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Cessna posted:I'm sure Asimov wrote about a dozen books on that which I will be sure not to read. Who needs those when there’s Wikipedia and weyland yutani tech manuals
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Dec 21, 2023 19:35
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Asimov invented the laws as an excuse to get out of writing stories where robots are physically threatening.
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Dec 21, 2023 21:52
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people misunderstand Asimov's laws all the time because he immediately used them as a framework for how those three simple laws actually have a lot of weird and potentially hosed up consequences. Ultimately he believed they were an ideal but wasn't stupid enough to think they were ironclad.
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Dec 21, 2023 22:48
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Gravitas Shortfall posted:people misunderstand Asimov's laws all the time because he immediately used them as a framework for how those three simple laws actually have a lot of weird and potentially hosed up consequences. Ultimately he believed they were an ideal but wasn't stupid enough to think they were ironclad. Yeah weren't a bunch of the stories basically mysteries or logic puzzles like "oh a robbit kill a dude, how do?"
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Dec 22, 2023 02:04
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Obviously the films wouldn't have been written with this intent but since modern perspectives allow us to consider this I'll ask: what if instead of proper AI Bishop is like GPT9.7 or something and the knife game is the result of their training set including an extensive catalog of self destructive behaviors regular marines do?
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Dec 22, 2023 02:28
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marine trained bishop avoids all the xenos by wearing a cardboard box
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Dec 22, 2023 02:57
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david_a posted:David only seemed to be programmed to care about Weyland; harming other people was no big deal. What can you do David? I can carry out directives that my human counterparts might find distressing or unethical. David, what makes you sad? Unnecessary violence.
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Dec 22, 2023 04:01
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Finished Dark Descent, some thoughts: Gameplay wise: it's clear there were several versions of the game concept going through development split between one based on hero/story characters and one based on xcom style random soldiers because there's missions still in there that only make sense for the former. You also get the sense that they really really wanted to make a roguelike mode but just couldn't get it to work because everything about the mechanics are basically built for that. Story wise: it very much has too much backstory. There are basically two stories running in parallel throughout the game; one of them gets told properly, the other has 90% of it crammed into the last mission in an incomplete and unsatisfying way that isn't sequel bait so much as 'the guy who wrote this liked it and refused to cut it'. Overall a fun B-tier game worth it on sale. Tindalos have good ideas and I hope they get to make more games where they get to develop them further.
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Dec 30, 2023 13:31
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Very sneaky to move my very favourite movie thread to a forum I never visit! Happy New Year!!! david_a posted:Regardless of whether Bishop planted the eggs (I don’t think it’s plausible, fwiw), I think the idea that he’s straight-up programmed to lie about following Asimov’s Three Laws is interesting. We don’t need to assume Bishop is lying about his ‘behavioural inhibitors’ because there’s no major conflict between his statements and his behaviour (which includes working with Burke to collect aliens for use as bioweapons). Bishop is a liberal robot, and the basic point of his stated rules is that he is “a good person” under that ideological framework. So, like, he doesn’t use guns because he is a good person. He’ll deliberately injure himself to avoid hurting Hudson, etc. He’s got a timid personality. A key word to pay attention to, however, is “allow”. Bishop cannot allow a person to be harmed by omission of action. If it’s downright impossible for that to happen, the implication is that the opposite is true: Bishop must act to prevent harm, right? But that’s clearly not what he does, since it’s completely incompatible with his vague role as ‘military helper guy’. The ultimate logical conclusion of such a rule would be for Bishop to attempt some kind of nonviolent revolution, or something. Why doesn’t that happen? Simply, Bishop’s rules leave it open that others might allow the harm. And that’s exactly what we see in the film: Bishop politely, unquestioningly, does everything that’s asked of him by the people who kill and allow the killing. He helps Burke with his attempted smuggling plot, for example, when Burke’s not even his boss. He’s just servile. Note that Bishop brings up the behavioural inhibitors in response