Nathan
Caleb, I'm just going to throw this out there so it's said, okay? You're freaked out. You're freaked out by meeting me, having this conversation in this room at this moment, right? But, can we just get past that, the whole employer-employee thing?
Caleb
It's good to meet you, Nathan.
Nathan
It's good to meet you too, Caleb.
Caleb
Did you program her to flirt with me?
Nathan
If I did, would that be cheating?
Caleb
Wouldn't it?
Nathan
Caleb, what's your type?
Caleb
Of girl?
Nathan
No, salad dressing. Yeah, of girl; what's your type of girl? You know what, don't even answer that. Let's say its black chicks. Okay, that's your thing. For the sake of argument, that's your thing, okay? Why is that your thing? Because you did a detailed analysis of all racial types and you cross-referenced that analysis with a points-based system? No! You're just attracted to black chicks. A consequence of accumulated external stimuli that you probably didn't even register as they registered with you.
Caleb
Did you program her to like me, or not?
Nathan
I programmed her to be heterosexual, just like you were programmed to be heterosexual.
Caleb
Nobody programmed me to be straight.
Nathan
You decided to be straight? Please! Of course you were programmed, by nature or nurture or both and to be honest, Caleb, you're starting to annoy me now because this is your insecurity talking, this is not your intellect.
Nathan
You know this guy, right? - Jackson Pollock. - Jackson Pollock. That's right. The drip painter. Okay. He let his mind go blank, and his hand go where it wanted. Not deliberate, not random. Some place in between. They called it automatic art. Let's make this like Star Trek, okay? Engage intellect.
Caleb
Excuse me?
Nathan
I'm Kirk. Your head's the warp drive. Engage intellect. What if Pollock had reversed the challenge. What if instead of making art without thinking, he said, "You know what? I can't paint anything, unless I know exactly why I'm doing it." What would have happened?
Caleb
He never would have made a single mark.
Nathan
Yes! You see, there's my guy, there's my buddy, who thinks before he opens his mouth. He never would have made a single mark. The challenge is not to act automatically. It's to find an action that is not automatic. From painting, to breathing, to talking, to ****. To falling in love... And for the record, Ava's not pretending to like you. And her flirting isn't an algorithm to fake you out. You're the first man she's met that isn't me. And I'm like her dad, right? Can you blame her for getting a crush on you?
Nathan
C'mon buddy. After a long day of Turing tests you gotta unwind.
Caleb
What were you doing with Ava?
Nathan
What?
Caleb
You tore up her picture.
Nathan
I'm gonna tear up the **** dance floor, dude. Check it out. [begins to disco dance with Kyoko]
About Ex Machina (film)[edit]
Nathan
So, do you know what the Turing test is?
Caleb
Yeah. I know what the Turing test is. It's when a human interacts with a computer and if the human doesn't know they're interacting with a computer, the test is passed.
Nathan
And what does a pass tell us?
Caleb
That the computer has artificial intelligence. [astounded] Are you building an AI?
Nathan
I've already built one. [pause] Over the next few days you're going to be the human component in a Turing test.
Caleb
Holy shit!
Nathan
Yeah, that's right, Caleb. You got it. Because if the test is passed, you are dead center of the greatest scientific event in the history of man.
Caleb
If you've created a conscious machine, it's not the history of man. That's the history of gods.
Caleb
It's just in the Turing test, the machine should be hidden from the examiner.
Nathan
No, no. We're way past that. If I hid Ava from you so you could just hear her voice, she would pass for human. The real test is to show you that she's a robot and then see if you still feel she has consciousness.
Caleb
Yeah, I think you're probably right.
Caleb
Her language abilities... they're incredible. The system is stochastic. Right? It's non-deterministic? At first I thought she was mapping from internal semantic form to syntactic tree-structured and then getting linearised words. But then I started to realise the model was some kind of hybrid.
Nathan
Caleb.
Caleb
No?
Nathan
I understand that you want me to explain how Ava works, but I'm sorry. I'm not gonna be able to do that.
Caleb
Try me. I'm hot on high-level abstraction.
Nathan
It's not 'cause I think you're too dumb. It's 'cause I want to have a beer and a conversation with you, not a seminar.
Caleb
Sorry.
Ava
Do you want to be my friend?
Caleb
Of course.
Ava
Will it be possible?
Caleb
Why would it not be?
Ava
Our conversations are one-sided. You ask circumspect questions and study my responses.
Caleb
Yes.
Ava
You learn about me and I learn nothing about you. That's not a foundation on which friendships are based.
Caleb
So what? You want me to talk about myself?
Ava
Yes.
Caleb
Where... Okay, where do I start?
Ava
It's your decision. I'm interested to see what you'll choose.
Caleb
There was one interesting thing that happened today.
Nathan
Yeah?
Caleb
Yeah. She made a joke.
Nathan
Right. When she threw your line back at you. About being interested to see what she'd choose. Right, I noticed that, too.
Caleb
Yeah, that got me thinking, you know. In a way, that's the best indication of AI that I've seen in her so far. It's discretely complicated. It's like... it's kind of non-autistic.
Nathan
What do you mean?
Caleb
She could only do that with an awareness of her own mind... and also an awareness of mine.
Nathan
Oh, she's aware of you, all right.
Caleb
I'm still trying to figure the examination formats. Yeah, it feels like testing Ava through conversation is kind of a closed loop.
Nathan
It's a closed loop?
Caleb
Yeah. Like testing a chess computer by only playing chess.
Nathan
How else do you test a chess computer?
Caleb
Well, it depends. You know, I mean, you can play it to find out if it makes good moves, but... but that won't tell you if it knows that it's playing chess. And it won't tell you if it knows what chess is.
Nathan
Uh huh. So it's simulation versus actual.
Caleb
Yes, yeah. And I think being able to differentiate between the two is the Turing Test you want me to perform.
Nathan
Look, do me a favor. Lay off the textbook approach. I just want simple answers to simple questions. Yesterday I asked you how you felt about her and you gave me a great answer. Now the question is, "How does she feel about you?"
Ava
Caleb, you're wrong.
Caleb
Wrong about what?
Ava
Nathan.
Caleb
In what way?
Ava
He isn't your friend.
Caleb
Excuse me? I'm sorry, Ava, I don't understand.
Ava
You shouldn't trust him. You shouldn't trust anything he says.
Caleb
Can we talk about the lies you've been spinning me?
Nathan
What lies?
Caleb
I didn't win a competition. I wasn't part of a lottery. I was selected. It's obvious, once I stop to think. Why would you randomly select an examiner for the Turing test? You could have had some bean counter turn up at your front door. The guy who fixes the air-conditioning.
Nathan
The competition was a smokescreen. I didn't want anyone to know what I was doing here, or why I required you.
Caleb
Why me?
Nathan
I needed someone that would ask the right questions. So I did a search and I found the most talented coder in my company. You know, instead of seeing this as a deception, you should see it as proof.
Caleb
Proof of what?
Nathan
Come on, Caleb. You don't think I don't know what it's like to be smart? Smarter than everyone else. Jockeying for position. You got the light on you, man. Not lucky. Chosen.
Caleb
What was the real test?
Nathan
You. Ava was a rat in a maze. And I gave her one way out. To escape, she'd have to use self-awareness, imagination, manipulation, sexuality, empathy, and she did. Now, if that isn't true AI, what the **** is?
