NiroZ
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When I first played Deus Ex, I must admit that I was enraptured by the story of the Artificial Intelligence. I'd say more but I don't want to spoil the plot.

Anyway, that is when I first discovered the awesomeness of AI, and cyberpunk. Since then I've discovered other literature pertaining to the subject, such as Isaac Asmov's work, Ghost in the Shell, System Shock 2, 2001: A space odyssey, the Sprawl Trilogy by William Gibson, Blade Runner and even that episode on the X-Files.

So I was wondering, is there any other literature on the subject? I know I should look into the work of Arthur C. Clark, and I've yet to cover all of Asmov, but I just wanted to try and make my search complete.

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[Last edited by NiroZ at 04-21-2008 07:32 PM]

Znirk
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Tangential perhaps, but many of Stanisław Lem's lighter stories feature robots in a world where the humans who built the first models are only a vague legend. The Cyberiad in particular builds around that theme, but it also appears elsewhere.

Ijon Tichy's Star Diaries (also by Lem) has a story about the ascent to sentience of a lost cargo of potatoes.

I hate to be obvious, but: Frankenstein.

Related non-fiction: The quark and the jaguar by Murray Gell-Mann. It's not about AI at all, but gives a highly "devourable" introduction to concepts of emergent complexity. This is the idea that the interaction of few simple rules can produce extremely complex behaviour (as in e.g. deterministic chaos), which certain SF plots mangle into "if you link up a large enough number of stupid computers, AI is bound to happen".

Beef Row
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Neal Stephenson writes alot of excellent Cyberpunk with a lighter more humorous but still incredibly deep style. The Diamond Age especially deals with AI, while Snow Crash is more about a fully realized form of cyberspace. They both also have a good look at how technology and the rise in association based on mutual interest instead of region could change the nature of technology.

Bruce Sterling writes some interesting cyberpunk stuff, though I'm not sure how much is directly AI related. Distraction is a good one.

Metropolis, both the German experssionist silent film and the
Anime thats somehow vaguely inspired by it are well worth seeing, and relevant to AI. (The original Metropolis also had special effects which inspired both the original Frankenstein film and Star Wars).

For a little bit of silly and old school there's always Wargames and Tron.

"Heavenly shades of night are falling, it's twilight time..." That was a really good episode.

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stigant
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You might be interested in some of Vernor Vinge's writing (both his fiction and non-fiction). Specifically, he pioneered the idea of the "Technological Singularity" - the idea that technology will continue to increase at an ever-increasing rate, eventually reaching a singularity beyond which we cannot predict what will happen. Our world will be so different the day after the singularity that we won't even recognize it. An example would be Judgement Day in the Terminator story line.

You can find his TS essays on line, and I recommend A Fire on the Deep and its psuedo-prequel A Deepness in the Sky if you're interested in fiction.

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[Last edited by stigant at 04-21-2008 06:20 PM]

robin
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The AI that I really liked is:
- I Robot (with Will Smith)
- The Matrix (Trilogy)
- Transformers

"I Robot" is the best story and plot.

The matrix 2 & 3 are really going a little bit too far of the imagination of the writers.

And Transformers, my favourite toys of all time. I probably dream of there real excistance This is also a very good story/movie, even for people who didn't grow up with the toys or cartoons. and actually there are to many deferences with the original cartoons, but it's one of my favourite AI

off topic:


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Someone Else
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I liked "The Bicentennial Man", by Arthur C. Clarke.

calamarain
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Someone Else wrote:
I liked "The Bicentennial Man", by Arthur C. Clarke.

It was by Isaac Asimov, not Clarke.

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Beef Row
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Oh, two more that slipped my mind the first time around.

AI (the movie) is excellent, has a perfect ending (but doesn't realize it has it and so goes on for about another half hour.) Its more about the emotional implications of the rather dubious idea of making an artificial replacement for a lost loved one, and well.. the whole Pinocchio theme of longing to be real.

Also, some of Phillip K Dick's books deal with AI.. the most obvious being "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" from which Blade Runner was adapted. Overall, he runs more to the post-apocalyptic than to the cyberpunk (which didn't technically exist as a genre yet when he was writing) but he's a definite influence on it.

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NiroZ
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Beef Row wrote:
Also, some of Phillip K Dick's books deal with AI.. the most obvious being "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" from which Blade Runner was adapted.

Been trying to get my hands on that book for a long time. I managed to read one of his books, A Scanner Darkly, which is a good book in its own right, but the technology in that was more for plot convenience than plot hinges.

Those who like 'I, Robot' the movie (not the book, which is utterly different) I recommend you play System Shock 2. It might take a while to see the connection, but its definitely there and I, Robot is but a dead flower compared to System Shock 2's rose.

I also should probably note that Ghost in the Shell has been attributed as an influence on the Matrix. And it has a more than passing similarity to Neuromancer.

And how closely does Bicentennial man the movie follow the book?