to the sanitized claim that Ash “malfunctioned” and “a few deaths were involved.” Bishop dismisses this as a product of imperfection - “twitchiness” - in older models. So his objection doesn’t account for a scenario where Ash didn’t malfunction, behaved perfectly, and just passively let the humans die. (Which is effectively what Ash did for most of Alien 1’s runtime, after all.) When understood this way, other questions about Bishop’s behaviour are settled pretty easily. Like, Bishop cannot fail to perform actions that would prevent harm - but what about actions that were never permitted, never on the table in the first place? When we talk about ‘omission’, we’re generally talking about a failure to perform as required by some law or regulation or whatever. Since Bishop’s responsibilities - the specific actions he is required to take - are defined by his programmers, they determine what constitutes a failure. For humans in reality, such legal duties and responsibilities only extend so far. These loopholes are undoubtedly how the programmers accounted for the inevitable conflicts in Bishop’s programming. Like, Burke is planning to smuggle deadly aliens through customs, but Burke might end up ‘greased’ (or sent to a hellish correctional planet) if he gets caught. Someone is harmed either way, so what does Bishop do? Well, Burke simply allows the omission of action that would allow the eggs to be smuggled. Then the protagonists can later allow Burke to be jailed or executed. SuperMechagodzilla fucked around with this message at 17:49 on Jan 2, 2024 |
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Jan 2, 2024 03:52
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I want a new David movie where he makes even more aliens and kills the company and the universe
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Jan 4, 2024 10:33
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:Very sneaky to move my very favourite movie thread to a forum I never visit! Having spent an awful lot of time evaluating and testing "AI" LLMs in the last few months, I am convinced that it's entirely possible that Bishop is not, in fact, an artificial person in that he doesn't really have thoughts or feelings despite being programmed to provide the impression that he does and that he believes he does.
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Jan 4, 2024 15:42
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That...just doesn't make sense to me. Henriksen definitely didn't play the character like a robot with no internal life, and has said so.
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Jan 4, 2024 17:05
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Halloween Jack posted:That...just doesn't make sense to me. Henriksen definitely didn't play the character like a robot with no internal life, and has said so. Agreed, even if “realistically” he would be an automaton who fakes being a real boy (even if he doesn’t realize it), for the purposes of the narrative and the fictional universe Bishop is as he describes himself: an (artificial) person.
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Jan 4, 2024 17:13
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Halloween Jack posted:That...just doesn't make sense to me. Henriksen definitely didn't play the character like a robot with no internal life, and has said so. I dunno, it makes more sense to me than SMG's explanation.
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Jan 4, 2024 17:44
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Maybe I misunderstand you all, but it seems pretty straightforward. Bishop's programming forbids him from like, shooting somebody in the face. If the guy next to him falls down and gets hurt, he has to render first aid instead of standing there watching. It doesn't demand that he follow "do not allow harm to come to humans" to its furthest logical conclusion so that he's bound to plot a revolution against Weyland-Yutani (and presumably every unjust authority that exists). There's no point in interpreting a setting in such a way as to negate the setting.
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Jan 4, 2024 17:59
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To steer away from robots for a bit, it always chafed me that there was noone onboard the ship, and literally the entire crew goes down to the surface. They (allegedly) have no idea what happened to the colonists, and they just leave the nuclear armed Sulaco in orbit? Hope there wasn't any sort of hostile ship around that harmed the colonists! It's bad doctrine!
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Jan 4, 2024 19:41
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There's probably a case to be made that Weyland-Yutani is not actually that rich or powerful, or at least has massive internal shortfalls that its administrators are desperately trying to paper over, as indicated by its staffing shortfalls and ridiculous moonshot treasure hunts. If they had a properly-funded science division, couldn't Mother have just made a note of the derelict's location, sent that note as a memo to the appropriate department, and let professionals handle this alien artifact crap?
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Jan 4, 2024 20:53
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They get bought out by Walmart so they probably weren't doing too well.
