Ava, Ex Machina

My choice of robot is Ava from the thriller movie Ex Machina. Speaking of the robot as a metaphor that allows us to think about or question what “human” means, Ava perfectly exemplifies the blurry boundary between human being and robots and questions us what is so unique about us that makes us human. Ava is a robot of contemporary technology and concepts of robots. She is more human-like. She doesn’t have super power. She is created for the pure academic research on whether we human could create true artificial intelligence with emotions and souls by the famous Turing Test.

Alex Garland, writer of 28 Days Later and Sunshine, makes his directorial debut with Ex Machina in 2015. The protagonist, Caleb Simth is a programmer at an internet-search giant. He gets to spend a week at the private mountain estate of the company’s founder and reclusive CEO, Nathan Bateman, by winning a company competition. Caleb learns that Nathan has chosen him to be the human component in a Turing Test-charging him with evaluating the capabilities, and ultimately the consciousness, of Nathan’s latest experiment in AI, which is Ava. Ava’s emotional intelligence proves more sophisticated and deceptive than the two men could have imagined. Nathan gave Ava one single task when conducting/participating the Turing Test with Caleb – escape. During the test, Ava uses all sorts of techniques and uses Caleb to fall in love with her and try to fulfill the mission. At the end, Ava kills Nathan with the help of another AI in the house, locks Caleb in the disabled control room of the house without any supply, and leaves the house for the real human world with a new identity. Ava finishes her mission and is able and willing to remove all the roadblocks to reach her goal. On one hand, she is not capable of love, something we human value the most in life. On the other hand, she has her own desire and ambition to fulfill after her mission and her goal become one.

Contemporary technologies and concepts of robots creates AI that are more like ourselves. Instead of armed with guns and laser swords, these robots are more complicated in their emotions. During the movie, I was skeptical about the creation and origin of Ava. I thought Nathan killed a woman and implanted her thoughts into a robot after erasing her memories. That is how sophisticate and deceptive Ava is. I thought she was a real person. Ava challenges me and everyone else the preconsumptions of human being. I am well convinced that she will succeed in the real world with what she is capable of when she escapes from the house. So, what makes us human when robots do a better job at our most unique characteristics as human beings? At the end of the day, this is an ongoing question we should all strive to answer.