USA: We're 'entering the age of artificial stupidity' – Westworld co-creator Jonathan Nolan

W/S Cast of Westworld arrives, San Diego
M/S Cast
W/S Panel
M/S Audience
SOT, Jonathan Nolan, Westworld co-creator: "You know, the thing about dystopias is they can look pretty beautiful. Right? But just because the world, you know, is corrupt on the inside doesn't mean it can't be smoothed over and pretty on the outside. So we wanted to find ourselves a version of a dystopia that didn't anything we'd seen before."
M/S Photographers
SOT, Jonathan Nolan, Westworld co-creator: "You know, the form of AI that we got on the show is thoughtful. I mean, murderous but thoughtful. And I think we're actually entering the age of artificial stupidity. I think that's where we're headed now, a low grade, kind of dumb algorithmic world where you picture… This is one of the concepts we started talking about when we were looking at this season, you know, trying to figure out what the rest of the world looks like, if indeed that is where the show is. And one of the things that happening is, you should call it the - well, HBO won't like this, but, the Netflix effect, right? Which is Netflix tells you what you want to watch next, because it's some giant algorithm in the sky that watches what you watch and decides you're going to watch manga for the rest of the night. So just picture that applied to every part of your whole life, and that kind of feels like the world that - when you talk to technologists, they talk about algorithmic determinism in quiet, kind of hushed terms because they know we've already built it, we're already kind of in there."
W/S Audience
SOT, Jonathan Nolan, Westworld co-creator: "You get to play around with these big ideas and present them to the audience as if they're far in the future, but they're not, they're kind of right now. And one of the fun things about the third season is we discard the idea of metaphor and just deal with the world for what it is, which is a giant shit show."
M/S Audience member asking question
SOT, Thandie Newton, Actor: "We as human beings, we control ourselves, you know, we teach ourselves how to be in the same way that human beings have taught robots how to be. And we're not doing a very good job, you know, we're not teaching ourselves the right thing. So, like, what's so beautiful about this artificial intelligence is that they're being taught important skills, and it's what they're going to do with them, is what separates them from us, and we should be embarrassed by how we're doing."
M/S Panel
SOT, Jeffrey Wright, Actor: "It just seems like a glaringly obvious driver behind wealth disparity in our country and we don't have a conversation about it, so I'm really appreciative that we at least have a conversation on our show about these things and increasingly show, this year, in season 3, the ways in which inequality is being driven, increasingly by these tools that we're all kind of addicted to at the same time. So, interesting little hook there.
M/S Panel
SOT, Aaron Paul, Actor: "Each script that we read, the onion is sort of just peeled back for us as actors, kind of learning more about our characters. So this is obviously a very new character to this world, to this show, but I think what Caleb does is, just, gives the fans of the show just a look at, just, one of the humans living in, sort of, futuristic society. You know, people 50 years ago would look at this society as being just a crazy, crazy futuristic world that just seems impossible to exist, but what you're about to see, season 3, is just right around the corner like, like he was talking about, and that is insane."
W/S Panel
M/S Panel
C/U Comic Con logo
W/S San Diego, California
SCRIPT
The cast and creators of HBO's Westworld unveiled a new trailer for the show at Comic Con on Saturday in San Diego, California. They also discussed the show's futuristic technologies being "right around the corner" and their implications for our society.
"I think we're actually entering the age of artificial stupidity. I think that's where we're headed now, a low grade, kind of dumb algorithmic world," co-creator Jonathan Nolan said. "One of the things that happening is, you should call it the - well, HBO won't like this, but, the Netflix effect, right? Which is Netflix tells you what you want to watch next. […] Just picture that applied to every part of your whole life, […] we're already kind of in there."
New cast-member Aaron Paul said, "People 50 years ago would look at this society as being just a crazy, crazy futuristic world that just seems impossible to exist, but what you're about to see, season 3, is just right around the corner like, like he was talking about, and that is insane."
Westworld's third season, set in a futuristic version of Los Angeles, is scheduled to broadcast in 2020.
While originally focused on comic books, San Diego Comic Con has become one of the largest yearly events focusing on nerd culture, gathering hundreds of thousands of cosplayers and fans every year. It will take place until Monday.