President Barack Obama has made his interest in science fiction known in the past,Karen Foster Archives but in a new interview about very real, very serious aspects of our future, the outgoing president reveals that he's far more of a Trekkie than anyone suspected.
SEE ALSO: NASA is run by a bunch of 'Star Trek' nerds, and this photo proves itIn an interview meant to promote Wednesday's science and technology event (the Frontiers Conference) at the White House, Obama sat down with MIT Media Lab chief Joi Ito and the editor of Wiredto talk about the future of technology.
The chat touches on everything from artificial intelligence to the future of human labor in the face of automation. But the real fun starts early when the president starts dropping sci-fi names in the same breath as real government policy.
"When I first got here I always imagined the Situation Room would be this supercool thing, like Tom Cruise in Minority Report, where he’d be moving around stuff," says Obama. "It’s not like that, at all."
"We’ve all got a little bit of Spock and a little bit of Kirk and ... maybe some Klingon in us, right?" — Obama
Then, on the topic of artificial intelligence, he turns to a fan favorite, The Matrix.
"In science fiction, what you hear about is generalized AI, right?" says Obama regarding the topic of the Singularity, which he directly mentions later in the conversation.
"Computers start getting smarter than we are and eventually conclude that we’re not all that useful, and then either they’re drugging us to keep us fat and happy or we’re in TheMatrix. My impression, based on talking to my top science advisers, is that we’re still a reasonably long way away from that."
But by far most of his enthusiasm was saved for Star Trek, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.
"I was a sucker for Star Trekwhen I was a kid … What made the show lasting was it wasn’t actually about technology. It was about values and relationships … it was really talking about a notion of a common humanity and a confidence in our ability to solve problems," says Obama, speaking to the somewhat utopian nature of the Star Trek's future. "Star Trek, like any good story, says that we’re all complicated, and we’ve all got a little bit of Spock and a little bit of Kirk [laughs] and a little bit of Scotty, maybe some Klingon in us, right?"
The sci-fi geek-in-chief also mentions Star Trek's themeswhen talking about The Martian, which he praises "because it showed a bunch of different people trying to solve a problem. And employing creativity and grit and hard work, and having confidence that if it’s out there, we can figure it out. "
But as much as Obama respects the egalitarian ethos of Star Trek, he's just like the rest of us in wondering when more of its imagined technologies will become reality.
"Fifty years later and it seems like we should — I don’t know if dilithium crystals are out there — but, you know, we should be getting some breakthroughs."
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