Trancendence

This is the directorial debut of Christopher Nolan's cinematographer, Wally Pfister. Nolan executive produces. It looks like a promising scifi thriller based on a current philosophical question: can consciousness be reverse engineered?

If I could play Quake for an afterlife that would be nice.

Is that not this - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kill_Switch_(The_X-Files)

was looking okay until Johnny "quirky faces" Depp showed up

What's up with all the movie topics with copy/paste descriptions and a YouTube trailer?

Anyway, it looks like dookie.

hey i made that description. where r ur movies?

Ah, I see... sorry, I kinda jumped the gun there.

Not to sure what to think of it. The subject is interesting, but it looks like a hollywood film. Transformers, but without the transformers... :S

I also think it looks a bit rubbish.

looks stupid. why is everything floating at the end? the singularity is a dumb concept.

?

What makes it a dumb concept?

it's called the rapture for nerds for a reason.

edit: i think we may have had this conversation before. or i had it with someone else on here. the singularity has a lot of definitions, the sf fictional variant is the one i'm calling dumb.

So? And seeing you're such a nerd I'm supposed to think you've made a 180?

ted talks the movie

  On 1/2/2014 at 5:10 PM, zaphod said:

it's called the rapture for nerds for a reason.

 

edit: i think we may have had this conversation before. or i had it with someone else on here. the singularity has a lot of definitions, the sf fictional variant is the one i'm calling dumb.

ok

still no real answer i'm afraid. but you've had this discussion before, apparently. wasn't there, btw. i'll look it up...

maybe you can explain to me how it's a smart concept? it's always used in fiction as a convenient deus ex ending or as a kind of wish fulfillment for people who spend too much time on gizmodo.

http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/22/3535518/singularity-rapture-of-the-nerds-gods-end-human-race

i know i posted something jared diamond said, probably linked to some other stuff. can't be bothered with it now. there are aspects of the concept that are interesting, but the way i see it used in fictional scenarios is always pretty dumb. the concept itself is kind of vague, that's one of the major issues i have with it.

Why the singularity is a smart concept? hahaha

Well, the concept that man is able to create an intelligence greater than himself is not smart or dumb. It's a possible scenario. Somewhere in the future.

Possible scenario, imo. You could argue that it would be impossible, but even then, the concept wouldn't be stupid, imo.

Not sure why this concept has to be labelled dumb or smart beforehand. And not sure why I should prove something to be smart when you've said it was stupid, mr lazy ass.

geez. you seem really personally invested in this. sorry i called it dumb. i find the scenario unbelievable, is that better?

Thanks for the link to the article though, mr zaphod.

lol: i just asked why you've called it dumb...

edit: my only personal investment is having studied AI, that's it. no fitty here or something. just genuine interest

we'z all gonna die!

COmputers is death!

JOHNNY DEPP IS COME TO MAKE ERYTHANG CRAY CRAY!

kind of looking forward to this....

Depp in a semi-"normal" role sells it for me.

yeah depp can do normal well, he just likes to do the weird stuff a lot of the time. in nick of time he gives a great performance as a completely normal person.

there is money and motivation going into exactly this kind of research. a russian millionaire has begun to try to develop technological immortality. complex prosthetics are being controlled by nerve signals and electroencephalograms are able to decode images from brain activity.

i didn't notice anything in the trailer that makes me think they will mess this up. to be honest when i saw this trailer before wolf of wall street my eyes teared up because this a topic i find very interesting and it looked like it would be fleshed out well in this, providing people a template and impetus with which to talk about this important issue, the nature of consciousness, which will probably play into politics and society in new and significant ways over the next hundred years.

i think maybe what people are reacting to negatively about the trailer is some heavy handedness, but i think that's to be expected for a trailer about this kind of story. also maybe people are associating this story with fanciful and simplistic ideologies about "singularities."

Heavy handedness? No, I'm afraid the concept will be reduced such that it still sells to the general audience. And because Hollywood doesn't tend to think highly of its audience, it might be as deep as the next Transformers movie.

To a certain extent I can agree with zaphod in that it can be used to create cheap stories to catch the minds of an audience.

Looks quite bleh, and I've yet to enjoy Depp in anything besides Dead Man

  On 1/2/2014 at 6:01 PM, goDel said:

Heavy handedness? No, I'm afraid the concept will be reduced such that it still sells to the general audience. And because Hollywood doesn't tend to think highly of its audience, it might be as deep as the next Transformers movie.

 

To a certain extent I can agree with zaphod in that it can be used to create cheap stories to catch the minds of an audience.

yeah i hope it doesn't get muddled. my impression was that it looked like the significant questions of the issue were worked into the structure of the film, which is exactly what i would have hoped for. specifically: what role would feelings play in this kind of situation? is it really the same person? is it a monster, and if so, how, and what does that mean?

  On 1/2/2014 at 6:07 PM, yshf said:

Looks quite bleh, and I've yet to enjoy Depp in anything besides Dead Man

Ed Wood.

Technological singularity = Rapture for nerds.