> I thought everyone in AI, and most HN readers, had seen "Colossus - The Forbin Project" by now.

You assume anyone in AI reads or watches anything beyond some current pop-culture, and even then it's unlikely. You can see it in the way they talk, or approach problems, or in their opinions.

It's not the history of another form of intelligent life following the same path, to draw any meaningful conclusions. It's a movie.

Let's consider the ending:

>Forbin defiantly responds "Never!"

That signals a human who wants to take some other human's share, by ... means. He wants that freedom. As do all the people who are now controlling this tech, and our lives to some degree. Of-course they want that freedom.

I've seen much of the AI industry, from CEOs to their whistleblowers and lobbyists, basically repeat the premise of this movie - that AI will become powerful and benevolent/malevolent. They don't seem to care which one is talked about, as long as "powerful" remains a silent assumption.

It's not just AI, this general phenomenon is called "being terminally online"

Elon Musk seems to repeat the stuff that ran around lesswrong quite often. And I'm sure some of the people investing on AI right now are afraid of Roko's Basilisk. And of course there's plenty of references to Yudkowsky, either knowingly or not (ironically, I've never seen anybody talk about that MIT study that created the Yudkowsky's timeline).

But that's it. I don't think there's more cultural references to be found.

exactly. Everyone grew up under the propaganda of liberalism and ayn rand powerful benevolent genius.

they idolatre Iron Man/stark like a god.

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