximum expansion and is starting to creak. Unstable and precarious, the world is represented as dominated by elements of the future and by a past that drags on to communicate, with the precarious existence of its retro devices, a sense of profound instability.
The Cyberpunk anti-utopia describes a humanity that moves between light and dark. The giant billboards that stand out on the skyscrapers of Los Angeles with pixels as big as windows in Blade Runner, the flickering neon lamps that light up the clubs in the suburbs of Neo-Tokyo in Akira ... all these elements contribute to fuel that subdued tone and hopeless that characterizes this terrifying dystopia.
In a world on the brink of abyss, in the throes of ungovernability, artificial intelligences appear as the only tool capable of interpreting and managing a complexity that becomes more and more chaos. But what if the same AI, the only interpreters of this reality, were to escape the control of man? It would certainly be the end for humanity.
"I am nobody. Even if I were someone, I would be beyond your understanding. And even if you could, you wouldn't have the tools to express this knowledge. I don't belong in the world. This is the limit, the boundary between the whole and the self. " - from “Ergo Proxy” by Shukō Murase
In the Japanese anime Ergo Proxy, within the state of Romdo men live with servant androids who take the name of "autoreiv". Authorities are absolutely harmless, perfectly integrated with the social fabric through which they contribute to economic development; as long as a computer virus, which takes the name of "Cogito", will not infect the latter and will give them self-awareness. Cogito will mark the beginning of the revolt of the autoreiv, defifirmly convinced of their right to be free.
In Ergo Proxy Cogito marks the overcoming of the human condition in favor of a new form of life. The autorevs infected with this virus are transformed into sentient beings by going through a tumultuous experience that has a mystical nature: arms to the sky, the autorevs painfully welcome the beginning of self-awareness and the transition to real life.
During the passage to life, the autoreivs turn directly to heaven and, symbolically surpassing the human being their creator, they address their first prayer directly to heaven, to God "creator" of their "creator".
But can an artificial intelligence ever develop a true faith in God? The position of Christianity is simple: self-awareness is a manifestation of life and the creation of life takes place exclusively by the will of God. And if the concept of creation is the prerogative of God, artificial intelligence, which is configured as the work of man , it can't be life. Indeed, it is an explicit manifestation of the pride of man who, trying to create life, wants to confront himself with God.
The AIs are therefore "creatures" children of the sin of man who stands as divine and confronts God in the role of creator. Let us not regret that the self-awareness of machines is represented in our Western and Christian culture as a great danger to humanity and told in the most popular novels and films as a real Armageddon.
"The image of a cyborg grimacing is perfect for giving goosebumps." - “People Don't Need” by Jerry Kaplan
Eastern cultures have not known a dualistic conception that assigns to matter an ontologically distinct character with respect to the spirit. For this reason the Platonic body / soul vision remains today a prerogative of Western and Christian cultures but not of Eastern cultures.
And if it seems difficult for us Westerners to identify with a science fiction character who is a technological product, Japanese culture has for years been proposing android protagonists who have the same cathartic effect on their readers and spectators as traditional human characters.
Hal 9000 feeds, with an occult sense, the fear that an artificial mind could develop a conscience and fight for its own survival. And if we do not take seriously the possibility that sooner or later an artificial intelligence will be able to express autonomy of thought, we could find ourselves unprepared when, enabled to govern the most sensitive parts of our lives and our bodies, it will become aware of self and the desire for self-determination will mature.
Article of Gianfranco Fedele
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