Excerpts from the newsletters, omitting site updates
and the futurist movie schedule.
In this issue:
• Review: The Island
• The really long-term
• In the news
• Futurist movie schedule
Review: The Island
(WARNING: SPOILERS IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT THIS MOVIE IS ABOUT)Movie released: 2005
Set: 2019
Future events summary
Human cloning
Likelihood – high
Time frame if it is to occur – 2010+
Memory implanting
Likelihood – low
Time frame if it is to occur – 2030+
Approach to the future – scenario exploration
Ratings
Futurism rating – 5
Only a small portion of this future is examined, and it is mostly just telegraphed with the usual technological props. (Amtrak will be using maglev trains by 2019. Who knew?)
Entertainment rating – 8
Not a fine film by any stretch, but it is an amusing couple of movies. Director Bay concentrates on what he does best: chase scenes.
Plausibility rating – 4
A society could make this choice, but these cloning and brain tech capabilities may or may not be possible.
Topics depicted
Human cloning
Humans probably will be cloned within a few years, but it is likely to be on a small scale, with little social consequence. (See ”A note on cloning” on the site for more.)
Clones might be viewed as less than human, but that is a designation which can be made about any group at any time. As clones are less inherently strange than identical twins, there is no clear reason to discriminate against them. (The opposition of some conservative Christians to technology-assisted reproduction might inspire hostility to clones, except that this group currently leans toward seeing anything potentially human as “ensouled.”)
Cloning technology may be useful for growing replacement parts, but this would be accomplished without creating whole people. Still, one can imagine that some living clones might be produced for their medical utility in loosely governed countries where power buys absolute privilege.
In any case, it will be extremely difficult to grow people to adulthood in days or months, as appears to be the case here.
The most realistic cloning movie remains The Boys from Brazil.
Memory implanting
The clones are given false memories through a rapid visual and audio imprinting process just after they are “born.”
This is more realistic than instant memory downloads, buts its feasibility remains doubtful. Genes provide instructions for a human brain, but not for an adult brain instantly ready to be filled like a dry sponge. The brain is shaped and in a sense created by experience, and is different from one day to the next, evolving slowly.
The movie strains belief further by having the “parents’” memories begin to surface in the clones’ minds. While our understanding of memory and genetics is not sufficient to call this impossible, it is highly unlikely.
The really long-term
For a truly long-term vision of the future, watch the documentary series The Future Is Wild. It examines the outcome of evolution 5 million, 100 million, and 200 million years from now.
Humans are out of the picture—perhaps we have gone on to other things—and the lack of intelligent beings reduces the story to a creative nature documentary, with little dramatic tension. (Though one might feel some pity for the poor little animal wandering the desert that was once the Mediterranean seafloor.)
The series is available on DVD from Netflix and some video stores.
In the news
“Despite Promise, Energy-Beam Weapons Still Missing from Action”
Lethal and nonlethal energy weapons continue their slow evolution toward practicality.
“Japan Dreams of Robot Moon Base in 2025”
The Japanese think of another use for their beloved robots.
Futurist movie schedule
In theaters now:
• The Island
• War of the Worlds
• Revenge of the Sith
Video / DVD:
• Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence – out
• Primer -- out
• Time of the Wolf – out
• Code 46
Upcoming:
• July 29 – Stealth
• September: Aeon Flux
• 2005 (?) – The Sound of Thunder [time travel]
• 2006: The Children of Men [environmental disaster]
• ?: Fahrenheit 451
Copyright 2005 Josh Calder
• Review: War of the Worlds
• Mini-review: Primer
• On the Web
• Futurist movie schedule
Review: War of the Worlds
Movie released: 2005
Set: 2005
Future events summary
Alien invasion
Likelihood – extremely low
Time frame if it is to occur – at any time
Approach to the future – scenario exploration
Ratings
Futurism rating – 5
Spielberg captures some of the terror that an overmatched humanity would feel in the face of this threat.
Entertainment rating – 8
This film is strongest as a war movie. Focused on one family's experiences, it depicts the chaos, horror, and loss of war up close.
Plausibility rating – 6
Judging the motives and choices of aliens is always risky, as they are likely to be unfathomable, but one can imagine reasons that another species might want our planet.
(Note to implausibly brave crowds: when giant machines rise out of chasms in the ground, leave the area.)
Topics depicted
Alien invasion
Any aliens who can show up here are likely to outgun us technologically. “It's not a war any more than there's a war between men and maggots,” says one person, and so it might be.
Aliens might instead be more in the Close Encounters mode, seeking knowledge, or that of Solaris, acting out purposes beyond our understanding.