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Jan 4, 2024 20:58
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Sir DonkeyPunch posted:To steer away from robots for a bit, it always chafed me that there was noone onboard the ship, and literally the entire crew goes down to the surface. They (allegedly) have no idea what happened to the colonists, and they just leave the nuclear armed Sulaco in orbit? Hope there wasn't any sort of hostile ship around that harmed the colonists! It's bad doctrine! It’s always bothered me too, but I think it’s partly because we’re missing a big character in the movie - the Sulaco main computer. The technical manual fluff claims that the ship is highly automated and can take care of itself. I assume that means in this universe, space combat is mostly handled by AI anyway. The marines left with two independent ways to contact the ship but I guess it was unforeseen that both the drop ship and APC would be destroyed. Even if there was somebody up there, they couldn’t talk to them anyway. Presumably a human would be a bit better about, you know, taking a closer look once all contact has been severed, but I suppose that’s related to one of the major themes of the movie (the marines hubris).
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Jan 4, 2024 21:17
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MacheteZombie posted:They get bought out by Walmart so they probably weren't doing too well. Ah, just like Bonobos.
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Jan 4, 2024 21:54
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Ferrinus posted:There's probably a case to be made that Weyland-Yutani is not actually that rich or powerful, or at least has massive internal shortfalls that its administrators are desperately trying to paper over, as indicated by its staffing shortfalls and ridiculous moonshot treasure hunts. If they had a properly-funded science division, couldn't Mother have just made a note of the derelict's location, sent that note as a memo to the appropriate department, and let professionals handle this alien artifact crap? That is a common misconception about ‘Aliens’, that the Company controls everything. The only Company person at Ripley’s inquest is Burke, everyone else is a government representative. Hadley’s Hope wasn’t strictly a WY operation - the ECA was involved, although WY did manufacture the atmosphere processor and the colony and obviously had a financial stake in things, and I think the colonists were considered mostly WY employees, which is why the colony manager (in the director’s cut) is responding to Burke’s request that they send someone out to check out the Derelict. The deployment of the Marines was a colonial administration routine procedures thing, WY/Burke did not request it and he was only attached as a civilian advisor and company representative - he didn’t actually have any control over the mission. WY obviously has some power, Burke did have a hand in picking Gorman so he could surreptitiously guide the mission the way he wanted to, and in the third movie WY owns a prison facility, has an armed starship, PMCs, and can shoot people without fear of reprisal. I’m pretty sure the Alien RPG gives a lot of leeway to players on how powerful and/or evil WY is; if you want the USCM entirely in their pocket, there’s expanded universe precedent for it and the RPG can accommodate it. But if you don’t want them to be omnipotent and want them to be just another big corporation doing unscrupulous stuff sometimes, you can do it. Edit— it’s also worth pointing out that Burke was essentially working unilaterally all throughout ‘Aliens’. Thematically he’s meant to be “The Company” personified, but narratively he was operating alone with essentially no oversight. It’s not hard to imagine that whoever dispatched the Nostromo, installed Ash, and wrote Special Order 937 could have similarly been a lone actor, but because the characters don’t know the person’s name, they attribute the malfeasance to “The Company”. Likewise an outsider looking in at the events of ‘Aliens’, not knowing Burke’s name, would attribute his actions to the faceless Company. To your point about Mother not sending coordinates back so the Company could send a dedicated team, that could play into the “lone actor” idea - perhaps sending the Nostromo out and hoping for the best was the best they could do given their resources and standing within the Company, or the furthest they wanted to push things lest higher powers get involved and they get cut out of the deal. That isn’t to deflect blame from the Company as a whole; they very clearly have a corporate culture problem where such malfeasance is inevitable, it’s just a matter of who does it first. Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 22:47 on Jan 4, 2024 |
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Jan 4, 2024 22:33
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I like to think that the Nostromo's special order wasn't anything unique, but just WY catching wind that something special was in that region of space. So they hurriedly sent out last-minute android crew replacements with secret special orders to all their commercial ships going through there, as an improvised search method just to get started while they prepare more effective means, and then never really thought about it again. There were probably dozens of other spaceships that safely completed their journeys without ever triggering the special order. It might not be the work of the lone agent inside WY, but it would make sense if detailed knowledge of the nature of the Xenomorph was restricted to a relatively small group within the company, concealing their efforts with largely abstract justifications such as "Weapons Research" or whatever else would sound most convincing to keep the larger corporate hierarchy off their back and also in the dark. Over time, that could still filter out to the point that lower-level employees like Burke recognize that something like the Xenomorph might be valuable to someone powerful within the company, without knowing why it is valuable. Slashrat fucked around with this message at 23:35 on Jan 4, 2024 |
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Jan 4, 2024 23:22
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If events were set in motion by a "lone agent," the question then is "Whose agent?" WY dispatched the Nostromo to pick up ore. Mother detected the distress signal and sent the crew to investigate.
