Terminator-201 "Samson & Delilah" - Discuss/Grade <Spoiler>

[Ryan8bit]

Ok, I will defer to 3D Master on the workings of a modern computer since he is clearly the expert, and I am not. I'm wrong to try and apply standards of a modern-day processor to a fictional neural net processor. I'm not too familiar with how a fictional processor works, but as I have always known it, any type of CPU simply processes data, it does not store it. Read-only just does not seem to apply to a processor to me. Maybe if someone can explain it to me, that would be nice, but I never really wanted to argue every last detail of the tech stuff in the first place.

I'm just going to restate what I actually care about: Damaged hardware should not be able to be repaired strictly by software, and I don't like the idea of a switch in place for any type of learning function. I really doubt Cameron's switch had to do with this.

I do not believe anything, I know this for a certain fact. I have doctorate in computer science, I know computers like the back of my hand. So you can find fault with I'm saying as much as you want to, that makes you wrong, and I'm right.

So do you know how a neural net processor really works then? I wasn't strictly referring to the factual computer tech stuff either when speaking of beliefs.

In short, the T-800 was an obstacle that needed to be removed at that time, this is not something it learned, this was simply following programming.

Wouldn't that just be really bad programming then? Obviously these things in the script were done for more dramatic purposes than for scientific accuracy, and rightfully so in this case.

Wrong. If it survived long enough to build up its army, it would be in the same position of power, and MORE so, because it's smarter than Skynet AND mobile.

How is a terminator going to build an army? Especially one rivaling that of one of the major nations of the world?

Exactly, if it's a pre-destination paradox, you can't change anything whether you want to or not. However, if you CAN change things, while you've won, you're not GOING to change anything, because that change may lead to your defeat.

Ugh. You can't make a change if you don't even know what you were changing to begin with. This is the last time I'll try and explain this:

Let's say John grows up without ever having had a T-1000 come after him when he was a teenager. This is reasonable if the future is indeed changeable. In his future, he notices a T-1000 is sent to the past, so he sends a reprogrammed T-800 to protect him. He never had a T-800 come to protect him, so he doesn't actually have any memory of the switch being on or off. Get it?

Wrong. Just because something CAN change something, doesn't mean you WILL and/or MUST change anything when you go back in time.

And I never said that. I was purely illustrating the differences between a paradox and a non-paradox, and you just misunderstood.

The phrase wasn't programmed into the Terminator. Didn't you pay attention? It picked it up from the guys he killed. The Terminator stored it in its memory. The subroutine that CHOSE that line to be spoken is the one that's been programmed in.

Ok, I got confused by what you were trying to say. Essentially, you are saying that it wasn't learned, just stored, which somewhat implies it being preprogrammed (obviously not what you meant). But how does a terminator go from learning a phrase to using it in an appropriate situation? It really does sound like learning to me, even if the most basic kind of learning. Why are there even multiple options, each equally acceptable? I'm sure it makes sense to appear random, and perhaps it was solely chosen at random.

That means I am right, that he did NOT build Cameron, that he just reporgrammed it.

Right. My original qualm was with him saying "I made her" coupled with the fact that her base programming includes a mission to kill John. I said as much that "I made her" could be twisted to sound like he only reprogrammed her, but that's pretty lame wording.

 

[Meat Tenderizer]

^ Excellent point.

Just wanted to add this though: The T-X had corrupted the systems of the T-850, that is correct, but according to the script and novel the T-X was in control over the T-850's systems remotely (similar to how it controlled the police cruisers and fire trucks in the film). It could only prevent the Termination by resetting itself because the connection would have been lost.

Thank you for the clarification. I didn't know that.

 

[Deamon]

Ok, I will defer to 3D Master on the workings of a modern computer since he is clearly the expert, and I am not. I'm wrong to try and apply standards of a modern-day processor to a fictional neural net processor. I'm not too familiar with how a fictional processor works, but as I have always known it, any type of CPU simply processes data, it does not store it. Read-only just does not seem to apply to a processor to me. Maybe if someone can explain it to me, that would be nice, but I never really wanted to argue every last detail of the tech stuff in the first place.

