Clarke, Arthur. 2001: A Space Odyssey. New York: Penguin Books, 1968



In the book 2001: A Space Odyssey we are Arthur Clarke takes us 31 years into the future from when the book is published. We are in the spaceship Discovery going to Saturn on a scientific mission, in the ship are crewmates Bowmen and Poole. With them also is a computer named Hal 9000 who talks and communicates with the brain of a human. However this can lead to catastrophe when the machine that is all powerful makes a mistake.



The Danger of Technology

We have all seen movies or read comics in which a series of killer robots threaten to destroy mankind. This isn’t quite what I mean when I say the dangers of technology. No what I mean is yes the physical fear of giving machines to much power but also the mental. Where does a machine stop becoming a machine and becomes a living thinking organism. In 2001: A Space Odyssey Arthur Clarke makes us ask this question.

We must start with the most obvious example Hal. Hal is a computer which controls the entire ship The Discovery and talks and communicates like a real person. This means he is holding five lives in his hands the two crewmates working on the ship and the three in hibernation. When he makes a mistake and in trying to cover it up kills all but one of the crewmates. This is a human like compulsion, killing to make up for your own mistake. Hal also has the fear of being disconnected which would mean death for him which any sensible organism tries to avoid he knows that if they find his mistake they will kill him and having artificial instincts mimicking human he does everything to avoid it.

Being a computer, Hal finds it impossible that he can make mistakes not realizing that the programmers where the ones to design him and are capable of making mistakes. From page 187 “I know you have had that on our mind for some time now, Dave, but that would be a terrible mistake. I am so much more capable than you are at supervising the ship.” This shows Hal has an inflated ego and thinks he is much superior to humans in every way. He thinks he is better and does what he thinks is best for the mission and eliminates anything in his way.

In 2001: A Space Odyssey we think were the limit is to human machines. You may think that sounds crazy but we already have artificial limbs, artificial hearts dialysis machines but where is the limit from human and machine, if you were to live 1000 years longer would you get a brain transplant? The extra terrestrials we see in this book are not long faced aliens with long fingers and big eyes. No they are simply intelligent radiation evolved out of its confiding physical shell. The author makes us think that possible we may evolve out of our physical shell and become plasma a gas. Or perhaps we will do the opposite and become more machine. These questions aren’t ones with a simply answer and we will never know what is right.

The dangers of technology is one of the most evident themes of the book. You can see without looking to far that this is one of the messages the author is sending out. Maybe the danger will be killer robots. But the biggest question he makes the readers ask is “where is the limit” where is the limit before man is machine and machine is man, with feelings and personalities. Well that will be controversies when the technology allows us to make such machines.



I would recommend this book to anyone who loves science fiction, or likes books with a lot of symbology and meanings. If you liked this book you can watch the famous Stanley Kubrick movie, or read the sequels 2010: Odyssey 2 or 2036: Odyssey 3