Johnny Depp uploaded to supercomputer in film about the Singularity
December 13, 2012
Johnny Depp will play Will, a scientist whose brain is uploaded into a supercomputer in Transcendence (2014), the movie’s producer told TheWrap.
The plot involves a scientist whose brain is uploaded into a supercomputer with the aim of creating the world’s first self-aware computer. A group of anti-technology terrorists assassinate Will, and his wife Evelyn uploads his brain into a prototype supercomputer.
Will asks Evelyn to connect a microphone and camera [and presumably a speaker] to the computer so he can see and speak to her. She goes on to connect Will to the Internet and he creates a backup of himself to every computer in the world.
When the anti-technology organization finds out, they try to steal the supercomputer and destroy it, but Will no longer needs the computer to survive. (TheWrap warns that the script summary it received could be out of date.)
Batman director Christopher Nolan is executive producing.
Comments (46)
by Khannea Suntzu
Not Keanu Reeves? How odd.
by Gabriel
Dear Editor, I’m not sure how to ask this because I’m not aware how/where to ask, but given that this is a topic about a movie…..I’m surprised their hasn’t been any topics thus far concerning this new movie that I heard about starring Ray Kurzweil (http://thesingularityfilm.com/) — it seems to be, again, a movie with a large panel of people talking about the various issues concerning the Singularity and going back and forth.
I’m just surprised that I haven’t seen anything about it on this website thus far, unless I complete missed it.
by Editor
On our list
by Gabriel
Ahh, okay – for a second, I wondered if I said something wrong because my post was stuck at “awaiting approval” :p
by Vhan
I bet these “anti-technology terrorists” use tech to meet their end goals. HOw hypocritical of them, lol.
by MrFriendly
The mind uploading stuff seems kinda antiquated and silly, nowadays. It’s just way too far-fetched for me to find interesting; i love science fiction, but i need it to be within the realm of sanity.
by Geffrard
but the mind uploading have technically already been done in the matrix; everyone in the movie was plugged into “the system” which is like a big virtual world that they lived in while their bodies were actually in some type of pod.
by Vitalensis
Mind Uploading it’s science now. It’s just question of time. Maybe we not upload your mind but truly transcend with science, technology and our imagination. Remember that the Sky’s No Limit.
by MrFriendly
It’s science now? Hmm. What size computer do you need, in terms of RAM, flops, etc? How many lines of code is a human mind?
by Aaram-Mòrist Singularity Film Maker
Estimated of about 10 Terabites my friend ; )
For a life of around 80 years, including brain, memories and phisical constitution as far as I remember in calculations disclosed, divulgued by Arthur C. Clarke, probably at the Apendix of 3.001 (around 1995-6) and also probably not considering compression and redundances, etc…
by Gabriel
I’m not sure how you feel it’s antiquated when you say that it’s too science-fiction; seems sort of an oxymoron. It’s certainly not practical right now, but it seems feasible, in principle, with the technology that is to come in the near-future (brain-scanners, continuing merger between humans and AI etc).
It’s a wonderful concept that is a ‘logical endpoint’ and will have ramifications for the human race that, in my opinion, dwarfs biotech and arguably even nanotech….it’s something that should be explored in full as tech moves forward – just because something is inpractical now doesn’t mean it can’t be done…we need to wait till we have all the pieces of the puzzle before we can write it, or anything inpractial, as truly impossible.
by MrFriendly
Science fiction has been around a long time, so there are plenty of ideas that are antiquated, but still are far-fetched, or won’t happen for many decades/centuries. Time travel is one of them. It’s one of the oldest, hardest, and if it happens, it’ll only happen deep in our future, thousands of years from now.
Mind uploading is garbage. I once believed in it, but after reading countless interviews with neuroscientists on this topic, I’ve yet to find even one who thinks that it’s EVER going to happen. Sure, we can always say that this or that *could* happen in the future, because of exponential growth, yadda yadda, but there’s no good evidence that it will actually happen. Also, when our current “AI” is so bad that the term is a misnomer, I absolutely cannot bring myself to believe that something like this will happen in the next few decades.
