Category Archives: ai106

AI106, DS106 & GITS – it’s about friendship and love

Discovering AI106 (DS106) was running again in 2024 gave me pause for thought. My pause wasn’t just on its theme of artificial intelligence or the Week 1 assignment of getting some inspiration by watching AI related films or reading AI-themed fiction. It was also Paul Bond’s Ghosts of future past blog post.

You had me at GITS

I’m a long time fan of 90s Ghost in the Shell (GITS) film and the later standalone sequel, Innocence. The two television series that make up Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex are also great.

Paul’s astute observations of AI in our current era and in the synthetic world of GITS and the big questions around what it might mean for our future all ring true. Yes, to this. Absolutely.

An enduring friendship

There’s another theme in GITS that really resonates with me (along with all the futuristic tech stuff). Friendship and love – the enduring friendship between Batou and Major.

The enduring friendship and love shared by Batou and Major is not dissimilar to the friendship and love (along with all futuristic tech stuff) shared by DS106 participants throughout its rich history spanning over a decade – it is #4LIFE, after all.

DS106 is back for 2024 in the synthetic-full-body-prosthesis-augmented-cybernetic form of AI106. And, I’m here once again.

But, as long as I’m here and we’ve come this far, I might as well stay awhile and see how it turns out.

Ghosts of future past

For an AI-related movie, I watched the anime version of Ghost in the Shell, a late 20th century vision of five years from now. I hadn’t watched or read it before, so it was about time. I noticed echoes of Bladerunner, RoboCop and The Matrix. The film was based on a manga which seems to unwittingly comment on our current situation.

Manga panel with a character saying "What the hell's going on here? That's just a goddamn teach-mech!"

image from Ghost in the Shell by Masamune Shirow

and also echoes Darwin Among the Machines from 160 years ago:

series of manga panels showing a discussion among robots, saying: Sure! Humans are a pain in the bearings to maintain, so rather than controlling them, we should annihilate them! To make matters easier, we can just trick them into quarreling among themselves - then they'll kill off each other! But wait,,, if there aren't any humans around, we'd have to do our own maintenance, develop our own accessories, and even change our own oil... Maybe we should keep them as slaves... But they're already doing those things, without our controlling or enslaving them.

image from Ghost in the Shell by Masamune Shirow

Beyond the thematic references, I was interested in the philosophical musings on evolution, life and humanity. The hero of the story is a cyborg, essentially a robot with a human brain. Is she then human? She’s not so sure:

Major Motoko Kusanagi: Well, I guess cyborgs like myself have a tendency to be paranoid about our origins. Sometimes I suspect I am not who I think I am, like maybe I died a long time ago and somebody took my brain and stuck it in this body. Maybe there never was a real me in the first place, and I’m completely synthetic like that thing.

Batou: You’ve got human brain cells in that titanium shell of yours. You’re treated like other humans, so stop with the angst.

Major Motoko Kusanagi: But that’s just it, that’s the only thing that makes me feel human. The way I’m treated. I mean, who knows what’s inside our heads? Have you ever seen your own brain?

Batou: It sounds to me like you’re doubting your own ghost.

Major Motoko Kusanagi: What if a cyber brain could possibly generate its own ghost, create a soul all by itself? And if it did, just what would be the importance of being human then?

And that refers to the AI in the film, the Puppet Master

Puppet Master: It can also be argued that DNA is nothing more than a program designed to preserve itself. Life has become more complex in the overwhelming sea of information. And life, when organized into species, relies upon genes to be its memory system. So man is an individual only because of his intangible memory. But memory cannot be defined, yet it defines mankind. The advent of computers and the subsequent accumulation of incalculable data has given rise to a new system of memory and thought, parallel to your own. Humanity has underestimated the consequences of computerization.

quotes from https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ghost_in_the_Shell_(film)

Could we draw a parallel between GPT and DNA? I’m out of my element here of course, but I see in both an encoding of the existing and the production of something new. The issue of memory is significant too. We used to preserve memories with film photography. This had imperfections, but was based on physical reality. The photos I take with my phone are mediated through algorithms, and have been known reinterpret reality.

So I asked our teach-mech Dr. Oblivion, “How does the vision of artificial intelligence presented in Ghost in the Shell hold up in the present day?”

phb256a · Oblivion On Ghost In The Shell

includes sample of Ghosthack from Ghost In The Shell (1995) OST

I think if I asked a better question, I might have gotten a better response. AI apps aren’t known for insight, and sometimes give us the most obvious string of words. Will our AI future be dystopian, or just disappointing?

The doctor does touch on an important point. We built the internet in order to augment human intelligence. Around the time of Ghost in the Shell, we opened it up to commercial exploitation, and a few people became unimaginably wealthy. For the past couple decades, more and more it’s been developed as a tool for social control. So who is the web for? Who is AI for? In ds106 we all have our own little pieces of the web, as it was meant to be. Entities like Alphabet and Amazon and Meta and Microsoft come along like Columbus and plant a flag in it and claim it for their own. Do we go along with that, or do we want open, public infrastructure? The easy path may not be the most rewarding.

“How… creative”

Earlier today Michael Branson Smith brought his Dr. Oblivion bot to life on the web. Cogdog had the doctor produce an ode to HTML:

Which was great. We had talked about having students submit their work to Dr. Oblivion for feedback, so here was an opportunity to try it out:

That little pause between how and creative is perfect. OK, but what more could I do with this? Well, I could find an open source backing track from bensound that sounded appropriate for beatnik poetry and put it all together:

phb256a · HTMLsonnet

Something tells me it will be an interesting semester.

