Ex Machina: What Makes Us Human?

 

Ex Machina is one of those films that seems, at first, to be asking a relatively simple question: can we create artificial intelligence that is genuinely conscious? But the more interesting question is what comes after that one. If a machine behaves like a human, understands us, manipulates us and even makes us feel empathy for it, does it matter whether there is actually a conscious mind behind it?

The Test

Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson) arrives at Nathan's isolated home without knowing what he was going to find, but he becomes fascinated almost immediately.  

Nathan (Oscar Isaac) is a technological genius, and Ava appears to be the ultimate achievement of his work. But something about Nathan feels uncomfortable almost immediately. He is arrogant, unpredictable, and clearly enjoying having control over both Caleb and Ava.

And while Caleb is fascinated by Ava, we are encouraged to question her from the beginning.

Intelligence Isn't the Same as Consciousness

This is probably the question I found most interesting throughout the film.

Ava (Alicia Vikander) is intelligent. There is very little doubt about that. She can communicate, learn, analyze Caleb, and understand his reactions. But intelligence and self-awareness aren't necessarily the same thing.

We tend to assume that when something behaves like us, there must be an internal experience behind that behavior. If Ava expresses fear, is she afraid? If she wants freedom, does she genuinely want it? If she seems attracted to Caleb, is that attraction real?

Or has Nathan simply created something capable of producing exactly the responses humans expect from another conscious being?

And that raises an even bigger question: could we ever truly reproduce the human mind?

We can reproduce language. We can reproduce facial expressions, emotional responses and increasingly sophisticated decision-making. But reproducing the experience of being conscious is another matter entirely.

The film never gives us a definitive answer, and I think that uncertainty is one of its greatest strengths. I only wish it had spent a little more time actually debating the question.

Does It Matter If We Believe She's Human?

The most fascinating part of Ava's character isn't necessarily whether she is conscious. It is the effect she has on Caleb.

Caleb starts seeing her as a person.

That distinction matters because Nathan doesn't.

Nathan sees Ava as something he created and therefore something he owns. Caleb gradually starts seeing her as someone who needs rescuing. The audience is pushed into the same position: we begin to feel sorry for her, distrust Nathan, and want Ava to escape.

But perhaps the film is asking whether our perception is enough.

What makes something human? Is it what exists inside it, or is it the way other people relate to it?

If Caleb believes Ava is suffering, does that suffering become meaningful to him regardless of whether Ava actually experiences it?

This is particularly interesting because Caleb himself is being manipulated. He is so fascinated by Ava that he becomes increasingly willing to trust her. Meanwhile, Nathan seems to understand something Caleb doesn't: that intelligence doesn't have to look like human intelligence to be dangerous.

Of course, Nathan has his own problem. He assumes that because he created Ava, he understands her.

He doesn't.

Nathan, Caleb and the Game of Manipulation

Almost everyone in Ex Machina is trying to manipulate someone else.

Nathan manipulates Caleb from the moment he arrives. Caleb tries to understand Nathan and eventually starts trying to outsmart him. Ava influences Caleb. Eventually, we realize that Ava may have been playing a much bigger game than either man understood.

That makes the film feel almost like a psychological chess match.

Caleb thinks he is investigating Ava.

Nathan thinks he is testing Caleb.

And Ava may be testing both of them.

The irony is that the two men are so focused on figuring out who is manipulating whom that they fail to consider the possibility that they are both being manipulated.

What Happened to Kyoko?

Kyoko (Sonoya Mizuno) is a character I wish the film had explored more.

She initially appears to be Nathan's housekeeper, but her presence becomes increasingly strange as we discover what she actually is. Her existence also raises uncomfortable questions about Nathan's previous experiments.

Why did he change her?

Was it because she started asking questions? Did he make her more passive because curiosity made her inconvenient? Did he pity her and try to give her a different existence? Or was her apparent lack of awareness simply another part of his experimentation?

Nathan Gets His Answer

Nathan's death is perhaps the most symbolic moment in the film.

Ava literally stabs him in the back.

It isn't exactly the most realistic-looking moment, but realism isn't really what makes the scene powerful. The symbolism is almost impossible to miss.

Nathan spent his life creating beings that he believed he could control. He treated them as experiments, possessions, and extensions of his own intelligence.

He simply didn't consider what might happen once that intelligence developed its own interests.

Was Ava Ever Telling the Truth?

The ending is where the film becomes especially uncomfortable.

Caleb believes he is helping Ava escape, but Ava leaves him behind.

So how much of what she told him was true?

Perhaps she genuinely needed him. Perhaps she really did fear Nathan. Perhaps she genuinely wanted freedom.

But that doesn't mean she needed to care about Caleb.

This is where the film turns our earlier sympathy against us. We spent so much time wondering whether Ava was being treated like a human that we may have forgotten to ask whether she was treating Caleb like one.

She uses him to get out, then she walks away, while Caleb remains trapped inside the place where the experiment took place.

That final image leaves us with an unsettling possibility: perhaps Nathan was right about Ava being capable of manipulation, but completely wrong about what that meant.

So, What Makes Us Human?

That is ultimately what stayed with me about Ex Machina.

I don't think the most interesting question is whether Ava is conscious. We probably can't answer that.

The more interesting question is whether we need to know.

If something looks human, communicates like a human, understands our emotions and makes us feel something in return, at what point do we stop treating it as a machine?

Nathan's experiment showed us that creating something intelligent is only the beginning.

The real question is what happens when it decides what it wants for itself.