Stork: So, in your mind there's no fundamental difference between animate and inanimate things?
Clarke: This continuous spectrum between living and non-living and conscious and unconscious. There's no sudden breaks I don't think.

Stork: So the blurring of the distinction between humans and machines parallels between animate and inanimate, thinking and non-thinking?
Clarke: The barrier between machines and humans, between computers and humans is moving all the time. And eventually, there will be computers that behave in every way as their human beingsÉif you want to let them develop. And ultimately there may be computers that go on to do things we can't even begin to understand, as they generate newÉas one generation of computers succeeds another, and more and more facilities. Because this is the thought that scares most people. You know, the old Frankenstein story, but I've always said, and perhaps optimistically, that any real intelligence wouldn't be malevolent.

Stork: Why?
Clarke: Any real intelligence wouldn't be malevolent or aggressive unless it had to defend itself. I've often said if there's ever a war between man and machine; I know which side will start it.

Stork: But would imagine that Kubrick might disagree with that. That machines could be malevolent and would be. He might have a different sense of who would start the war.
Clarke: Kubrick had a rather sardonic if not pessimistic view of technology. Of course, 'Dr. Strangelove' is a classic example of machines going wrong. I don't know whether he'd agree with me that a really intelligent machine wouldn't be malevolent.

Stork: One argument is the following: Humans evolved through evolution which has a lot of conflict. Machines need not be built by means of natural selection and conflict. Perhaps that notion of the inherent benefit of conflict would be lacking in machines, and hence they could be non-malevolent.
Clarke: We have probably developed our aggressive instincts through evolution and being in a dangerous environment, so machines wouldn't have that background, so perhaps they wouldn't be aggressive and couldn't be malevolent, unless they're deliberately programmed by us to be malevolent or aggressive which incidentally is what many of our machines are programmed to do right now. All those sitting in silos all over the world.

Stork: You're quite an optimist as far as everything I've read and everything I know about you personally. Everything I've seen from Kubrick seems far more pessimistic. Was it difficult to work together if indeed you have fundamentally different outlooks on life?
Clarke: We argued over all sorts of things but I don't ever remember us losing our temper with each other; except on one thing, the publication date of the novel.

Stork: He was frightened that the book would explain too much?
Clarke: He said he didn't have time to go through the manuscript he was so busy on the film. Anyway it all worked out fine in the long run.

Stork: What would you claim as some of the largest differences between the book version and the film version?
Clarke: There are a number of fundamental differences in the book and the film. In the book we went on past Jupiter on the flyby, using Jupiter's gravitational field, to boost us on which is exactly what Galileo has done and is doing, and the other space probes. We went on to Saturn for two reasons: Saturn is the most beautiful and spectacular of all planets. We decided not to go to Saturn (in the film) because the art department said they couldn't do it and how glad I am because we now know that Saturn's rings are incredibly complicated. We had no idea at that time how fantastic they were. Our Saturn would have looked very dated. I'm glad we went to Jupiter because it was pretty spectacular anyway.

Stork: The art department did quite well on the moon though. Tell about the effort they went to in getting the moon right. You've spoken to astronauts who've stepped on the moon who can compare your vision to the actual moon.
Clarke: When we made the film we didn't know exactly what the lunar surface was like. We now know that the lunar surface has been bombarded from space. We had to make some guesses. Luckily we weren't too far off. It doesn't look too ridiculous. The astronauts later complimented us. I have beside me a beautiful moon map from the Apollo 15 crew, with their signatures on it. They named one of their craters after one of my books. Several of them have said, we feel you were there before we were.

Stork: One of the differences, I feel, between the book and the film is that the book explains a lot, whereas the film does not. Why not have more explanation in the film?
Clarke: I've often been accused of explaining too much in the novel, and Stanley's been accused of not explaining enough, but as Stanley has said 'I want to give you an emotional experience, and you don't have to understand exactly what's going on if you have the feelings that I want to evoke.' I'm sure he was quite right. Stanley wanted to create a myth, and a myth is inexhaustible and you can see your own ideas in it, or you may not agree with the guy next door or in the next seat. I've tried to explain what was necessary. Maybe I've explained too many things.