Filmmaker James Cameron has said he warned the world about the rise of artificial intelligence and its dangers decades ago with his 1984 hit film The Terminator.
In a new interview with CTV News, the iconic director shared his thoughts on the surging fears over AI and its encroaching role in Hollywood amid the Writers Guild of America’s ongoing strike and demands for job protections against AI technology.
The Oscar winner made it clear that he’s more concerned AI will cause a nuclear disaster than create “a good story”, which he believes requires humans.
“I think the weaponisation of AI is the biggest danger,” James said. “I think that we will get into the equivalent of a nuclear arms race with AI, and if we don’t build it, the other guys are for sure going to build it, and so then it’ll escalate.”
“You could imagine an AI in a combat theatre,” he added. “The whole thing just being fought by the computers at a speed humans can no longer intercede, and you have no ability to de-escalate.”
Pointing to his classic film, The Terminator, which follows a self-aware AI cyborg named Skynet that takes control of the world and launches an attack on humanity, James declared: “I warned you guys in 1984! And you didn’t listen.”
When asked about natural language processing tools driven by AI tech, like ChatGPT, and their ability to produce compelling screenplays, James argued that “you have to be human to write that”.
“I just don’t personally believe that a disembodied mind that’s just regurgitating what other embodied minds have said — about the life that they’ve had, about love, about lying, about fear, about mortality — and just put it all together into a word salad and then regurgitate it,” he said.
“I don’t believe that’s ever going to have something that’s going to move an audience. You have to be human to write that. I don’t know anyone that’s even thinking about having AI write a screenplay.”
Though James maintained that he “wouldn’t be interested” in AI writing his scripts, he declared: “Let’s wait 20 years, and if an AI wins an Oscar for Best Screenplay, I think we’ve got to take them seriously.”
James isn’t the only star who doesn’t seem troubled over AI storytelling possibilities.
The creator of Netflix’s Black Mirror, Charlie Brooker, admitted last month that he used ChatGPT to help draft an episode for the series ahead of its season six premiere, but it turned out to be “shit.”
Charlie said all the AI chatbot did was to basically sift through the show’s episode synopses and “sort of mush them together”, resulting in a colossal disappointment.