logo
‘Battlestar Galactica' star says show's AI warnings more timely as sci-fi fantasies come to life

‘Battlestar Galactica' star says show's AI warnings more timely as sci-fi fantasies come to life

Fox News04-04-2025

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — "Battlestar Galactica" star Tricia Helfer feels the show was a prescient warning about artificial intelligence when it debuted more than 20 years ago.
"We did warn against AI while we were shooting it," Helfer told Fox News Digital at the Beverly Hills Film Festival this week.
She continued, "It was 20 years ago, and I've recently re-watched it and went, 'Oh my gosh, it's even more relevant now.' So I think we just really need to be careful. It's a slippery slope between using it to our advantage and having it maybe be able to control us a little bit."
"I think we're a little bit far off from the humanoid Cylons yet and humanoid robots, but I don't know, they're coming," Helfer added.
"Battlestar Galactica" debuted on the SyFy channel in 2004, reimagined from the 1978 original series, and follows the battle between humans and Cylons, the humanoid sentient robots humans created that turned on them and launched a nuclear attack that nearly wiped out the entirety of humanity.
Helfer played a Cylon in the series, named Number Six, who played a key role in the story as both antagonist and ally.
Regarding AI, the Canadian-born actress said, "It's not going away, so I think it's something that we're going to have to embrace. But I think one of the things 'Battlestar Galactica' did was warn about it. And that's, I think, something that we need to make sure [is] that we have is regulations and an understanding of how quickly and how overwhelming this technology could become."
WATCH: 'Battlestar Galactica' star says show's AI warnings more relevant than ever
A "Battlestar Galactica" reboot was in the works at Peacock with Sam Esmail, the showrunner behind "Mr. Robot," but it has since been halted and shopped elsewhere, per Variety.
In 2023, Esmail spoke with The Hollywood Reporter about how the new version's view of AI would be evolving from the original.
"The world is changing way too fast for us. I mean, when we started working on it, I obviously was aware of AI, but now, four or five years later, it's in the public consciousness and now that's so influential in how we're going to tell the story," Esmail told the outlet. "The allegory piece is something that is crystallized in a different way, too. The focus is the same, which is the fear of tech and how it might take over, but this idea of just 'the robots are going to be our overlords' is a very facile and overly simplistic way of looking at it. Now that the audience is more sophisticated about the consequences, I think we have to match that with 'Battlestar.'"
"It's a slippery slope between using it to our advantage and having it maybe be able to control us a little bit."
While Helfer believes humanoid robots are still in the somewhat distant future, there are some attempts to create them in the present day.
Suzanne Somers' widower, Alan Hamel, recently worked with an AI company called Hollo to create a "twin" of his late wife.
"I am working with Hollo, an AI company to create Suzanne AI. It's very exciting to think about being able to interact with Suzanne's twin," Hamel told Fox News Digital in a statement last month.
The robot replica of Somers trained on her film and TV appearances, as well as her books, to bring back the "essence" of the "Three's Company" star, according to Hollo.AI CEO Rex Wong.
When it came to the Suzanne AI, Wong said, "The robot, which we did in collaboration with Realbotix, is the first of many AI versions of Suzanne, but AI Suzanne can also be accessible via call, chat and text. AI Suzanne highlights how we can extend a person's legacy and bring it to the next generation, and one of the services we will be rolling out will be the ability to preserve one's legacy for future generations or bring back a loved one."
Somers died in 2023 after a long battle with breast cancer.
Hamel told the New York Post that the idea for the Somers AI-powered bot "absolutely did come from her" and that "She may have known her life was going to be shortened [after a lifelong battle with cancer]."

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Hurricane Sandy May Have Affected The Brains of Unborn Children
Hurricane Sandy May Have Affected The Brains of Unborn Children

Yahoo

time21 minutes ago

  • Yahoo

Hurricane Sandy May Have Affected The Brains of Unborn Children

In October 2012, one of the largest and most destructive storms to emerge from the Atlantic devastated the US and Caribbean. Hurricane Sandy left deep scars in affected communities, including the loss of more than 250 lives, tens of billions of dollars in damage, and the less tangible – but still potent – effects of stress, grief, and trauma among survivors. New research suggests the hurricane even affected the unborn children of parents who were pregnant when the superstorm hit. And for those who experienced extreme heat as well as storm stress, the effects may have been compounded. "To our knowledge, no prior work has examined how exposure to multiple climate-related stressors during pregnancy might work together to shape children's developing brains," says Donato Delngeniis, a neuropsychologist from Queens College in the US who led the investigation. While hurricanes are a regular feature of the Atlantic Ocean weather system, ongoing human emissions of greenhouse gases are changing the climate in ways that intensify hurricane wind speeds, and exacerbate storm surges – like those that flooded New York City during the hurricane – by raising sea levels. This is stressful enough to take a toll on anyone, but for people who are pregnant, stressful events like these can affect their babies' development, too. From 2019 to 2022, Delngeniis's team recruited 34 New York City-born children, around the age of eight, for brain scans to measure the volume of their basal ganglia gray matter. This part of the brain coordinates deliberate movement, procedural and conditional learning, habit formation, cognition, and emotion. Eleven of the kids in this study were in-utero when Hurricane Sandy made landfall in New York, with flood, winds, and ensuing electrical damage destroying homes. The rest were womb-bound either side of the storm, but not during its onslaught. Those children who had been exposed to the hurricane in-utero had significantly larger volume in a number of basal ganglia regions, including the putamen and globus pallidus, which are involved in regulating movement, and the right caudate nucleus, which is associated with cognitive and motor functions. "Despite never personally experiencing these climate events, we are seeing how climate change may be fundamentally altering children's brain development while they are still in the womb," Delngeniis says. "The noticeable increase in children's brain volume could potentially lead to future behavioral disorders." Seven of the children exposed to Hurricane Sandy, and 17 of those who weren't, were also exposed to extreme heat (at least one day with a temperature above 35 degrees Celsius (95 degrees Fahrenheit) at some point while they were developing in the womb. This allowed the researchers to explore the added dimension of extreme heat exposure. Based on the scans, extreme heat exposure on its own had no notable effect. But when paired with exposure to the hurricane, statistical analysis revealed, extreme heat amplified the adverse effects of hurricane exposure on basal ganglia volume, creating "profound disruptions to the children's developing brains," according to behavioral neuroscientist Yoko Nomura, also from Queens College. Children exposed to both extreme heat and the hurricane tended to have a larger-than-usual left pallidum and a smaller-than-usual left nucleus accumbens, a structure which is considered the interface between motivation and action. Given the study's limited sample size and focus on large brain structures, further research would be needed to confirm the findings and determine whether specific stages of development or even sex may play a role in the outcome. But their implications are concerning in a world where extreme storms and heat waves are becoming commonplace. "These imaging methods enable us to observe how environmental stressors can cascade through a pregnant mother's experience to reshape the structure of a child's developing brain," says neuroscientist Ahmed Duke Shereen from City University of New York. "Our findings provide us with compelling evidence that the climate crisis is not merely an environmental crisis – it is a potentially neurological one with consequences for future generations who will inherit our planet." This research is published in PLOS One. Just How Dirty Are Beards? Here's The Science. Most People Develop Diverticulosis in Their Gut by 80 … So What Is It? Common Psychiatric Medications May Increase Risk of ALS

