Stanley Kubrick's A.I. film and my Mind Children book
I think Kubrick liked Mind Children when it appeared in 1988
because it articulated ideas he had settled on decades before. For
instance, the plot of 2001 was an adaptation of Arthur C. Clarke's
early great novel "Childhood's End" about humanity's transcendence,
while HAL reflected Marvin Minsky's ideas about machine transcendence.
The New York Times has a page of archived Kubrick articles:
http://www.nytimes.com/library/film/kubrick-index.html
In an interview at the time of the release of 2001, In 2001, Will
Love Be a Seven-Letter Word? (April 14, 1968) Kubrick mentions that
we should think of machines as our children, and a means to overcome
our biological limitations:
It's generally thought that after a highly-developed science
gets you past the mortality stage, you become part-animal, part-
machine, then all machine. Eventually, perhaps, pure energy.
Another article on the NYT page 'A.I.': The Masterpiece a Master
Couldn't Get Right (July 18, 1999) (or local copy) mentions the
"Mind Children" role. It seems Kubrick gave a series of screenplay
writers (at least Bob Shaw and Ian Watson) copies of Brain Aldiss'
"Super Toys Last All Summer Long", "Pinocchio" and "Mind Children" to
meld.
Ian Watson mentions this in a Playboy interview
http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/sk/memories/iw.htm (or local copy)
A Kubrick FAQ quotes John Baxter's Kubrick biography quoting Bob Shaw
on it:
http://members.nbci.com/scifimovies/art_kub_2.html
http://members.nbci.com/scifimovies/art_kub_1.html
(or local copy)
Steven Spielberg's A.I. is faithful to Kubrick's script. The movie
has three distinct parts. In part one we meet David, teddy and family
as in "Super Toys". Part two, David's quest for real boyhood through
a dangerous world, resembles "Pinocchio". Part three has
ultra-advanced robots technologically resurrecting a human, an idea
suggested in "Mind Children".
Hans Moravec -- June 25, 2001
Here's a summary of my side of the interaction with the Kubrick
household assembled a few years ago:
Some time in mid 1993 I received a phone message from Anthony (Tony)
Frewin, Stanley Kubrick's assistant at Boreham Wood, saying that
Kubrick had greatly appreciated my book "Mind Children" and was
interested to read in a magazine that I was writing another, then
titled "Mind Age: Transcendence through Robots". Three or four
chapters were done at the time, and I called back to say I'd be happy
to provide the draft to date, not least out of appreciation for
2001. Frewin indicated that Kubrick didn't yet want to reveal what
project my books fed.
On September 16, 1993 I received a fax from Frewin saying Kubrick had
been travelling and wanted to thank me for the typescript, and eagerly
looked forward to reading it.
On November 28, 1993 I happened across a newspaper article: "Kubrick
to direct a big-budget 'AI'" - ... project is shrouded in secrecy ...
post-greenhouse world where many daily tasks are performed by robots
... Kubrick put aside "Aryan Papers" to work on it ... necessary
computer effects weren't available [before] ...
Over the next year I sent subsequent chapters as they were done. A
covering letter with the final chapter 6 on May 17, 1994 thanks Frewin
for a phone message confirming receipt of chapter 5.
I remember a call around then from Frewin in which he thanked me and
indicated that Kubrick had wanted to speak directly, but had to put it
off until later because he was "so very, very busy."
Then there was no further contact. The news started to be about "Eyes
Wide Shut," but I figured he'd get back eventually ...
The publication of the new book was delayed in 1995 by publisher
hijinks, and I took the opportunity to update, expand and slightly
reorganize it to seven chapters in 1996. It was finally published in
January 1999 (actually late 1998) under the title "Robot: mere machine
to transcendent mind".
Oh, I forgot one tenuous interaction: On September 11, 1995 I was at
NASA HQ in Washington at an event instigated by director Dan Goldin to
give a talk along with Roger Penrose (sort of playing the patsy:
Goldin had really liked Penrose's anti-AI book, and I was there for
balance). At the dinner following Penrose mentioned that he had been
looking to possibly buy a house in Cambridge owned by Brian Aldiss,
and that when Aldiss heard that Penrose would be meeting the author of
"Mind Children" he was very excited, and sent greetings! Asked by
others at the table who Brian Aldiss was, I said he was a well-known
British science fiction writer, whose stories had been a formative
influence in my development. Penrose said Aldiss would be pleased to
hear that. The Kubrick connection was mentioned subliminally.
Hans Moravec -- November 17, 1999