Robocop Trailer: The Belief of Free Will

So the reboot for the robocop film drop the first trailer today, and we got a glimpes of one of my favourite up-and-coming actors Joel Kinnaman as Robocop, as well as always welcome face of Gary Oldman (greatest), Michael Keaton (who’s just getting back on the saddle of acting), Abbie Cornish (Australian), Jay Baruchel (pulling a Jonah Hill and making his way into serious roles) and Samuel L. Jackson (yeah mother fucker).

While the movie actually doesn’t look half bad (I was terribly worried it would look shitty), what interested me the most was something that Gary Oldman’s scientist has done to Robocop; make him believe that he has free will. All the decisions that he makes out in the field he thinks he is making, yet he isn’t. It is his programming that is making him choose. I just thought that it was a really interesting concept. I mean, that begs the question, do we have free will? Well, of course we do right?

Maybe. Maybe we are programmed to think we do.

I won’t delve into that, it hurts my brain. But in terms of design fiction, if we make robots, making them believe they are making their own decisions would probably avoid any sort of I,Robot or Terminator situation.

Anyway, interesting stuff.