Alex Garland's 'Ex Machina': is true artificial intelligence sci-fi or sci-fact?

Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter for all the latest entertainment news and reviews Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. “But we are approaching a point where machines will be willing to say to us: ‘Please don’t switch me off…’ They’ll have the capacity to want something, to feel things.” This view is shared by Ex Machina’s scientific advisors: Murray Shanahan, a professor in cognitive robotics at Imperial College, whose writings form the basis for the film’s logic, and geneticist and science broadcaster Adam Rutherford. “The robotics side of things – Ava’s body – we can get to in 10 or 15 years I think,” says Shanahan. “I don’t think there’s anything inherently bad about creating a conscious machine,” he says, “because we create new consciousness routinely in the propagation of our species – we have children. Plan auto-renews until cancelled Try for free open image in gallery Garland's writing credits include 2002's '28 Days Later' Rutherford, too, dismisses Hawking’s warnings: “I don’t think he knows what he’s talking about,” he says.