Those bent on using the Earth for themselves might begin terraforming, as these do, and might see us as little more than maggots. We humans still barely acknowledge our biological kin on this planet, and have difficulty extending empathy even to our own species. Alien morality would be shaped by emotional and logical systems sharply different from our own.
It is not apparent why the aliens adopt their two-part invasion strategy (if that is in fact what happened). Perhaps equipment is pre-deployed automatically, and the crews cannot arrive until long after for some reason.
(SEMI-SPOILER)
It is also unclear why the aliens would overlook such a flaw in their invasion plan. They may be used to biology that generates far less evolutionary change, and did not consider whether such changes could hurt them. (Or maybe they are just alien creationists, ideologically blinded to the realities of Earth biology.)
Mini-review: Primer
This is a pure thought-piece, contemplating the possibilities of time travel.
Futurism rating – 3
The focus is not on discovering the future but on the dilemmas arising from of being able to travel through time.
Entertainment rating – 7
This is a remarkable bit of very-low-budget, first-time filmmaking, but it is also deeply puzzling, and eludes understanding even after discussion and multiple viewings of the crucial scenes.
Plausibility rating – 2
Time travel hangs onto possibility only thinly, according to physicists.
On the Web
“125 Questions: What Don't We Know?”
Science magazine examines the big unanswered questions; their answers bear on everything from aliens to time travel.
“The Onion 2056”
“Leather-clad Nomads Seize Power in Australia” and other important stories.
“How Far Can He Spit?”
Another impressive output of the Japanese robot obsession.
“Robot Driven by a Roach”
Such biohybrids are the fast track to AI with intentions and feelings.
“Twin Data Highlight Genetic Changes”
Further reason clones will be unlike their “parents,” even if their genes are identical.
Futurist movie schedule
In theaters now:
• War of the Worlds
• Revenge of the Sith
Video / DVD:
• Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence – out
Upcoming:
• July 22 – The Island
• July 29 – Stealth
• September: Aeon Flux
• 2005 (?) – The Sound of Thunder [time travel]
• 2006: The Children of Men [environmental disaster]
• ?: Fahrenheit 451
In this issue:
• Mini-review: Equilibrium
• Not quite futurist
• Articles and sites of interest
Mini-review: Equilibrium
In the wake of a world war, an oppressive government seeks to eradicate the ability to feel. The entire populace takes prozium, which suppresses emotional highs and lows, under the watchful eyes of the clerics, who enforce the ban on feeling and all that might inspire it.
Futurism—4
Gattaca, THX 1138, The Matrix, Triumph of the Will, Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World, Judge Dredd, Alphaville, Logan’s Run, 1984,Clockwork Orange, and The Handmaid’s Tale: these are the movies the director himself says he was "accused of ripping off." "It’s true," he admits in the DVD voiceover—and the derivative nature is apparent in almost every scene.Entertainment—6
Some nice production design and cinematography are wasted on a trite and familiar plot, filled with gratuitous fighting lifted shamelessly from more popular movies. Some have been harsher. The New York Times reviewer wrote, "A ridiculous sci-fi action melodrama and breath mint that could be stupider only if it were longer."Plausibility—4
Abandoning subtlety, the movie depicts a path unlikely to be chosen, and the "clerics" are endowed with essentially magical abilities, without the excuse of unreality provided in The Matrix.Not quite futurist
Many movies are almost but not quite futurist. These are some you should see, though they will not be covered by Futuristmovies.com.
Brazil
Ostensibly set in the future, this is more a fable about all the horrors of the second half of the 20th century, from the banality of advertising to the terror of hidden bombs, in an Anglo-American neverland. The only really futurist element is a menu with miniscreen that displays entrees. Still, the movie's underlying ideas, such as the increasing elusiveness of reality, make it worth watching for those interested in futurist films.Men in Black
The aliens look odd but act rather human in this movie that definitively answers the question: why is Manhattan so different?Donnie Darko
Is it about time travel? Insanity? A really mean-looking giant rabbit? Puzzles like these are turning this into a cult film.Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
Humans battle ethereal aliens on a devastated Earth in this computer-animated film. Though the plot wanders into mysticism, technical innovation and visions of genuinely strange and fearsome aliens make it worth watching.Cube
Confused Canadians caught in killer cube.Frequency
Though based on fantasy rather than science, its time-travel scenario is better than average.Articles and sites of Interest
The Second Coming of Philip K. Dick
Wired on the writer whose work formed the basis for Blade Runner, Minority Report, the upcoming Paycheck, and other movies.When Sci-fi Forgets the Science
The BBC asks: does bad science make a poor sci-fi film worse?The Drake Equation Revisited
A series from Astrobiology Magazine examines the Drake Equation, a formula for analyzing the likelihood and prevalence of life in the universe.Robotics to Play Major Role in Future Warfighting
The US military reports on future combat robots.Mission Possible: Asteroid Tugboat Backed for Trial Run
NASA has preliminary plans for a "tugboat" to prevent a Deep Impact-like disaster.Will Fact Match Fiction as Scientists Start Work on Thinking Robot?