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Jan 4, 2024 23:26
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Halloween Jack posted:If events were set in motion by a "lone agent," the question then is "Whose agent?" WY dispatched the Nostromo from Thedus in the direction of the distress signal, knowing Mother would pick up the signal and wake the crew.
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Jan 4, 2024 23:32
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Nah.
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Jan 4, 2024 23:37
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Yeah.
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Jan 4, 2024 23:41
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Nah, they're an ore freighter. It's clearly stated that they're transporting ore.
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Jan 4, 2024 23:43
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Halloween Jack posted:Nah, they're an ore freighter. It's clearly stated that they're transporting ore. Yes, and they were going to be heading back to earth with that ore, from Thedus. Instead, they were deliberately sent off-course from Thedus in the direction of a signal, with a secret android onboard, and a secret Special Order loaded in the computer. The crew doesn’t know this (although Lambert points out that they’re off-course after they wake up), the ship gets to the signal and Mother wakes up the crew per apparent “routine”, but they were sent there on purpose. Ripley even spells it out in the inquest in ‘Aliens’. The expanded universe even clarifies it further, indicating that the Nostromo was sent on purpose and that 900-series Special Orders became semi-standard operating procedure written by humans and loaded into computers in the event of the detection of xenobiological (not specifically capital-A Aliens, though) specimens that might be of interest to the company. Apparently there were 36 prior Special Orders we don’t know about, and at least 2 after ‘Alien’ (Special Order 939 is in Alien Isolation). Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 23:55 on Jan 4, 2024 |
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Jan 4, 2024 23:51
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They're off course because the ship picked up the signal.
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Jan 4, 2024 23:56
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Schwarzwald posted:They're off course because the ship picked up the signal.
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Jan 4, 2024 23:58
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Why would the company send an ore freighter to investigate the signal, and not tell them why they're there? How would they know what to do? Mother detects the signal and reroutes the ship.
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Jan 5, 2024 00:02
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Halloween Jack posted:Why would the company send an ore freighter to investigate the signal, and not tell them why they're there? How would they know what to do? Mother detects the signal and reroutes the ship. They send the ore freighter with a secret android and secret orders because that’s who would get there the fastest, or that’s all whoever was in charge could manage given their available time/resources/whatever. They don’t tell the crew because they’re expendable, and you generally don’t tell them that. Ash knows what to do, he’s the secret Android with secret orders. The Company doesn’t know exactly what they’ll find, just that they want it, it might be dangerous, and as such the crew is expendable. If it doesn’t work out, oh well - it’s the 37th time they’ve done this song and dance. Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Jan 5, 2024 |
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Jan 5, 2024 00:06
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There's no indication that WY lacks the time or the resources to send whatever kind of ship investigates aliens, if that's what they want to do. Why send people who have no training, equipment, or even knowledge of why they're there, in the hopes that they'll somehow get the job done thanks to a spy? Ash doesn't even join the search party. Even if they somehow knew that they were sending these ore haulers to investigate alien stuff, they could just have them investigate and report back, and send a trained crew later. Halloween Jack fucked around with this message at 00:20 on Jan 5, 2024 |
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Jan 5, 2024 00:18
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Halloween Jack posted:There's no indication that WY lacks the time or the resources to send whatever kind of ship investigates aliens, if that's what they want to do. Why send people who have no training, equipment, or even knowledge of why they're there, in the hopes that they'll somehow get the job done thanks to a spy? Ash doesn't even join the search party. In ‘Alien’ the Company knew less than Burke did, they knew there was a signal and its general direction. They send the closest ship they control in the direction of the signal, with secret orders and a secret Android installed onboard before departure, because they want to capitalize on their find as fast as possible before someone else (in the company or elsewhere) beats them to it. They have it play out as if it’s “routine” as to not spook the expendable