Steven Spielberg on AI: "I don't believe there is any substitute for the soul"

There are few directors, if any, who can boast such an impressive array of iconic films as Steven Spielberg. From Jaws to E.T., Jurassic Park, Schindler's List, Saving Private Ryan, and many, many more (yes, we know we haven't even mentioned the original Indiana Jones trilogy).

This makes him especially interesting to listen to when it comes to film, since he clearly knows what he's talking about. On the IMO podcast, he tackled the phenomenon of AI, which, as we all know, has been a hot topic lately. Many fear that lazy and penny-pinching Hollywood executives will let artificial intelligence write screenplays in the future, which would mean that the human perspective would disappear.

Spielberg readily admits that he doesn't know much about AI, but one thing he does know is that it's hard to replace a soul:

"Where I don't love AI is where it takes a position, or there's an empty chair at a writer's table. There's six writers, and there's an empty chair, and there's a computer in front of the empty chair, and it is the seventh writer. I'm not willing to substitute, because I don't really believe in sentience. I don't believe there is any substitute for the soul. I don't think that is an algorithm that is inventible."

He is not anti-AI, however, and sees great potential for it in fields such as healthcare and education. But when it comes to artistic creation, he believes computers should be kept out:

"But don't tell me that I don't have the right antagonist in this movie, don't tell me how to write my dialogue for this character, don't tell me where the camera has to go."

The coming years will be exciting as we see how the film industry uses AI in filmmaking, and in the longer term, how it can be utilised in the best possible way.