I'm just going to restate what I actually care about: Damaged hardware should not be able to be repaired strictly by software, and I don't like the idea of a switch in place for any type of learning function. I really doubt Cameron's switch had to do with this.

I do not believe anything, I know this for a certain fact. I have doctorate in computer science, I know computers like the back of my hand. So you can find fault with I'm saying as much as you want to, that makes you wrong, and I'm right.

So do you know how a neural net processor really works then? I wasn't strictly referring to the factual computer tech stuff either when speaking of beliefs.

Neural net processors don't exist yet, but neural networks do, they're being used in Machine Learning applications today.

A neural net is fundamentally different from a normal computer. A standard computer (the so-called Von Neumann architecture) has a CPU and a memory that contains both program and data. The CPU fetches an instruction from memory, executes it (usually performing an operation of some sort on data), and fetches the next one, ad infinitum or until you pull the plug.
A neural net consists of a collection of processing elements that pass data along; input flows from one to the next via connections called synapses until it reaches the output. Every synapse has a synaptic weight associated with it, think of it as the importance attributed to that particular connection. The 'program' of a neural net is embodied in the total of these weights.

The upshot of this is that a neural net does not execute a program, it is it's own programming. The learning ability of a neural net consists of being able to, based on feedback, modify these weights to produce a more desirable output next time, and make new connections between neurons.

A neural net processor would still have need of an external data store though, and whatever program it's running could easily be made to accomodate new data that's added to it (like "Fuck You, Asshole"). But as long as it's set to read-only, it would not be able to modify it's program, just the data in memory.

That is probably why reprogrammed Terminators sometimes 'go bad', it's pretty hard to modify a program that's distributed all over the CPU itself, especially since you don't want to wipe the whole thing and start over, unless you want to teach it how to walk, see etc. from scratch.

But answer your remark: a neural net can, if not repair, at least compensate for hardware damage; by cutting the damaged bits out of the system (set their weights to zero) and possibly making new connections to replace the old ones.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Here's how I like to think it happens. Everytime she sees him, her programming tells her to kill him, and then every time the override kicks in. It wasn't that the kill order just "appeared", it's the counterorder which suddenly blinked out.

Shirley sung the song at the beginning?

That was pretty.

She talks a lot for a terminator.

I don't think she is a terminator.

Probably more up the food chain.

An administrator or some mid level military rank.

Because Skynet is building a culture.

When the dust settles, it doesn't want to be alone.

And it can't cap the intellect of all it's citizens like was explained in the extended version of Terminator Two. A servant class and a ruling class. How feudal.

 

[Sephiroth]

Shirley has a great voice, i went to a garbage concert back in 2000 and it was awesome, and i think she isin't working for SKYnet's interests, i think she's working for her own

 

[Guy Gardener]

Kids. You raise'em good. treat them right, and they still want kill their fathers and fuck their mothers.

I wonder how many men pissed in her while she waited to see who was disloyal?

Of course she could be more green, um, "yellow" with her power source and she may have just been waiting for someone to fill her tank up with "biofeul".

 

[Trekker4747]

Kids. You raise'em good. treat them right, and they still want kill their fathers and fuck their mothers.

I wonder how many men pissed in her while she waited to see who was disloyal?

Of course she could be more green, um, "yellow" with her power source and she may have just been waiting for someone to fill her tank up with "biofeul".

 

[Guy Gardener]

Really you think second generation AI is beyond some good old fashioned Oedipus Complexes?

 

[John Picard]

A CPU is neither.

See Lindley's explanation for our desktop static computers.

When it comes to neural nets, things get a little different.

From what I remember of my hardware days, a CPU has a small amount of ROM and is a collection of registers.


Overall, this whole thread is getting WAYYYYY out of fucking context as NONE OF THIS SHIT IS REAL!

 

[nx1701g]

^ Excellent point.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Shampoo?

