Entertainment through film and media is something that almost every person in our society enjoys and uses as a way to connect with other people. One thing that a lot of people can probably agree on is that movies, while still fiction for the most part, are very often a reflection of issues or phenomenons in our reality. You can find a piece of reality in almost any movie, no matter how far removed from the real world it seems. Another undeniable truth is that movies and entertainment have an incredible amount of influence on people and their opinions. It’s also impossible to deny that AI is rising in influence with the debut of LLMs such as ChatGPT and engineers such as Elon Musk exploring the manufacturing of life-like robots, and there seems to be a very common distrust of it throughout society. All of this tied together, the question to be explored is how does the depiction of AI in consumer media correlate to the fear, distrust, and overall ill feelings that many people have towards advancing AI technology?
Being a research project, sources will play a key role in developing the argument. The background sources will help to explain the common ways that AI has been depicted in media throughout time and as it became more prevalent. Sources such as Greer’s “Escaping Only So Far” can be used as theory sources that support the narratives of entertainment media being a reflection of real world issues and the influence it has on people. Exhibit sources, pieces of actual media/movies such as Avengers: Age of Ultron or the Terminator movies, will provide evidence of the phenomenon that is being explored and help the reader really see the depictions of AI that cause that innate fear. Argument sources will aid in setting up the claim and getting the point across to the reader; a specific source that will be especially useful in this is the “Public understanding of AI intelligence through entertainment media,” which explores a lot of the topics that will be included in this paper. Finally, motive sources will give the argument a foundation and provide a reason that this topic should be talked about and explored.
1 Comment
Add Yours →I think your exhibit pieces will fit in very well into your paper, and I am also using Age of Ultron as an exhibit piece to draw points/examples out and use them for my argument. However, I do have a question that naturally arises as I read your intro paragraph. Obviously the rising of these more sci-fi movies is correlated with a higher distrust in AI and LLMs, but does the general public actually need to fear AI or is it the product of cases taken to the extreme in popular media, or somewhere in between as a culmination of the two?