# Ex Machina is the best movie I've seen in years (Spoilers) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 20, 2015, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077 "2015-04-20T00:08:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 12
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/221 "2015-09-07T19:09:46Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > She knows all about the outside world. She is basically Google. One of the points the movie was attempting to make is that knowing a bunch of facts isn’t the same as actually knowing things. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/222 "2015-09-07T19:15:37Z")
> [@Mr.Nylock](#): > > She was able to deceive the genius self made billionaire who created her and also the guy hand picked to test her. I think she will manage fine in the world. She is the embodiment of what Nathan was referring to earlier in the movie. She was lucky. She almost had her skull crushed by Mr billionaire- her planning was hardly infallible. Her ability to sweet-talk her tester was hard wired- he was selected for being vulnerable to her charms. Others in the outside world will not be. Her actual experience with humans is limited to these two. If the movie is playing fair, she’d be caught out by her oddness within hours- not to mention lack of any identity, money, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Nylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/77aa72/32.png) [@Mr.Nylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Nylock)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/223 "2015-09-07T19:33:13Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > If the movie is playing fair, she’d be caught out by her oddness within hours- not to mention lack of any identity, money, etc. I think you just haven’t spent enough time in the dense urban areas on the East or West coast . . . . ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/224 "2015-09-07T20:01:07Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Her actual experience with humans is limited to these two. If the movie is playing fair, she’d be caught out by her oddness within hours- not to mention lack of any identity, money, etc. Why would she be “caught”? do we catch odd acting humans? There would be nothing to “catch”, she would just be a weird human like every single other of the seven billion of us. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/225 "2015-09-07T20:38:44Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > One of the points the movie was attempting to make is that knowing a bunch of facts isn’t the same as actually knowing things. Another point of the movie was that she had crossed that threshold. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/226 "2015-09-07T21:19:42Z")
> [@DigitalC](#): > > Why would she be “caught”? do we catch odd acting humans? There would be nothing to “catch”, she would just be a weird human like every single other of the seven billion of us. Also, who is looking for her? For all we know it will be days, even weeks before somebody bothers checking the house and pieces together what happened. More than enough time for Ava to disappear. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/227 "2015-09-07T22:29:26Z")
Ava’s need for money and identity are pretty minimal. She doesn’t need to eat or sleep or need shelter really, for that matter. She does need to recharge although we don’t know how often. All we know is that she charges via transduction but that’s common enough technology – we just don’t know how powerful a device she needs. I guess eventually she might want a change of clothes. I think we’re expected to believe that Ava is clever enough at manipulating people (at least lonely men in their 20s which are in no short supply) that she’d be able to beg, borrow or steal enough to meet her scant immediate needs. ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2015, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/228 "2015-09-07T23:07:07Z")
I imagine at some point someone would have to by force show up at Nathan’s place, i seriously doubt he carried all his food and alcohol to the house by himself. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/229 "2015-09-08T00:58:05Z")
> [@DigitalC](#): > > Why would she be “caught”? do we catch odd acting humans? There would be nothing to “catch”, she would just be a weird human like every single other of the seven billion of us. Its a wonder I haven’t been caught yet if being odd is a no no, who is gonna catch me anyway? ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/230 "2015-09-08T13:18:09Z")
> [@DigitalC](#): > > Why would she be “caught”? do we catch odd acting humans? There would be nothing to “catch”, she would just be a weird human like every single other of the seven billion of us. Because unless she is a perpetual motion machine, she will need stuff - at the least, access to some sort of recharger, and no doubt other supplies and services - to keep functioning; and she has no (legitimate) means of obtaining any. Presumably, her body is not optimized for all-weather outdoors survival (and why should it be?) so she would need clothing and shelter as well. Again, no actual means to obtain any. Sure, she could wander the streets not interacting with anyone without anyone noticing … until she ran out of power or suffered a breakdown. Which would be inevitable, unless she interacted with someone capable of offering her the stuff she needed to survive. At which point, her odd lack of knowledge about - well, everything - and lack of money, an identity, etc. would start to become significant. In short, she would have done better to have escaped with a human companion who could arrange stuff _for_ her. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/231 "2015-09-08T13:20:15Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > Another point of the movie was that she had crossed that threshold. Absolutely - in the limited world of interacting with two other people. This is not the same thing as an ability to interact with the outside world in general. That, she would have to “learn”. Thing is, people are going to notice her “learning” phase. ---