crew (if Ripley was able to decode the message and determine it’s a warning and not a distress then you’d better believe the Compsny did it beforehand). Ash is not in the search party because he needs to be on the ship to be able to override Ripley and get the organism on the ship - he can’t do that if he’s locked out with the others and Ripley won’t let them onboard. The Company’s gamble doesn’t pay off after the Nostromo doesn’t show up back at Earth as planned, whoever sent the Nostromo to the signal says “oh well” and doesn’t draw attention to it, and in the intervening time the signal gets shut off and the Company can’t chase it again until Ripley shows up. In the ‘Alien’ script, comic adaptation, and novelization, Dallas shuts off the beacon when they’re in the Derelict. According to James Cameron, volcanic activity damaged the Derelict sometime after ‘Alien’ (and in ‘Aliens’ the derelict is visibly damaged. In Alien Isolation, the player shuts off the beacon. Like that’s the point, there’s limitations to the Company’s power and they can’t just omnipotently and omnisciently puppet master everything for every contingency. They took a gamble with the Nostromo because that was the best option they had at the time to work as fast as possible. In the time it would have taken Company Employee/Committee 27479 to rally up a dedicated strike team to send trained scientists with special equipment after a signal that might not even bear fruit, someone else who detected the signal could have pulled a Nostromo and sent whatever they had available first. Burke’s plan is no different. Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 00:59 on Jan 5, 2024 |
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Jan 5, 2024 00:52
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Yeah this is just weird stacking of conspiracy and stupid maleficence onto W-Y when on it's face the story of Alien is that the Nostromo stumbles on the signal by random chance and then events play out because the company has a stack of secret standing instructions that say "the nuance of the situation doesn't matter at all because we absolutely do not value our employees at all, go get that money". The point of the story is that there's no calculation being made and no grand plan, the company straight up does not care.
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Jan 5, 2024 00:56
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Xenomrph posted:In the ‘Alien’ script, comic adaptation, and novelization, Dallas shuts off the beacon when they’re in the Derelict. According to James Cameron, volcanic activity damaged the Derelict sometime after ‘Alien’ (and in ‘Aliens’ the derelict is visibly damaged. In Alien Isolation, the player shuts off the beacon.
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Jan 5, 2024 01:00
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Hey, believe whatever you want I guess.  The thread went through this song and dance like a year ago or something, it was stupid the first time too. Halloween Jack posted:If the drafts, spinoffs, and related marginalia all contradict each other, how can you base your interpretation of Alien on any of them, much less all of them together? I'd rather just enjoy the movie. The point was “take your pick, there are explanations”. And I very heartily endorse enjoying the movie. My enjoyment comes from incorporating other things outside of the movie, which are very clear on how things went down.
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Jan 5, 2024 01:01
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We can all agree the Nostromos' previous science officer was one lucky son of a bitch.
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Jan 5, 2024 01:09
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Xenomrph posted:Like that’s the point, there’s limitations to the Company’s power and they can’t just omnipotently and omnisciently puppet master everything for every contingency. They took a gamble with the Nostromo because that was the best option they had at the time to work as fast as possible. In the time it would have taken Company Employee/Committee 27479 to rally up a dedicated strike team to send trained scientists with special equipment after a signal that might not even bear fruit, someone else who detected the signal could have pulled a Nostromo and sent whatever they had available first. Burke’s plan is no different. Anyway, of the available explanations for what happened in Alien, I'm going with the plot of Alien.
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Jan 5, 2024 01:11
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banned from Starbucks posted:We can all agree the Nostromos' previous science officer was one lucky son of a bitch. I wanted to write a fan fiction about Bob Davis’s Terrible Day, where Bob is on Thedus, he gets chewed out by his boss for being late on reports and he’s being passed over on a promotion, he gets word from his mom on Earth that his dog died, his girlfriend dumps him via videophone, and he learns that he’s been bumped off his ticket home to Earth (the Nostromo) at the last minute and the next ship heading to earth isn’t for 3 months. God, what a lovely day! Halloween Jack posted:Anyway, of the available explanations for what happened in Alien, I'm going with the plot of Alien. 
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Jan 5, 2024 01:14
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