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Funding Successful
This project successfully raised its funding goal on November 4, 2011.
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Project By
Connected as Shad Clark (320 friends)
I'm a writer and filmmaker using elements of horror, thriller, and science fiction to tell thought-provoking stories that transcend typical genre trappings. My films ANONYMITY and SIDE EFFECTS MAY INCLUDE have been featured on IFC and have played numerous festivals around the world. ANONYMITY won an award along the way and was optioned for feature development. As a screenwriter, my work has been awarded or otherwise recognized by Creative Screenwriting Magazine, IFP's Emerging Narrative Program, and Francis Ford Coppola's American Zoetrope Competition. In recent years, I've also begun to write and publish short fiction. My stories LITTLE BOY PIG and UPGRADING GOD are available for Kindle.
More information on all of my past, present and future projects can be found at www.shadclark.com.
Shad,
I think all of the better movies are at least a little philosophical. As with your teaser explanation below (thanks for that!) it is after all not so much the technology that gives us pause, but rather the repercussions - both good and bad.
I think in a way that the specific concepts of immortality through storage of one's mind, the potential for a copy of you walking around, and whether or not that copy would be sentient (and/or deserving of the same rights as 'the original') were part of the storyline for 'The 6th Day' . Of course that was wrapped up in an action/suspense/comedy type popcorn movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger but if you can bring yourself to look past that (after enjoying it - it's not that bad of a movie, and the 'whispercraft' is one hell of a design.. but I stray) then there's some good stuff there.
Your story seems to go for the more interesting questions, so absolutely it won me over :)
Re: gender. In the case of your story, where clearly if the individual was a man and gets stored then to the individual himself, he would still be a man. Legally speaking, however - well, we're still struggling with that right now, it would seem. It becomes easier if that artificial brain is in a reasonably male body, but more complex again if it were a female body.
However, in the case of a personality (of an AI - assuming it is sufficiently intelligent to be considered a personality) born into a gender vacuum, I'm not sure it would be as easy as you suggest. Even in the current world there are parents who will name their child based on their determined sex, and the child would most likely have a voice to match it. Only to find that later on in life that child comes forward with the suggestion that they don't feel like they should be that sex. If anything, it would be easier for an AI that had no sense of body as there is no constant reinforcement of the 'assigned' gender. But I think that's a different movie altogether :)
I should hope he'd still be in love with his wife, although it may depend on the exact situation.. looking forward to future updates already! :)
Thanks again!
Richard,
Thank you so very much for backing my film! I'm glad the concept won over your vote of support and intrigued you enough to get a little philosophical on me. :)
You're right in that similar elements have been used in other scifi stories before, though not in the same way that I'm exploring them -- or at least not that I'm aware. In BladeRunner, for instance, it's suggested that Rachel has the childhood memories of Tyrell's niece, but she doesn't think or believe that's who she is. From what's revealed in the film, Rachel seems to be a composite personality that's been given her own "unique" identity.
What interests me, at least for the purposes of this film, is what it means to possess (or be possessed by) an exact copy of someone else's mind. What do specific memories and emotions mean to an individual if they were never his/hers to experience?
What sparked this idea, and this is something I plan to explain in greater depth in a future update, is the transhumanist notion that immortality can be achieved through mind uploading. In all proposed methods, mind uploading technology involves creating an "image" of the subject's brain -- essentially a copy. In some methods, particularly the one involving serial sectioning microscopy (slicing up the brain and then scanning in each layer), the original brain must be destroyed in the process. Suggesting that the copy is truly one and the same as the original, at least to me, seems a little disingenuous. And when you consider that the hapless copy knows no better, then I'd say it's even potentially a little cruel, depending on whether or not we're prepared to declare the artificial copy sentient.
You raise an interesting question regarding gender. If an A.I. were to come into being in a vacuum of gender, then I'd say that being's creator(s) would be the ones imposing the idea of a gender through the name and voice they assign. (HAL can't really be a man, though that's how we think of him.) Otherwise, if we're talking whole mind uploading or a composite of memory implants, I believe gender is hard-wired into psychology at that point. Without giving too much away, I will say that the artificial mind in ALL I THINK OF IS YOU sees himself as still being very much in love with his wife.
Hope this answers some questions while further piquing your interest! ;)
Cheers,
Shad
oh no.. stop.. please, stop! Take my money, but stop that clip!
..it's actually the sound that does it, I think.
All kidding aside - backing for the concept, of course. I think I've seen this concept in a few other scifi type stories, but usually not very well-explored (and often from a "the person doesn't realize they're (in) a machine" perspective).
Given the fact that we are taking the question of identity further and further - be it facial transplants (with the face often considered the premiere attribute for identification) or the more recent discussions on 'gender-neutral' and declared-sex record options such as in passports* - it's also really quite contemporary despite the concept likely being timeless (until such a time we actually can realize such technology).
* This may seem silly at first, but what gender -is- a personality that has no body in the traditional sense - and how does your answer to that question reflect on those who do have a body?