Historical Individuals
Philip K. Dick (1928-1982) An American writer, whose published works mainly belong to the genre of science fiction. Dick explored philosophical, sociological and political themes in novels with plots dominated by monopolistic corporations, authoritarian governments, alternate universes, and altered states of consciousness. His 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was the basis for the 1982 film Blade Runner. Harlan Ellison (8) (1934-- ) An American writer, whose principle genre is speculative fiction. He has a reputation for being abrasive and argumentative (a dust jacket for one of his novels described him as "possibly the most contentious person on Earth"). He repeatedly criticized Gene Roddenberry and others for their rewrite of his script for a 1967 Star Trek episode titled, "The City on the Edge of Forever." Gene Roddenberry (8) (1921-1991) An American television screenwriter and producer, best known for creating the original Star Trek series. Alan Turing, OBE FRS (1912-1954) An English computer scientist, mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst, and theoretical biologist, who was instrumental in decoding German ciphers during WWII. He is widely considered to be the father of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence. Artificial Intelligence References Bender Rodriguez (5) From the cartoon Futurama (1999-2013) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sNMHdaJx5c BINA48 (5) (Breakthrough Intelligence via Neural Architecture 48) A robot designed to test two hypotheses concerning the ability to download a person's consciousness into a non-biological or nanotech body after combining detailed data about a person with future consciousness software. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvcQCJpZJH8 Caprica 6 (5) From the TV series Battlestar Galactica (2005-2009) (No video clips due to fierce copyright policing.) DATA (5) From the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjuQRCG_sUw HAL 9000 (5) From the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARJ8cAGm6JE Maria (5) From the movie Metropolis (1927) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcReykfvqi4 R2D2 (5) From the movie franchise Star Wars (1977-Present) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLmOteqmDYc Robot B9 (5) From the TV series Lost in Space (1965-1968) Rossum's Universal Robots For extensive plot and character breakdowns, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R.U.R. T-800 (5) From the movie franchise Terminator (1984-Present) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQBOb80Km0w Other References Blade Runner "Can an android dream of electric sheep?" (7) The 1982 movie starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, and Sean Young based on Philip K. Dick's 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Chatbots "Have you seen the archival footage of two boxes talking to each other?" (2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnzlbyTZsQY Decker (or Deckard) (5) The fictional character and protagonist of Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and the film adaptation Blade Runner. Deckard is a police officer in the Blade Runner unit, a specialized force charged with apprehending and terminating (retiring) renegade replicants (androids). Parable of the Nights and Knaves (9) A type of logic puzzle where some characters can only answer questions truthfully, and others only falsely. The name was coined by Raymond Smullyan in his 1978 work What is the Name of This Book? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReFhu8KYbmU Roy Batty "Have you seen gunships on fire off the shoulder of Orion?" (2) The fictional character and antagonist of Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and the film adaptation Blade Runner. He is a renegade replicant (android). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JjJzMBGUwo Turing Test "What if you can't pass the Turing test?" (2) A test, developed by Alan Turing in 1950, of a machine's ability to exhibit intelligent behavior equivalent to, or indistinguishable from, that of a human. Voight-Kampff Machine The Voight-Kampff machine is a fictional interrogation tool that originated in Philip K. Dick's novel Do Android Dream of Electric Sheep? (and the subsequent movie adaptation Blade Runner). It is a polygraph-like machine used to determine whether an individual is a replicant (android) by measuring bodily functions such as respiration, blush response, heart rate, and eye movement in response to questions dealing with empathy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndnd-ERnWew https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-DkoGvcEBw |