So, sure, I guess anything is possible, including miracles, but I’m more interested in the very exciting future of technology that’s coming in the near future, with real payoffs, such as augmented reality, smart homes, virtual reality with HMD’s, and so on.
by MrFriendly
In other words, I want to see films come out that depict realistic, near-term technologies – not those that stretch the imagination so much that I have to have a sort of faith that it’ll happen.
That’s all I meant.
by mARK
absence of evidence…
there have been times when there was no evidence or expert support for continental drift, human evolution, government by the people, a world market for more than five computers, a need for more than 640KB of ram, …
by MrFriendly
…and therefore, we will be able to soon upload our minds into computers.
I mean, you can’t disprove it; therefore, it shall happen. Right…
There’s plenty of evidence that the exponential increase in computing power is slowing down. There’s lots of evidence that we know almost nothing of the brain. But hey, someone will figure it out cause…it’s the future, right.
This is truly a religion, and I’m not one to bash religions, so I’m just leaving it at that. Believe whatever makes you feel warm and fuzzy.
by MrFriendly
…and therefore, we will be able to soon upload our minds into computers.
by Damon Montano
Thank you for telling us what happens before we actually watch it.
Appreciate!
by MrFriendly
lol
by Kennita Watson
To get a jump on the “try to take over the world” angle, it might be valuable for Johnny to have an episode where he realizes that he could control all kinds of computer power and make himself and his family and friends fabulously wealthy, as well as targeting a number of juicy military targets (no, that’s for the sequel); one way to resolve it would be for him to team up with a worthy human on the outside whom he makes semi-fabulously wealthy by teaching him/her to bulletproof computer systems to protect them from the kind of hacking he was tempted to do.
by Jay Swartz
It will be interesting to see how the character’s abilities are exhibited. While he’ll be portrayed positively, I hope they avoid scaring people. Having the character pass through security systems, bypassing passwords and firewalls, is not realistic. That is unless they have a scene where he takes the time to use the internet to vastly improve his knowledge…
by Arctic Poppy
Isn’t this Edward Scissor-hands revisited????
by Gorden Russell
Then let’s revisit Edward Scissor-hands, Arctic Poppy. I had a lot of fun with that movie and I want to go again.
by Dipintus
It would be interesting to confront modern trends in sci-fi and their relation to the society that spawned them with past ones. Eric Rabkin’s lectures on authors such as Wells and Mary Shelby have given me an entirely new perspective on the social impact of fiction.
by Giulio Prisco
We don’t know much about Transcendence yet, but I hope the movie will very good and very successful. It may give a lot of visibility to the uploading meme and put it in a top place in our collective mind, more so than thousands of academic papers. If that happens, young and brilliant scientists will be more motivated to develop the technology.
by Joe
I will not see this movie (I hope) until Depp renounces his support of baby killer Damien Echols. What a tragedy is Depp throwing his effort into such an evil character. He must have demons beyond comprehension.
by H.K. Fauskanger
Whike we should not necessarily expect a very deep or realistic movie, it is interesting that this time around, the bad guys are the ones that oppose the new technology. The Neo-Luddites have become the villains. Earlier movies (Terminator and Matrix franchises) would typically pit the good, “natural” humans against the evil machines. Any “good” AI in a story would have to assist the human side, in effect betraying their own machine kind (the Uncle Bob Terminator, the Oracle). It would be an interesting cultural shift if AIs and uploaded humans are now seen as the good guys, while the humans who want to destroy the machines are no longer self-evidently the ones we should be cheering for.
by Giulio Prisco
Right, this will be a major shift from Frankenstein, if the current info on the plot is right.
by Gorden Russell
That’s it, Giulio! Shift from Frankenstein to Pinocchio. The denouement will be that Depp loads back from mainframes into a humanoid robot and escapes with his wife up a space elevator to a waiting starship. Of course, Evelyn will make sure that the robot is covered with cloned flesh. And, oh yeah, it will be anatomically correct, too.
by Gabriel
Yes yes YES — so much antagonism I feel comes down to that….that their have been DECADES of technology portrayed negatively as you say. It’s something that builds within people’s unconscious mind.
