Contemporary cultural conceptions of the future encompass two main approaches: an open future informed by multiple possibilities and a closed future that can be deterministically extrapolated from the present. The article explores the clash of the two approaches in Alex Garland’s miniseries Devs (2020) and season 3 of Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan’s Westworld (2020). The shows feature quantum computers that gather large data sets about human subjects to analyze them and predict the course of their lives. This translation of human behavior into quantifiable data characteristic of surveillance capitalism can be used for manipulation and control of society by predetermination and inevitably raises questions about determinism and free will, cause-and-effect relationships, and the nature of reality. However, both shows propose a way out of the world of techno-domination by introducing an unpredictable element that creates an anomaly and unlocks the potential to regain agency and rewrite one’s future.
Sonia Front (Sun,) studied this question.