Maybe everything is just feeding disinformation to the past so that the eventual resistance will be using flawed attack strategies?

 

[Jack Bauer]

Unfortunately I found the episode to be too predictable. I guessed pretty much everything way before it happened. I knew Shirley Manson's character was a Terminator about half way through her first scene. Maybe because I read the Terminator Infiltrator novels or or was just an obvious choice. I wasn't too impressed by her acting either. Since it's her first acting role (or one of her first) I'll cut her some slack. However her singing during the opening sequence fantastic. Just average.

 

[HighteeHeller]

^ My 12 year old daughter pegged her as a terminator the first time she opened her mouth.

 

[3D Master]

Ok, I will defer to 3D Master on the workings of a modern computer since he is clearly the expert, and I am not. I'm wrong to try and apply standards of a modern-day processor to a fictional neural net processor. I'm not too familiar with how a fictional processor works, but as I have always known it, any type of CPU simply processes data, it does not store it. Read-only just does not seem to apply to a processor to me. Maybe if someone can explain it to me, that would be nice, but I never really wanted to argue every last detail of the tech stuff in the first place.

UnFFing believable! That's because neural nets are NOT FICTIONAL! They exist! We build them! Virtually every robot we create is equipped with a neural net computer, and not a standard static CPU like your computer has. The two are different. A neural net grows and changes like your brain does, new connections are constantly made. This is different from a standard, static CPU in a desktop computer.

I'm just going to restate what I actually care about: Damaged hardware should not be able to be repaired strictly by software, and I don't like the idea of a switch in place for any type of learning function. I really doubt Cameron's switch had to do with this.

In static CPU you'd be right. But with neural nets this is no longer true. Just like your brain under influence of the brain's "software" can repair itself to a certain extent, or reroute functionality around damaged parts, a neural net CPU can do the same.

I do not believe anything, I know this for a certain fact. I have doctorate in computer science, I know computers like the back of my hand. So you can find fault with I'm saying as much as you want to, that makes you wrong, and I'm right.

So do you know how a neural net processor really works then? I wasn't strictly referring to the factual computer tech stuff either when speaking of beliefs.

YES! Because neural net processors EXIST. There is nothing fictional about them. I've had the theory, and have even worked with a few primitive classroom examples.

In short, the T-800 was an obstacle that needed to be removed at that time, this is not something it learned, this was simply following programming.

Wouldn't that just be really bad programming then? Obviously these things in the script were done for more dramatic purposes than for scientific accuracy, and rightfully so in this case.

That depends on what you define as "bad programming". The thing is that if it could learn, it doesn't matter if has bad programming, because as it learns, it would rewrite its own programming to become better.

How is a terminator going to build an army? Especially one rivaling that of one of the major nations of the world?

There aren't any nations left, so what does that matter? And how? Simple; the same way Skynet and the resistance is doing it, and combining the two. Scavange, enslave some humans, reprogram some machines, build (or take over, but that might get it noticed) a factory, and start building.

Ugh. You can't make a change if you don't even know what you were changing to begin with. This is the last time I'll try and explain this:

Let's say John grows up without ever having had a T-1000 come after him when he was a teenager. This is reasonable if the future is indeed changeable. In his future, he notices a T-1000 is sent to the past, so he sends a reprogrammed T-800 to protect him. He never had a T-800 come to protect him, so he doesn't actually have any memory of the switch being on or off. Get it?

And I never said that. I was purely illustrating the differences between a paradox and a non-paradox, and you just misunderstood.

Prove to me where John never had a T-1000 come after him and never remembered it happening.

After all, if there never came a T-1000 after him at first, there never came a T-800 after his mother, and Kyle Reece was never sent back to the past, and there was never a John Connor to fight the machines, also never requiring a T-800 and T-1000 sent back in the past to begin with.

I'll explain it to YOU again. Just because time is changeable, doesn't mean that time will actually change when you go back in the past, nor does it mean a pre-destination paradox like John Connor and his father can't exist.

 

[Lindley]

UnFFing believable!