In a way, it’s natural….their are guidelines really with writing – you have to make characters and stories that the reader can relate too….how often are Immortality, Reality Warping, Omnipotence, and radical-sorts of abilities portrayed as good things? How often is radical technology every portrayed as positive things?
For goodness sake, the very first printed story was the Epic of Gilgamesh which was ABOUT immortality! And what happened in the end? The man in question got his wish, lost it, and then realized that the only real immortality was living through your achievements, children etc….basically, the conventional wisdom.
It would be a wonderful change of pace if radical tech was finally portrayed as good things….that Death is portrayed as, well, Death, an end to life and not something to rationalize and preach. You can’t apply the logic of literature to the real world, that’s silly….that just shows you need to seperate reality from fantasy, and while I’m not saying we should just outright ignore all literature and media when discussing this….
On principle, this is something to understand — their is no reason why we shouldn’t stop growing as individuals, stay at a certain level of capability, or otherwise, stop transcending as human beings….boiled down, that’s what we do, and death takes that away.
by H.K. Fauskanger
In popular fiction, the idea of technologically achieved immortality hasn’t been very prominent yet. But the idea has long been around in supernatural versions, most notably in the literary vampire mythology developed since the 1800s. And sure enough, the “message” is that immortality is only available if you surrender your humanity and become a monster, constantly killing others so that you can live. The good and moral choice is to stay mortal and let nature take its course! But even here a cultural shift can be discerned, with “good” vampires figuring in recent movies (Bella of Twilight fame wants to be turned to stay with her love forever, maybe not so different from couples signing up to cryonics).
If mind uploading becomes a practical option several decades from now, I’m sure some will regard the uploadees as sinister vampire-like entities — unnatural monsters who have surrendered their humanity to achieve infinite lifespans. Some will argue that they are indeed “undead” rather than truly living (or TRULY concscious, or TRULY feeling …), for as everybody ought to know, only a version 1.0 biological human who is proud to be mortal can “really” enjoy life! But as noted, popular mythologies and movie franchises may seem to move beyond the cliche that “immortality is always bad and dehumanizing, and only the evil and selfish will seek it”.
by Gabriel
That is true HK, that the cultural trend HAS been to slowly express themes like that positively rather then negatively…this will probably, at one point or another, lead into tech-immortality and things more of a human nature. As before, I think in many ways it just boils down to plot-purposes why immortality and radical capabilities are portrayed as bad things, because you have to create characters that the audience can relate to, and the further the go, the harder that is — hence, Immortality and other such radical abilities are portrayed negatively.
But again, it’s one thing to do something for the sake of a plot, and another to ay something is a bad idea just because a movie said so, and I think alot of people come to their conclusions because of that — “because I saw X movie and they had immortality and it was a bad idea, so I don’t like it”.
That’s just wrong though; the rules of media aren’t the same as real life, this shouldn’t have to be explained. Not that we should ignore all media and literature when discussing these things, but it’s something people need to understand and I don’t think some consciously do.
What I hope to see from this new movie Transcendence, above all, is fairness — either Mind-Uploading will be portrayed as positive or negative…the plot will demand it to be either way, and in a sense, it doesn’t matter….I just hope they at least do their research and try to present the concept to audience in an un-bias way, so people don’t look at the concept in a good or bad light for the wrong reasons.
by Tom B.
Is anyone troubled by the line “backed up to every computer in the world?” That seems rather implausible for a range of reasons. Massive redundancy is one thing, but how would he think as a single entity? Would he need to use a least cost routing algorithm to reconstitute his consciousness from one nanosecond to the next?