Trump to attend 'Les Misérables' premiere as protests persist across the country
Trump to attend 'Les Misérables' premiere as protests persist across the country

Yahoo

time38 minutes ago

  • Yahoo

Trump to attend 'Les Misérables' premiere as protests persist across the country

President Donald Trump is set to attend the opening night of 'Les Misérables,' a musical set against a background of revolution and protest, at Washington, D.C.'s John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Wednesday. 'I love the songs, I love the play,' Trump told Fox News Digital last week. 'I think it's great.' The opening night of a monthlong run of the Tony Award-winning show comes amid widespread protests against the president's immigration policies and his decision to deploy members of the military in response. Protesting against power is a major theme in the show, which is centered around student-led demonstrations against the French monarchy. 'Set against the backdrop of 19th-century France, the musical tells an enthralling story of broken dreams and unrequited love, passion, sacrifice, and redemption — a timeless testament to the survival of the human spirit,' reads the official summary on the Kennedy Center's website. Songs from the musical have been used in protests against governments around the world since the show debuted in 1980, including by pro-democracy demonstrators in Hong Kong in 2019. Protesters sang one of the show's most popular and recognizable hits, 'Do You Hear the People Sing?' which includes the lyrics, 'Do you hear the people sing? Singing a song of angry men?' The show will be the first production Trump has attended as head of the Kennedy Center. He did not attend any performances during his first term in office, and in February he replaced the entire board of trustees and had himself named chairman of the board. The shake-up resulted in some concerts being canceled — including a performance by the Gay Men's Chorus in honor of Pride Month — and other artists and productions pulling out of planned shows to protest the changes, including actor Issa Rae and a production of 'Hamilton.' 'Our show simply cannot, in good conscience, participate and be a part of this new culture that is being imposed on the Kennedy Center,' 'Hamilton' producer Jeffrey Seller said in a statement in March. A spokesperson for "Les Miz" said Wednesday, 'We are looking forward to performing for DC audiences beginning tonight and throughout the engagement at the Kennedy Center, where the US first saw the original production in 1986.' The performance Wednesday is serving as a fundraiser for the Kennedy Center. First lady Melania Trump, Vice President JD Vance and his wife, Usha Vance, are expected to attend as well. Security will be tightened around the venue for the performance, the Kennedy Center said. 'Please be advised the Kennedy Center will be closed to non-ticket holders on Wednesday, June 11, 2025, due to enhanced security protocols,' the venue's website said. This article was originally published on

See Pope Leo XIV rocking a Chicago White Sox hat in St. Peter's Square
See Pope Leo XIV rocking a Chicago White Sox hat in St. Peter's Square

Yahoo

time2 hours ago

  • Yahoo

See Pope Leo XIV rocking a Chicago White Sox hat in St. Peter's Square

During his weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square on June 11, noted White Sox fan Pope Leo XIV donned a Chicago cap to take a picture with a newly married couple, the groom also sporting a White Sox hat. The White Sox's social media accounts were quick to share a photo of the pope wearing the White Sox hat, which he required him to take off his traditional zucchetto skullcap. Advertisement Shortly after being announced as the first American-born pope, Leo's brother revealed that "His Holiness," a Chicago native, supports the White Sox rather than the Cubs. Photos of Leo at a 2005 World Series surfaced and it turned out he was on camera in a crowd shot during ninth inning of the Game 1 broadcast. The club has embraced its most famous fan, putting up a Pope Leo mural at Rate Field, near the section he was sitting during the 2005 World Series. Chicago swept the Houston Astros in that Fall Classic, the club's first championship since 1917. Last week, the pope repped his alma mater by putting on Villanova hat for a photo in the Vatican, which was presented to him by members of an Italian American group. Advertisement In May, Vice President JD Vance gave Leo a Chicago Bears jersey during a visit. The USA TODAY app gets you to the heart of the news — fast. Download for award-winning coverage, crosswords, audio storytelling, the eNewspaper and more. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: See Pope Leo XIV wearing Chicago White Sox hat at Vatican

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into the world of global news and events? Download our app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store