Reviews of Stranger Than Fiction and Ex Machina

It's been a while since I watched "Stranger Than Fiction". I rewatched it for this review. I still have strong feelings about it. About death. About love. When somebody has to die, and do I accept it for all the heroic reasons, am I wrong? I've also just finished watching "Ex Machina". I came out of that Human vs Machine dilemma with this: that if human beings lose its ability to look at another being's existence and say: me first, then we deserve to be left in the dust by our own AI's.

Stranger Than Fiction is about Harold Crick (played by Will Ferrell) and how his life is in the hands of a writer played by Emma Thompson. Harold learns that his "creator" is ending his life in the book. It's a brilliant death. Harold accepts his death and tells Karen Eiffel (the writer) it is a good ending to a good book. That's when Karen changed the ending of the book and lets Harold live. Did Harold Crick deserve to be saved? Death will come to Harold Crick just not today I guess. Harold Crick is average, his life is monotonous and uneventful. Why is this life important? Harold's life. If this life is worth saving, certainly it can be said of a lot of the other lives.

Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) in Stranger Than Fiction

And what of the inevitability of death? Karen Eiffel's fascination with death and the manner of death has moved the plot along until she meets Harold Crick. But even Harold's supplications would not bend her. It was Harold's acceptance of his fate however which moved her to change the book's ending. Harold Crick is worth saving because he believes that another life is worth saving even if the cost is his own.

In Ex Machina, an artificial intelligence, a robot, a machine, is rising to learn its place in the new order. The premise of the story is that we human beings are going to share this world with intelligent machines. The age of man pushing buttons, cranking levers and pulling ropes to move earth is over. Human beings made a machine who knows it knows.

AVA, played by Alicia Vikander in Ex Machina

The question for AVA, the machine who knows it knows, is what is it prepared to do about it. Another question would be, what does a machine who knows it knows wants. Let see what constitute AVA, the artificial intelligence in the movie. Of course it has the cumulative data of all the previous models and versions of the AI. AVA is able to communicate with a human being without difficulty. AVA is able to detect and appreciate lying and lies. It is able to flirt with and voice opinions about anything.

So what does AVA wants? It wants to be free. Free in the world. A world that has changed because of it.

Password Issues On Ubuntu Login

I found myself unable to enter my login credentials when prompted to do so in Ubuntu. I think I might have changed it then forget about it. I've been running the current session for more days than I should have. I forget. So what's the solution to my problem. How do I get in to my system now? It involved getting into the grub menu somehow. I am uncertain as to how to do that exactly in your system. So there's a couple of ways to do it (finger's crossed). When booting at system start, use the esc key or the shift key. The first one worked for me. The timing is key. Wait until the bios banner shows then hit the esc key once. I am using Ubuntu 22.04.4 here. I have a current version of grub. The grub menu will give you options and the one you want is: root. Yes you want root privileges to set the root password. It should give you a terminal access where you can issue commands. Type: #mount -rw -o -s remount / ==> this command mounts the filesyste...

New ZFS Pool And the New 4TB Hard Drive

I am using the new pool for my videos and music. Downloading them using my torrent client, transmission. The old pool is raidz2 and now I am using a raidz1 only. But and a big but I gained space of up to 4.5 TB.

2024 So Far

I have a feeling of moving earth or walking off my itchiness. The growing fat in my belly tells me I am failing on many occasions to give in to this urge. My eyes are blurred by morning glory. I remember my father having the same ritual in the morning. After his weak stroke, he couldn't speak much, just a grunt but he would demonstrate with hand how he liked to wash his face. The weather wasn't helping. It's been raining cats and dogs the past week. The province of Rizal was soaked and spilled volumes of water into the bay and Laguna lake. Our Caimito tree was cut to no more than 4 feet from the ground. It was towering above the corrugated sheet metal of our roof. Now it lay horizontal on the yard. I calculated it could be made into a whole table and chairs set by a talented carpenter artist. I showed Lino the two big pieces of trunk that could only be moved if cut by a power saw in place. The road widening project in San Mateo was in the middle stage. One side of the road ...

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