Who’s Afraid of the Anti-God?

There is a memorable scene in the first installment of the final Mission: Impossible film where thousands of government workers sit in a huge room transferring digital files to plain white paper using old-fashioned typewriters. A super-intelligent algorithm known as the Entity—an omniscient, omnipresent form of artificial intelligence—has escaped its constraints (thanks, Russians), ripped through the world’s computer networks, and stands ready to rule the planet. The only way to slow it down is to unplug government computers and go analog, but it’s no use. By the time the second installment opens, the Entity has all but taken over the world’s nuclear weapons and turned them on our own heads.