@rooprect said:

@wonder2wonder said:

@Knixon said:

I have a hard time with the later stuff because of the idea of HAL having a "consciousness" that can exist somewhere separate from the machine. Nope.

I don't intend to discuss this, but this does remind me of a Science and Philosophy question 'What is consciousness?'.

That's a favorite topic of mine too. Do you know of any movies that get into it?

I guess in a passing way this movie mentions it, but only in the early scene when SAL asks Chandra if she will dream when she's temporarily shut off, and Chandra says "Of course you will, all intelligent beings dream." That would imply that, at least according to Clarke, SAL is conscious. HAL asks the same question at the end, referring to his death, and Chandra says "I don't know."

That itself is a loaded line, touching on the subject of whether consciousness exists after death.

Actually that's what Chandra says to SAL, back at the university before leaving on the Leonov. SAL was not being turned off, just having various portions disconnected as was done with HAL. And no electronic machine could "dream" or anything else, when turned OFF.

When HAL asks about dreaming, just as Chandra is getting ready to leave Discovery, his answer is "I don't know."

Of course, Chandra WANTS TO believe HAL - and SAL - are conscious. But that doesn't mean he's correct.

Since SAL and HAL are both machines, while their mechanisms are being tested etc they would likely malfunction in various ways, and the recordings of those malfunctions might be "dreams" to Chandra, but so what? All they really are is error logs. Windows does that.

@rooprect said:

@wonder2wonder said:

@Knixon said:

I have a hard time with the later stuff because of the idea of HAL having a "consciousness" that can exist somewhere separate from the machine. Nope.

I don't intend to discuss this, but this does remind me of a Science and Philosophy question 'What is consciousness?'.

That's a favorite topic of mine too. Do you know of any movies that get into it?

Here is a documentary film.