C’mon scifi! If you’re going to do this stuff, think it through.
by Gorden Russell
Well, of course, Tom B., not every computer has enough memory to store his connectome. But multiple, redundant packets could be stored everywhere, so that he could recover himself after a catastrophic assault.
by Kennita Watson
They said “backed up to every computer’, not “running on every computer”. A copy of him on every computer he would fit on, and sometimes many computers to get enough bits together, makes sense, and could pretty much be done now, but the multiprocessing, operating system crossover, synchronization, etc. needed to run on many, much less most or all, of them at once would be its own nightmare.
by Tom
I wouldn’t be so sure running on many would be that impossible.
Are neuron response times, including transmission between neurons really that much slower than a well-managed connectome running over the internet?
Would appropriatey organised, higher levels of redundancy and complexity over billions of connected devices be less than a human mind? Or more. Or just different?
What if it ran slower, but could solve problems in new ways with new SW that our old HW does not, and cannot run?
It seems to me, that this is rapidly becoming more of a SW problem, rather than a HW problem, the creation of an internet-wide mind.
by FInglas
Sounds like the Lawnmower remake to me.
by Starheart
Can we say, “Software pirate”?
by Antenna
I want to see that ! I hope they don’t ruin the whole idea of mind uploading by being too spectacular. The “one scientist against all’-plot seems a bit unrealistic, but let’s wait and see.
by Gorden Russell
Really Antenna, you can’t be too spectacular in a Johnny Depp movie. Of course there will be car chases, but they will be using unpiloted Google cars. Also, there will be UAV dogfights and sword fights between welding robots in an auto plant. This will all be great fun.
And what’s so unrealistic about “one scientist against all?” There was a time when a lot of people in the Inquisition ganged up on Galileo. Even now, there are people who should know better, who refuse to accept The Law of Accelerating Returns, and then call Ray’s projections unrealistic. Sometimes it seems like there are a lot of “stick-in-the mud” people who are against Ray. This has happened before in the world of science. Harold Bloom points this out in his book, The Global Brain.
by Gorden Russell
Another thing I forgot to mention, once his “self” is uploaded, Depp will be able to hack his way into a lot of government security cameras so as to watch his pursuers. He will even be able to tap into those “license plate” cameras you see on the back bumpers of County Sheriff’s cars. Counties now have data bases that tell where everybody in the county is from moment to moment, and where they are likely to be later in the day. They even sell this data to repo men, so that they can track down automobiles that are in arrears of their payments.
When your head is up in the Cloud, you’ll be able to do a lot of hither-to unthought of things.
by Bri
It’s nice that they give a positive to tech story line, instead of that the uploaded brain tries to rule the world kinda thing.. Hopefully it will encourage a positive view towards what tech can do for people.
by asiwel
Science fiction is full of this sort of thing – and not all of it is “mankind against evil (or misguided) machines.” In fact, most of the “best” stories I can think of in the past 10 years or so really do paint the “AI” as either a friend, wiser elder, or more-or-less indifferent community member who cooperates when that is perceived as in its best interest. HAL (was sort of sad actually) and Terminator, etc., are not really representative of the literature. DATA of Star Trek and various “intelligent” spaceships or cyber entities are more in vogue. I too would enjoy more movies where the AI is a “good guy” rather than a BORG.
by seeker
Like with zombies – you have to shot it in the head, if not it will resurect !!! :)
by Atmic
This is great — the more singularity plausibility enters the collective consciousness, the better.
by Casey
Indeed; the movie itself sounds interesting, but I’m probably more excited about the potential social impact. Great work, Johnny Depp and the producers of this movie.
by Mr.X
@Atmic? Why, does the dead weight really matter!?
If yes, why exactly!?
Ps: Just being provocative (“dead weight”).I’d like to know, though.Or is it just “commonsense”?