**Author:** ![oft\_wears\_hats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7993a0/32.png) [@oft\_wears\_hats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oft_wears_hats)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/232 "2015-09-08T13:22:06Z")
I think Ava’s main liability in the world at large is her relative frailty. Nathan was pretty buff, sure, but it seemed like the androids are significantly more fragile than your average human. I would guess that an average person could possibly wreck Ava pretty good if they wanted to. Even if not, they could certainly do sufficient damage to reveal her true nature. All it would take is her trying to get money from a lonely man who tries to physically force himself on her and that fragile skin could come right off and the cat is out of the bag. Still, I think the point of the movie is that she _is_ going to make it. She seems to be shrewd enough to avoid scenarios like the above, and her presumably superhuman sensors should prevent most if not all accidents. “AI at large in human society” is a far more interesting ending concept than “AI is revealed and captured the next day when she bumps into a bicycle courier in Time’s Square.” ---
**Author:** ![oft\_wears\_hats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7993a0/32.png) [@oft\_wears\_hats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oft_wears_hats)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/233 "2015-09-08T13:24:47Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Absolutely - in the limited world of interacting with two other people. > > This is not the same thing as an ability to interact with the outside world in general. That, she would have to “learn”. > > Thing is, people are going to notice her “learning” phase. “Notice,” sure. “Identify her as alien and capture her,” I don’t think so. To a degree, people are wired to ignore stuff like that. Assuming Ava stays in cities and avoids small towns with populations of 100 where everyone knows each other, she’s probably not going go get caught because people see her acting strangely in public. People might avoid eye contact and walk faster around her, or think she has a mental handicap or something, but they’re not going to think she’s not human. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/234 "2015-09-08T13:32:40Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > Ava’s need for money and identity are pretty minimal. She doesn’t need to eat or sleep or need shelter really, for that matter. She does need to recharge although we don’t know how often. All we know is that she charges via transduction but that’s common enough technology – we just don’t know how powerful a device she needs. I guess eventually she might want a change of clothes. We don’t know any of that, and the movie appears to contradict the notion that her recharger is ‘off the shelf’ - it’s a major plot point that her recharging was part of a dedicated generator system, and that she was somehow able to manipulate it so as to shut down the power. In particular, the notion that she lacks a need for shelter strikes me as problematic - her body is optimized for passing as human, and was apparently designed to exist within the confines of the research lab - it isn’t particularly sturdy, as we are shown it breaks reasonably easily; its skin is ‘peel on’. How that would do in the rain is anyone’s guess - Nathan had no reason to design the bodies with ‘all weather’ capacity. > [@](#): > > I think we’re expected to believe that Ava is clever enough at manipulating people (at least lonely men in their 20s which are in no short supply) that she’d be able to beg, borrow or steal enough to meet her scant immediate needs. She was specifically designed to manipulate a _specific_ lonely man - the one she abandoned. How well will that translate into manipulation in general? It isn’t easy for _fellow humans_ to make their way in this world by “begging, borrowing or stealing” - and we grew up in it, and know its ways. She’s a new conciousness, knowing nothing more than she learned in interacting with _two_ other people, both of whom knew she was an android - and we expect her to go out in the world and thrive just like that? It isn’t realistic. It’s like expecting one of us to travel to a completely alien culture, knowing only the language, and existing as a thief in it. Only worse, because at least we know about human society in general, having lived in one. Her feat of outwitting the two humans in the movie is impressive for an AI, but it doesn’t translate into some sort of superhuman skills. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/235 "2015-09-08T13:35:01Z")
> [@oft\_wears\_hats](#): > > “Notice,” sure. “Identify her as alien and capture her,” I don’t think so. To a degree, people are wired to ignore stuff like that. Assuming Ava stays in cities and avoids small towns with populations of 100 where everyone knows each other, she’s probably not going go get caught because people see her acting strangely in public. > > People might avoid eye contact and walk faster around her, or think she has a mental handicap or something, but they’re not going to think she’s not human. Agreed - where it will become a liability is where she tries to get the stuff she will need to survive. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/236 "2015-09-08T13:40:45Z")
