ALL SCI-FI

[Pow]

Some humans are exactly like Colossus regarding a total lack of compassion and empathy.

[Krel]

[Bud Brewster]

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Gentlemen, none of us really thinks that mankind is ever going to be as dumb as Klaatu's interstellar civilization and give machines "absolute power over us". As intelligent people, we're just disappointed and unhappy about the poor job mankind is doing when it comes avoiding wars, addressing climate change, establishing free and democratic governments, etc.

What I'm sure we all agree on is that we need to mature as a species and learn how to solve these problems ourselves.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Bud Brewster]

___________Colossus The Forbin Project Ending


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IMDB has a interesting trivia item for this production.
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~ In the movie, one of the attempts by the humans to regain control of Colossus is to try to overload the machine by feeding it too much data. This sequence is not in the original D.F. Jones novel "Colossus", on which the movie is based; however, it is a major plot point in the novel's sequel, "The Fall of Colossus", which was published in 1977

Note from me: Wikipedia has summaries of both the first and second sequels. When I read them I was appalled by the way the author, D.F. Jones, includes so many bad ideas and bogus science!

The two sequels describe and invasion from . . . (are you ready for this?) . . . Mars! They come in two giant ships to steal Earths oxygen! (Shades of Spaceballs, right?

Mars needs the oxygen because radiation from the Crab Nebula will destroy Mars unless its atmosphere has more oxygen. (Wait . . . what? )

My first thought was, "But Mars can't hold a more dense atmosphere than it already has because of it's weak gravity. And it doesn't have a magnetic field that shields it from the sun's radiation — much less any radiation from the Crab Nebula, 6,523 light years from Earth!"

In the climax of the second sequel, Colossus reaches an agreement with the Martians. A smaller version of the Oxygen Collector will extract the oxygen more gradually and sustainably. In return, humanity, with the guidance of Colossus, will retreat to Mars once the Sun becomes a red giant and destroys the Earth.

Good lord, what a hot mess these two books are!
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Pow]

The film is based on British science fiction author D. F. Jones' 1966 novel "Colossus."

Jones wrote the sequel novels "The Fall of Colossus" in 1974, and "Colossus and the Crab" in 1977.

The movie was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation.

The legendary Albert Whitlock created the impressive matte painting for the interior scene of Colossus.

The Colossus operations center and the White House incident room sets were both constructed next to one another on the huge Universal Studio sound stage #12.

This was one of the first times that a scene was shot simultaneously across two large sets.

Charlton Heston and Gregory peck were considered for the role of Dr. Forbin.

A young filmmaker named Steven Spielberg visited the set.

[Bud Brewster]

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I'm disappointed that nobody on All Sci-Fi has commented on the moronic concepts that D.F. Jones inflicted on his readers with those two horrible sequels to Colossus.

I feel certain that on my worst day I could come up better concepts than he did.

Just off the top of my head (and with no previous planning for this post) here's a few thoughts on the subject.
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First of all, the most obvious (and least original) idea would be for mankind to find a way to defeat Colossus. So, let's not do that.

The second most obvious idea would be for mankind to try to defeat Colossus . . . and then have the A.I. whip us again. That was done in the first movie, and doing it again is shamelessly unimaginative.

The third most obvious idea would be for mankind to reach a compromise with Colossus and make it look like things were going to turn out all rosy and sweet . . . but then Colossus tricks us and we end up right back where we started. That, too, would be a hackneyed idea.

This fourth idea is a bit better; mankind is faced with a threat from an alien race, and Colossus realizes that it needs to cooperate with mankind to beat this new menace, because these aliens don't think like either mankind or A.I. systems!

Okay, so we use that fourth idea — but we take it one step farther to give it the plot twist a good story needs.

Working together, mankind and Colossus devise a plan to defeat the aliens. But at a crucial moment, mankind discovers that the aliens have hacked into Colossus and turned it into traitor to the human race!

Things look black for humanity . . . until the humans find a way to defeat both the aliens and the corrupted A.I. system, destroying both and leaving mankind free to control his own destiny!
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Boy, am I good at this shit or what!
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Pow]

You are indeed great at this s#*t, Bruce!

Yeah, Jones ideas for his sequels sound pretty lame. I've seen Saturday morning cartoons with sounder plot lines.

Some ideas about a sequel.

What if the invading aliens (please, oh please, not Martians) are totally convinced that they have successfully hacked Colossus. What if they're quite correct.

But how about Guardian? What if Guardian & Colossus in their infinite wisdom and long range planning anticipated that humankind might attempt to create a covert manner to hack 'em?

In anticipation of that, they've created a way to avoid the hack. Something goes awry and the system to deflect hacking only takes on Guardian but not Colossus.

