AI illustration

Science fiction often gives AI and intelligent robots human-like characteristics, and friendships and even romantic relationships with advanced machines have been widely described in movies, books and TV shows. How do these depictions compare with current scientific research into what might be possible in the future?

Join us for this live online Imperial Lates discussion, where Professor Murray Shanahan, cognitive robotics researcher at Imperial and Google DeepMind, and scientific consultant on the British Sci-fi film Ex Machina, will be joined by science fiction authors Aifric Campbell and Anita Chandran. Together they will explore whether advances in AI and robots could ever result in human-machine companionship.

Imperial Lates

This event is part of Imperial Lates: Sci-fi.

Where does science end and science fiction start? Join us at Imperial Lates as Imperial’s scientists explore the scientific basis of our spacefaring, technologically enhanced futures through talks, artistic workshops and live demos.  

Hear from scientists, science fiction writers and sci-fi fans discussing where the movies get the science wrong, how science fiction inspired modern day research and what science of today might inspire the visionary books, films and comics of tomorrow. 

Imperial Lates are most suitable for over 18s.

See the full Lates events programme >