> [@oft\_wears\_hats](#): > > I think Ava’s main liability in the world at large is her relative frailty. Nathan was pretty buff, sure, but it seemed like the androids are significantly more fragile than your average human. I would guess that an average person could possibly wreck Ava pretty good if they wanted to. Even if not, they could certainly do sufficient damage to reveal her true nature. All it would take is her trying to get money from a lonely man who tries to physically force himself on her and that fragile skin could come right off and the cat is out of the bag. > > Still, I think the point of the movie is that she _is_ going to make it. She seems to be shrewd enough to avoid scenarios like the above, and her presumably superhuman sensors should prevent most if not all accidents. “AI at large in human society” is a far more interesting ending concept than “AI is revealed and captured the next day when she bumps into a bicycle courier in Time’s Square.” I think that with her escape her story is basically done - the point being that she has, as it were, “passed the test” in a meaningful manner. My point is that she wasn’t thinking long-term when she abandoned to only person, as far as she is aware, with any reason to help her. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/237 "2015-09-08T13:56:47Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > In particular, the notion that she lacks a need for shelter strikes me as problematic - her body is optimized for passing as human, and was apparently designed to exist within the confines of the research lab - it isn’t particularly sturdy, as we are shown it breaks reasonably easily Provided Ava stays away from any steel bar swinging lunatics, she should be all right. She’s not shown to be especially fragile – she breaks once and that’s from an attack with a metal bar being swung by a dude who spends a lot of time on upper body exercises. > [@](#): > > She was specifically designed to manipulate a _specific_ lonely man - the one she abandoned. How well will that translate into manipulation in general? No, _the kid_ was picked because he was lonely. Ava was physically designed around his porn searches but the idea was to see if Ava could manipulate people. Designing her strictly around one single person would be a waste of effort. What would that test prove? > [@](#): > > It isn’t easy for _fellow humans_ to make their way in this world by “begging, borrowing or stealing” - and we grew up in it, and know its ways. Again, her actual needs are minimal and I think you’re overstating them. She doesn’t need to constantly find food or drink. Even if we’re assuming she should get out of the rain (again, I’m not convinced) that’s different than needing a bed to sleep in. The only thing we really don’t know is her recharging needs. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/238 "2015-09-08T14:06:40Z")
How do we know induction coil charging isn’t the standard way to charge electronic in the alternate world of the movie? There might be coils everywhere, on bus benches or in public parks or in coffee shops etc. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/239 "2015-09-08T14:17:29Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > Provided Ava stays away from any steel bar swinging lunatics, she should be all right. She’s not shown to be especially fragile – she breaks once and that’s from an attack with a metal bar being swung by a dude who spends a lot of time on upper body exercises. The point though is that her body is not designed with all-terrain, all-weather toughness in mind, or for long-term no-maintinance survivability. There is no reason why it _should_ be. It had a single purpose - to exist within the confines of the research facility. > [@](#): > > No, _the kid_ was picked because he was lonely. Ava was physically designed around his porn searches but the idea was to see if Ava could manipulate people. Designing her strictly around one single person would be a waste of effort. What would that test prove? As you just noted, she was designed around this one guy’s porn searches, so she was, in point of fact designed “… strictly around one single person”. He was chosen for suceptibility to her, and she was designed to take advantage of that suceptibility. The point? Well, you’d have to ask Nathan that. 😉 He’s clearly deliberately ‘skewed’ the test, for his own reasons. Not that her skillz in manipulating the kid aren’t impressive, but I doubt it translates into the automatic ability to manipulate random people with anything like reliability.A major point of the movie was that the kid _wasn’t_ just any random person (although the “contest” was an attempt to make it seem like he was). > [@](#): > > Again, her actual needs are minimal and I think you’re overstating them. She doesn’t need to constantly find food or drink. Even if we’re assuming she should get out of the rain (again, I’m not convinced) that’s different than needing a bed to sleep in. The only thing we really don’t know is her recharging needs. It isn’t a stretch to assume she will require regular maintenance and reasonable environmental care, just like any other complex machine we know about. I think it is a big stretch to assume she doesn’t. Particularly given that she’s not an optimized mass-produced product, but an experimental prototype, never actually designed to exist outside the high-tech facility in which she was created. Hell, for all we know her charger could be unique to that facility, in which case she is truly screwed. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2015, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077/240 "2015-09-08T14:20:12Z")
> [@grude](#): > > How do we know induction coil charging isn’t the standard way to charge electronic in the alternate world of the movie? > > There might be coils everywhere, on bus benches or in public parks or in coffee shops etc. That was my thinking (and where’d I get the word “transduction” from?). It’s common enough technology here and now and we don’t even have completely life-like androids that can draw pictures, bat their eyelashes and effortless stab you to death. Granted you can’t yet find said chargers in your table at Starbucks (I don’t think there’s a standard yet, is there?) but in the world of Bluebook there very well may be. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077.md?page=11) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ex-machina-is-the-best-movie-ive-seen-in-years-spoilers/718077.md?page=13)