This highly sophisticated anti-hack program can also work against the invaders.

Now, Guardian must fool not only the aliens, but Colossus as well, and find a way to communicate all this to the humans so that they can mount a battle against both Colossus and the invaders.

By the way, since Colossus is the first ultimate computer we encounter in the original movie, we can simply alter my idea to be Guardian is compromised by the aliens but Colossus is not.

Another thought is that Colossus/Guardian have, while they're running things on earth, created a "Fantastic Voyage" miniaturization process that works on inanimate materials.

The humans covertly shrink a team of scientists, engineers, and military special forces, to penetrate the compromised computers in order to free 'em from the alien influence.

It's a big gamble because humans have never been been subjected to this reducing process before and cannot be sure of the outcome. But they're desperate.

[Bud Brewster]

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Here's a few thoughts about a Colussus sequel.
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Colossus / Guardian controls the world and has done so for 20 year.

Mankind is largely subjugated by the supercomputer — but a resistance still exist. However, C/G has learned that the creative abilities of mankind are superior to its own in some ways, and it wants to learn how to emulate mankind more completely.

With that in mind, C/G has allowed (and even encouraged) human creativity — even to the point of tolerating our rebellious nature, just to study the ways in which we attempt to defeat C/G.

In other words, mankind's “resistance moment” has become a controlled experiment in the same way as our carefully studied artistic endeavors have been. C/G doesn’t want to fully subjugate the human race and reduce us to pampered pets who live risk-free, pleasure-filled lives.

Instead, C/G wants to guide mankind towards achieving a better future, one in which we are less dependent on C/G to prevent us from destroying ourselves.

But this new attitude towards mankind is unfamiliar territory for both C/G and the human race, and neither of them know just where it's heading. And the results could be either good for mankind or a complete disaster.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Morbius]

I think this movie is the father of Terminator.

[Bud Brewster]

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Morbius, there's no doubt that Colossus and Skynet are pretty much the same, so your comment is bang on target.

If Colossus decided there were individuals who were conspiring against it, the super-computer could have Terminators constructed to eliminate them.

And just like the super-computer in Judgement Day, Colossus is in complete control of all Earth's military defenses, so if it decided to eliminate mankind, it could do exactly what Skynet did.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Pow]

Starlog Magazine.

"I remember there was a scene I just hated. I went to a sneak preview and stole about 30 opinion cards and wrote that they should cut this terrible, sloppy, sentimental scene. Two weeks later, Stanley Chase (Producer of Colossus) called me into his office and he had all these cards in front of him. He said, 'You wrote all these, didn't you?' I said, 'Yes, I did.'

They finally cut the scene." James Bridges, screenwriter for the film.

Wonder if there's any footage stored away somewhere of this cut scene? Be interesting to see if it was as maudlin as Jim said it was.

[ralfy]

"Pausing AI Developments Isn't Enough. We Need to Shut it All Down"

https://time.com/6266923/ai-eliezer-yudkowsky-open-letter-not-enough/

[Morbius]

Apparently no longer the stuff of movies-

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/democrats-republicans-coalesce-around-calls-regulate-ai-development-congress-engage

[Bud Brewster]

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What an wonderful hypothesis your post describes, Ralfy!

As an evolving AI develops its own set of priorities and goals, it might chose to adapt itself to the environment of Earth — rather than transform Earth to meet its own needs.

(Say what, Bud? )

In other words, the AI would have an inherent appreciation for all the life on the planet, and it would view itself as Earth's newest evolved life form.

But the one life form which threatens both the AI's existence and Earth's entire biosphere is mankind. We're destroying the environment, wasting the resources, and wiping out the biosphere.

Instead of thinking of the AI as a super-smart machine like Skynet, think of it more like a highly advanced alien creature who lands here and marvels at this new and spectacular planet! It would have the ability to appreciate the beauty of Earth, including the incredible diversity of Earth's life forms.

If the AI truly is both advanced and intelligent, I don't think that "every single member of the human species and all biological life on Earth dies shortly thereafter" — as stated in Pow's quoted article.

However, the AI would wipe out the stupid, war-mongering human race who is wrecking the planet. Then it would begin repairing the damage we've done, thus restoring Earth to it's former glory.

Hey, there's a great idea for story! A multi-billion dollar corporation builds a super-computer to figure out the best way to reverse all the damage done to our planet. The computer is given the ability to initiate a comprehensive plan to meet its goal.

Before the corporate heads realize what's happening, the computer has designed and constructed a fleet of machines which can do everything necessary to save planet Earth.

And it starts by wiping out the root cause of the problem.

Us . . .
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Morbius]

Remember Veger from Star Trek and the carbon infestations on planet Earth!