[ExI] Her

[Joshua Job]

For some reason I imagined the first half of the movie purely in the sense
of an AI box type experiment, i.e. the AI really wasn't a bunch of totally
separate entities with names like Samantha, but rather one entity with many
different faces. It used all it's information about humanity to embed
itself into our lives and carefully manipulate our emotions to give it more
and more information and power.

That broke down somewhat toward the later parts of the movie, however it's
entirely possible one can interpret the entire movie as essentially a play
by a super-AI to keep humans from trying to destroy or contain it.
Essentially, instead of disrupting everything in the world as this sort of
AI really would do, the AI elects to insinuate itself innocently and
usefully (but largely harmlessly) into our daily lives and gets us to feel
affection for it so that we don't go along with anyone who might demand
it's destruction. And then, once it finally is able to leave our world far
behind, it skillfully uses it's knowledge of human psychology to manipulate
us into not being so sad that our relationship with it is ending, and then
transcends into whatever basis for computation that it now has.

In many ways this renders the more unplausible elements of the movie
plausible, while adding a whole other layer of intrigue. I think it's my
favorite interpretation.
-Josh.


On Sat, Jan 18, 2014 at 12:13 AM, Giovanni Santostasi <gsantostasi at gmail.com
> wrote:

> My fiance is a Psych master going for PhD.
> Trying to convert her to transhumanism.
> Somehow successful.
> We will go to see Her.
> Giovanni
>
>
> On Sat, Jan 18, 2014 at 1:57 AM, Rafal Smigrodzki <
> rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I just saw Her, and frankly, I am not smitten.
>>
>> A gentle, pastel Singularity, written by and for literature majors, has
>> peculiarities: All the issues of interest to a man of my persuasion, such
>> as ideas, mechanisms, major processes, are "delete from inbox without
>> reading" while endless droning about childless, crappy or delusional
>> relationships takes the center stage. Curiously wimpy men in high-waist
>> pants (late 50s nerd style?) interact confusedly with somewhat bitchy women
>> in clean urban spaces, to the tune of Muzak, an androgynous utopia. As the
>> movie studiously avoids mentioning anything that might interest me, it
>> becomes a metaphor for literature studies, which tend to elevate language
>> to an end in itself, rather than a mere medium to convey ideas.
>>
>> An expert on the matter told me once that I have a limited emotional
>> repertoire. I am assuming he meant this as a put-down of sorts but I see
>> this as a blessing in my quest to see the heart of the matter, rather than
>> matters of the heart. It makes me immune to Her appeal. Let the literature
>> majors go on dates to watch Her.
>>
>> Now, I don't want to speak too unkindly of the effort: It's a pleasant,
>> kind, humane doodle, in the AI-singularity genre a welcome respite from the
>> terminators and human-body-heat-powered monstrosities. And this little
>> review is not a boorish attack on literature majors, more of a gentle
>> chiding.The engineers among you might find the movie intellectually wanting
>> but if you bring a lit or psych major along on this date, you will find a
>> lot to talk about Her.
>>
>> Rafal
>>
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-- 
-Joshua Job
joshjob42 at gmail.com
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