Thursday, February 23, 2023

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This could easily be a student essay I read and graded over and over again over 20 years.

It’s that full of vague and glittering generalities and tendentious bullshit. The essay natters on but actually says nothing. It strings words together in the proper order but clearly doesn’t know what they mean (and doesn’t care). The ideas presented are not supported by any explanation, nor are they examined. The HAL-9000 is “sentient”? What does that mean? It kills the crew in order to save the mission? How does that work? By what reasoning does the fictional computer make this determination?

Mind you, answering those questions requires an analysis and evaluation of the plot of the entire movie. There’s a plausible argument that Kubrick just needed something to happen and in Act 3 to propel the plot forward to Act 4. There are other plausible arguments for why HAL turns suicidal, including that the computer just can’t cope with the mission that is finally explained to the audience (but which HAL knew) as Dave removes HAL’s higher functions (essentially his AI). Which raises questions as to what the story is telling us about computer functions that, 22 years after “2001,” we have yet to achieve (and what does that tell us about 1968?).

In other words, there is analysis, which essays are supposed to provide, and there’s weak attempts at baffling ‘em with bullshit. And I don’t see the value of a computer doing that; human beings are already quite proficient at trying to fool others.
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