The usual alleged advance in artificial intelligence.
Copyright 2003 Josh Calder
In this issue:
- Mini-review: Star Trek Nemesis
- Going to Mars
Mini-review: Star Trek Nemesis
"I don’t know if all this has made any sense," Captain Picard asks at one point. The answer, alas, is: not particularly.Tedious and poorly plotted, this reunion of the "Next Generation" cast feels like an extended, uninteresting episode of that series. There is nothing new from a futurist perspective. Aliens are nasty but not strange, and somebody gets cloned; for a change of pace, they ride around in dune buggies, the film’s most innovative contribution to the franchise.
Ratings for Star Trek Nemesis
- Futurism—5
- Entertainment—6
- Plausibility—3
Going to Mars
Movies like Mission to Mars and Total Recall became a little less plausible this week when NASA announced that high radiation levels may present dangers to humans on Mars. A three-year Mars mission could probably expose people to NASA’s lifetime space radiation limit. Astronauts on the planet are likely to require places to shelter from radiation storms, and settlement would require permanent protection.On the positive side, recent probes have revealed the presence of large quantities of water in Martian soil, particularly in the northern hemisphere. Pictures also seem to indicate briny water flows seeping out from underground. Readily extractable water would be crucial for early exploration and eventual colonization.
Though it is not yet firmly planned, a manned Mars mission still appears possible for the early 2020s. Permanent settlement might follow decades later.
Link: NASA’s Mars exploration program
http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/
December 10, 2002
In this issue:
- Mini-review: Sum of All Fears
- Alien morality?
- Movies in the news
Mini-review: The Sum of All Fears
This standard loose-nuke story is too near daily headlines to require much imagination about the future. While neo-Nazis are generally small-time losers rather than international masterminds, there are plenty of real terrorists out there.It is all too plausible that they might get their hands on a bomb. Thousands of weapons remain in Russia, guarded by an ever-more rickety and impoverished military. Extremism and civil war could overcome nuclear-armed Pakistan, and India and Israel may also face future internal instability.
For a Clancy adaptation, this movie lacks both intricacy and action set-pieces. And it does not take the scale of disaster it depicts seriously. Ultimately, it is only slightly entertaining.
Ratings for The Sum of All Fears
- Futurism—2
- Entertainment—7
- Plausibility—8
Alien morality?
A reader recently asked whether it was likely that intelligent aliens would have moral codes or beliefs, or whether such ideas are distinctly human.Humans seem to have moral codes because we are a highly variable, social, semi-hierarchical species with a broad emotional palette. All of those things could be different in an intelligent alien species.
There may be reasons to expect some kinds of alien behavior codes. To become intelligent, beings must evolve, which seems to require individual variation. Intelligence itself would also seem to require individual variation: intelligent beings have to be able to respond in complex and varied ways to their environment. Diverse individuals might well require codes to smooth their interactions.
(This all applies only to intelligent individuals. A single or Borg-like intelligence is also imaginable, and would not require a code regulating how it treats "others," for it would not easily conceptualize the idea of "an other." Such an entity might theorize about morality between more than one entity, but it would have the character of the book Flatland, a theoretical exercise.)
But alien codes need not be "moral," as we understand the idea. Humans have codes, such as grammar, that attempt to govern behavior but are not moral. Dangling modifiers are seldom considered sinful.
Even if an alien species had moral codes, they are unlikely to be similar to our own. First, human morality varies immensely: things that are forbidden in some cultures are obligatory in others. Second, the basic determinants of why humans think things are right or wrong—such as pain, pleasure, memory, group bonds, and individualism—could be substantially different in aliens.
So the short answer seems to be that aliens might or might not have moral codes, and such codes might partially resemble our own, or they might be wholly and inscrutably different.
Movies in the news
The Washington Post on Saddam Hussein’s paranoia about security:
"But even these relatives entrusted with important military commands are kept on edge and constantly tested for loyalty. 'Everyone is a "blade runner," with the possible exception of three to six people,' Amatzia Baram . . . recently wrote in the Journal of International Security." (November 17, 2002)
August 8, 2002
In this issue:No date for Armageddon
- Mini-Review: Rollerball (2002)
- Roller-Enron
No date for Armageddon
February 1, 2019 might have been the date that Deep Impact and Armageddon ceased to be futurist movies. An asteroid large enough to cause global devastation was discovered on July 9th, and for a time appeared to have a chance of hitting Earth 17 years from now.Further observations showed that the asteroid would miss our planet. In any case, 17 years is enough warning time that the object could probably have been deflected, perhaps with a rocket or nuclear explosives.