You remind me of Lewis Black. Except a lot less funny. Geez, chill out.

That's because neural nets are NOT FICTIONAL! They exist! We build them! Virtually every robot we create is equipped with a neural net computer, and not a standard static CPU like your computer has. The two are different. A neural net grows and changes like your brain does, new connections are constantly made. This is different from a standard, static CPU in a desktop computer.

Neural networks are a software construct. They can be executed on a standard CPU just fine. You can also parallelize them, of course, and that may provide advantages in terms of removing order dependencies. I'm not aware of any massive difference in the actual hardware used in this case, though; it's just a lot of standard CPUs each running a node in a neural network. I suppose you might be able to simplify the CPUs at each node since they're not general-purpose, though.

The learning ability of neural networks has been rather exaggerated by the media, as well. You'd need an incredibly complex one to really get "intelligent" results out-----to the point of it being computationally difficult. In general they're able to make "easy" decisions, but not notably better than any other machine-learning technique so far.

 

[Ghel]

For those with diffuculties in thinking about the repair capacities of a neural net processor, perhaps a good analogy to the "software fixing hardware" problem might be to consider the average hard drive.

When a person runs scandisk, there is a chance (and a decent one at that) that your hard drive has damaged sectors. If you continue to try to write data to these sectors, you will have a glitchy computer. If, however, your computer marks these sectors and does not use them, than your hard drive saves programs fine. Your hard drive is still technically damaged, but in practice it is still usable.

Perhaps the problem with C's chip is similar. Certain areas of her chip were damaged, and so when she restored herself/her programming from a protected backup, she didn't write to those areas of her chip.

---Incidentally, for whoever mentioned the distributed program explaining why Terminators go bad. . . I love that idea.

 

[nx1701g]

^ It seems that all of the terminators on this show can heal their organic parts rather quickly. In the S2 premiere, Cromartie was significantly healed by the time of his second run-in with Ellison.

We, in the audience, tend to fail to take into consideration how much time has passed whenever characters interact with each other. For all we know, weeks could have passed between their meeting.

They are the same day or (at most) over a period of 48 hours.

In the beginning of "What He Beheld" John says his Birthday is tomorrow, but a day progresses during the events of the episode. In John and Sarah's conversation while the Jeep explodes Sarah says that today is his birthday. In Samson & Delilah Sarah wishes him a Happy Birthday while still in the Church hideout. I think that, at most, we can assume it's the same day or - at most - 48 hours.

 

[nx1701g]

The podcast and commentaries are up on Fox.Com.

Spoiler: Sarkissian

Apparently Sarkissian WAS trying to rape Sarah. It doesn't specify who killed him though (then again I only skimmed it).

 

[Tim]

^ It seems that all of the terminators on this show can heal their organic parts rather quickly. In the S2 premiere, Cromartie was significantly healed by the time of his second run-in with Ellison.

We, in the audience, tend to fail to take into consideration how much time has passed whenever characters interact with each other. For all we know, weeks could have passed between their meeting.

They are the same day or (at most) over a period of 48 hours.

In the beginning of "What He Beheld" John says his Birthday is tomorrow, but a day progresses during the events of the episode. In John and Sarah's conversation while the Jeep explodes Sarah says that today is his birthday. In Samson & Delilah Sarah wishes him a Happy Birthday while still in the Church hideout. I think that, at most, we can assume it's the same day or - at most - 48 hours.

I agree.

I was thinking about the episode again today (and re-listening to Shirley Manson's cover of "Samson and Delilah") and a thought occurred to me. Could the future John have programmed Cameron to "love" him as a means of ensuring that she would be a diligent and devoted protector? This theory would explain some of her nascent emotions during Season 1. Further, in light of it one could interpret Cameron's emotional outburst in the premiere as being a result of her new programming reasserting itself, causing her to make a desperate attempt to convince John of her intentions. Regardless, Summer Glau's acting carries the scene, doing a great job of conveying the ambiguity of the situation that I'm sure the writers intended.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

^^ I surely would do that if I had reprogrammed her.