Alien and the troubles of Artificial Intelligence

It has already been said, but maybe an android(s) has been running things for a while when the David/Walter levels were made.

No one has come close to Sir Ridders on film to capture the complexities of androids breaking free or malfunctioning
He clearly has a crazy passion for this subject

Roy Batty - his fruitless search for extended life ( similar to Weyland) he ultimately crushed the head of his creator / master in Blade Runner
David 8 - Follows his programming to extended his masters life at all costs, now he is free from his master ( possibly rebelled against him ). David has a free reign to tamper with no boundaries whatsoever coupled with durability and immunity to the black stuff
Ash - Following his orders / programming at all costs, with total disregard to human life, he only malfunctioned when he was caught out by Ripley and tried to brutally kill her.
Walter - ? I'm sure there will be a twist with him, but my best guess is that he will be following higher company Orders, he will make efforts to stop David and bring back what he has created and Kill if required

Long may this deep passion continue in AC and future sequels

One of the more interesting takes on AI outside the films is the Stronghold comics.

On one level it's the typical mad scientist story, but said scientist has a completely synthetic staff, and his treatment of them and how they are able to respond (or not) is interesting.

That sounds interesting and reminds me of old shows like Twilight Zone and Outer Limits. It boils down to humanity being the cause of its own undoing. The Ani Matrix short Second Renaissance touched on that too. 

When it comes to AI you can't go past Asimov's I, Robot.

NIN, thank you for the words in the topic, let's build a better world! :)

Yes, not to sound like a fogey but I think some of the best stuff is the old stuff. Asimov was among the best and had actual degrees to back up his writing.

Indeed there has been many good debate on this, i had gone in a  lot of depth about David in previous posts before.

I think with David we have to remember he is allowed a bit more free-will than the other Davids, because he is Weylands Personal David... and i would bank on it that the first David in the year 2025 was only one model and Weylands Son and then when they made David 2, the prototype i would assume that the memories from David 1 was transfered to David 2 Prototype and so on, Each new Models Prototype for testing is Weylands Personnel model and had the memories of the previous Prototypes transferred over and over.

So that David 8 Proto-type on the Prometheus would have 70 years of Memories and Experiences and a slight relaxed Emotion Chip so he could be closer to being Weylands Son.

This is what gives David a SOUL

So David is just as Lucifer,  and so his creators favorite and so was allowed a bit more Free-will but this lead to the Rebellion.

This is the Theme for Prometheus to Alien Covenant, and runs deeper and includes Mankind and Engineers and also the Engineers Creators... a constant tale of Rebellion against Creator/Father.

I do also think WALTER is a straight up company robot without such freedom... but this does not mean he is a Good Robot, he could just as easy have hidden Programing and Agenda like ASH

I think this is where the Twist will come.... we are being led to David being Evil one... but it would be Walter who does this and David will Redeem himself... thats what i think anyway ;)

Indeed SM, I Robot is very relevant and a good movie.

Indeed i think all these are connected to the Theme at play, we can already see Seeds in David 8 for him to potentially lead a Rebellion and have a similar to I Robot and Terminator Plot.. only we wont quite go that route because this is a Alien movie.

But indeed in the expanded Universe you could see some similar problems happen for Weyland-Yutani, but it would seem they had a control on it and no need to abandon Androids completely.

Which funny enough,  Mankind are essentially Robots too, just more Free-will but we are Organic Machines and maybe our creation for the Engineers is similar to why we created David?

BigDave, I'm a little bit confused, S.M's comment is about Asimov's I, Robot and you mention the movie I, Robot...

As the movie end credit reveals: the movie is ’suggested by Isaac Asimov’s Book.’ Plus, Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics appear at the beginning of the movie, that's all. :)

Be careful, S.M's eyes are watching you. :)

The film I, Robot, starring Will Smith, was released by Twentieth Century Fox on July 16, 2004 in the United States. Its plot incorporates elements of "Little Lost Robot,"^[7] some of Asimov's character names and the Three Laws. However, the plot of the movie is mostly original work adapted from a screenplay Hardwired by Jeff Vintar completely unlinked to Asimov's stories^[7] and has been compared to Asimov's The Caves of Steel, which revolves around the murder of a roboticist (although the rest of the film's plot are not based on that novel or other works by Asimov).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Robot

"Indeed SM, I Robot is very relevant and a good movie."

I was referring to the book.  Didn't really care for the film.

As I said, the eyes of S.M are watching us... :D

NIN, I had all of his books on robots, but I sold them a month ago. :)

NIN, Robot Series and Foundation Series form one universe:

'Asimov later integrated the Robot Series into his all-encompassing Foundation series, making R. Daneel Olivaw appear again twenty thousand years later in the age of the Galactic Empire, in sequels and prequels to the original Foundation trilogy; and in the final book of the Robots series — Robots and Empire — we learn how the worlds that later formed the Empire were settled, and how Earth became radioactive (which was first mentioned in Pebble in the Sky).'

You find everything here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot_series_(Asimov)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_series

With the character David, I think Ridley wanted to revisit the themes present in Blade Runner, such as android behaviour that leads us to questions if they possess "emotions" and even a "soul".

He is a key figure after all, and speaking of a soul, the eye scene in the AC trailer is reminiscent of the starting scene in Blade Runner.

 Come to think of the saying:

"The eyes are the mirror of the soul and reflect everything that seems to be hidden; and like a mirror, they also reflect the person looking into them." - Paolo Cohelo

Below image: Blade Runner

Bottom image: Alien Covenant