Too little warning, even years, and deflection might not be possible. And the most likely scenario for the near future is no warning time at all, as most potentially threatening asteroids have not been detected.
This year has already seen two notable near-misses. In January, an asteroid large enough to devastate a medium-sized country missed Earth by about 400,000 miles, only weeks after it was discovered. And in June, a football field-sized rock came within 75,000 miles, a third of the distance to the Moon. Had it hit, it could have leveled a large city.
An impact that size happens every few centuries, scientists estimate. The last one exploded over Tunguska, Siberia, in 1908, destroying about 800 square miles of forest.
Mini-Review: Rollerball (2002)
The 2002 remake of Rollerball loses nearly all the futurism of the original, leaving a harmless little action movie about extreme sports in Central Asia.It does suggest one principle likely to play out in the future: if you want to get away with something, whether in death sports or, say, biotechnology, find a place in the developing world where government is absent, or bows to the whims of the powerful.
The most entertaining future death sport remains Series 7, reviewed on the site.
Ratings for Rollerball (2002)
- Futurism—2
- Entertainment—7
- Plausibility—8
Roller-Enron
On the subject of Rollerball, Jape Trostle, an editorial cartoonist in Durham, NC, notes the following:"Twenty-six years before Enron became a business and political scandal, Rollerball accurately anticipated Enron's implosion. The evidence is irrefutable:
Rollerball
Arrogant executives of an energy corporation based in Houston—one with a big 'E' for its logo—attempt to manipulate things to their liking by altering the rules. In the end, the executives bring about their own downfall in a spectacular crash and burn that plays out on televisions around the world.Enron
Arrogant executives of an energy corporation based in Houston—one with a big 'E' for its logo—attempt to manipulate things to their liking by altering the rules. In the end, the executives bring about their own downfall in a spectacular crash and burn that plays out on televisions around the world."(Used with permission)
June 13, 2002
In this issue:
- A note on Spider-Man
- Blade Runner in Brazil
- Movies in the news
A note on Spider-Man
As fantasy, a comic book brought superbly to life, Spider-Man doesn't merit a full-scale review, but it does contain some futurist elements.
It is already possible to genetically engineer "super spiders." Common genes and body structures across spider species would make a combination easier. The process would be imprecise at this point, as spider genomes have not been a high research priority.
Spider genes have been inserted into mammals. A biotech company has created goats that make spider silk proteins in their milk, to harvest the silk for use as an extremely strong biomaterial.
But engineering spider-like abilities in a human would be difficult. A system as complex as web shooting would have to be integrated with many other biological systems, requiring exact genetic knowledge that will be decades in developing.
The Green Goblin's armored suit has cousins in the real world. The US military is researching exoskeletons that would give soldiers increased speed, strength, and stamina.
Blade Runner in Brazil
A recent Washington Post story chronicled the urban dystopia that is Sao Paulo, Brazil. With 18 million inhabitants, it the fourth largest city on the planet.
Severe inequality—the richest 10% of the population control more than 50% of the wealth—drives extreme crime rates and a booming kidnapping industry.
The rich are insulating themselves from the social disaster around them. Executives escorted by bodyguards take off from "fortress-like" corporate headquarters in the city's growing fleet of helicopters, used by the elite to avoid the masses completely.
The helicopters can ferry them to one of Sao Paolo's 300 gated communities, such as Alphaville—shades of Brave New World—which has three helipads of its own.
Surrounded by electrified walls, Alphaville is protected by a private army of 1,100 men. Residents can watch their departing servants each night on TV Alphaville, which features workers being searched on a live feed.
The 21st century is the century of Third World megalopolises. Soon, for the first time ever, a majority of the world's people will live in cities. And most of the future cities of film will be realized.
The worst visions of this urban future, such as Soylent Green, have already arrived in places like Karachi and Lagos. At the manicured and monitored end of the spectrum, cities like Singapore will resemble San Angeles of Demolition Man. Most cities will lie somewhere in between.
Movies in the news
- The head of a patient advocacy group was recently quoted lamenting squeamishness about stem cell research. "Many of these organizations were terrified at the idea of having to support something called cloning. They watched too many science fiction movies of Arnold Schwarzenegger clones."
- The unfortunate Godzilla (1998) made no attempt at plausibility, but is still inspiring real-life imitation. Captured al Qaeda leader Abu Zubaida hinted to interrogators that Godzilla's encounter with a bridge had suggested a target for the terrorist organization. Heroically, the investigators actually watched the movie, confirming that he was referring to the Brooklyn Bridge.
Copyright 2005 Josh Calder