Zine vs machine

I hadn’t paid much attention to zines until recently. The Gettin’ Air episode with Dr. Anne Pasek talked about a zine-based conference raised my interest, and then some criticisms of our library brochure led me to slap together to above zine thing. Today I heard about the HTML Zine Club and thought it had possibilities.

I wonder if we might use this with ds106. There is a category for code assignments, but I’ve never done anything with it due to my ineptitude. It could also work under web assignments which I’ve given minimal attention. There is a primitiveness to the zine concept, a punk-rock anyone-can-do-it aesthetic, that suits a basic HTML page.

I was thinking it might work in AI106 as a rebel action – fight back against the machine by taking control of the inner workings, or something like that. It might be a Luddite move, or a way of infiltrating a Luddite group.
If we do it late in the semester it could be a way of bringing together previous work and creations in a low tech way, a handmade web page substituting for a handmade zine, presenting some sort of narrative. It’s something to think about

BOOM!

The good people at Metafilter introduced me to NEEDS MORE BOOM today, which will apparently script Bayhem into any movie scene. My first thought was to see what it would do with Nicholson’s “You can’t handle the truth” scene, which came out okay.

So what might it do with Radio Raheem?

The output is below. Not really what I expected. It somehow feels happier. I’m wondering how this might be used in AI106. Could this be built upon, illustrated and visualized? Sweded? Or made into an audio production?

The Love and Hate soliloquy scene with Radio Raheem in Do the Right Thing
directed by Michael Bay
INT. SAL’S PIZZERIA – NIGHT

The neon sign outside the pizzeria flickers, casting a menacing glow on RADIO RAHEEM’S face as he enters, wielding his BOOMBOX like a weapon.

Raheem’s music clashes with the rock ballad playing inside, causing an eerie dissonance. He’s a tower of a man, decked out in rings. A DRONE shot reveals two rings: one that reads “LOVE”, the other “HATE”.

RAHEEM
You see these? These are my rings.

Sal looks disinterested, wiping down the counter. Raheem turns up the volume on his boombox, causing the chandelier to vibrate.

RAHEEM (CONT’D)
This here is LOVE. And this…HATE.

Suddenly, a low angle shot shows the LOVE ring activate, glowing bright as it projects a holographic story. It’s a modern Romeo and Juliet tale, except with more explosions. Laughter, love, then tragedy.

RAHEEM (CONT’D)
Love always wins. Always.

Sal rolls his eyes. Raheem steps closer, the floor creaking under his weight. The HATE ring activates, projecting an equally explosive war scene filled with missiles and robots.

RAHEEM (CONT’D)
Hate is everywhere. But love? Love is stronger.

Suddenly, the Italian opera aria crescendos, and the ceiling fan spins out of control, then EXPLODES. Everyone ducks for cover.

Sal raises an eyebrow at Raheem, dusting plaster off his apron.

SAL
So what? You a philosopher now?

RAHEEM
Just speaking truth, Sal.

A close-up of the LOVE ring glowing, Raheem slams his fist on the counter. The BOOM causes the plates on the wall to quiver.

RAHEEM (CONT’D)
Love is a powerful thing.

Suddenly, the ground rumbles, and a CAR bursts through the wall, chased by a ROBOT DOG. The two tumble out into the street, causing a fantastic EXPLOSION.

Sal and Raheem look at each other, then back at the wall.

SAL
Well, that was unexpected.

As they walk outside to assess the damage, a small PIZZA BOX near the counter ticks ominously, followed by a tiny, yet impactful EXPLOSION, sending bits of cheese and tomato sauce flying.

FADE OUT.

“When a plan comes together”

The best part of co-teaching, the most fun, is seeing how different ideas come together. As we’re planning AI106, I get to see all the genius conceptions gel, and hopefully make more of my thoughts than I could on my own.

I had a couple ideas coming in. One I touched upon earlier comes from reading Sontag, and Sacasas as well. Storytelling is a fundamental human activity. It is necessary in that it is how we understand the world, and essential in that it is something we’re driven to do. While it may be possible for a tech app to string words together in the form of a story, any deep meaning in the story would come from the human reader rather than the machine generator. When I had ChatGPT create a story outline, it put forth something workable. But it was also too familiar, lacking in any twists or surprises. The output is like an averaging of storylines, squarely targeting mediocrity. I’m not sure how to work this idea into the run of the course, but it may fuel ongoing discussion.

In many iterations of ds106 students created characters that they used to interact with the course and build stories around. We have floated the idea that in AI106 their characters could be human or bots. My second idea borrows from role-playing games. We could have a list of character archtypes, like

Innovator – interested in making new things, trying new things, open to risk and disdainful of guardrails
Regulator – interested in stability and security, approaches risk with great caution
Luddite – militantly values people over property and technology
Mad genius – feels entitled to rule the world by virtue of intellectual superiority
Documentarian – tracks the facts and tells their story
Technician – dedicated to making things work and keeping things running
Artist – sees all tech as paintbrushes and palettes, tools and media for self-expression
Evangelist – dedicated to spreading the good news and preaching the potential, disinterested in drawbacks
Philosopher – works to bring clarity to truth, meaning and ethics
Investor – feels entitled to rule the world by virtue of financial advantage

and have the students fit their characters into one. This could give the students some inspiration and direction, and sets the stage for interaction and plot development while giving the class a lot of latitude to determine where the story goes.

Perhaps in honor of Oblivion U I will bring an Oblivions set to ds106radio one of these days. The music may not be for everyone, but some of the attitude might suit the course.

Tech Noir

The Darker Side of ds106