The Sixth Day

Work Title: The Sixth Day
Medium: Film
Episode Title:
Year: 2000
Writer(s): Cormac Wibberly
"Original" Writer: Yes Writer(s): Marianne Wibberly
"Original" Writer: Yes Own work?: Yes
Summary:

Power-hungry politicians set out to clone humans in order to gain wealth and power. A pilot/family man is caught in the game, eventually cloned, and engaged in a fight to reclaim his life from his double and save the world.

  • Self-Written?: 1
  • Source Name:
  • Source URL:
Era/Year of Portrayal: near_future
Distinctive characteristics of the world in portrayal:

More virtual reality technology; cloning of animals permitted; automatic cars; virtual girlfriends; advanced aircrafts; etc.

Technology

  • Name of portrayed presence-evoking technology: Incubators holding blanks (adult-sized fetus-like shells) of humans ready for cloning; cloned humans themselves; virtually displayed images of daily schedules, news, advertisements, television and film entertainment; interaction with virtual girlfriend; two-way interactive video communication
  • Description of the technology: An incubator holding blanks (adult-sized fetus-like shells) of humans inserted with genetic coding for cloning; the cloned humans themselves
  • Nature of task or activity: Interacting with cloned humans
  • Performance of the Technology: The incubator continues to function properly until it is destroyed at the end; the clones are programmed to die in 5 years
  • Description of creator(s): The creators of the incubator and genetic cloning process are white males in their 40s-60s
  • Major goal(s) of creator(s): The creators' primary goals are to become wealthy, powerful and control the world
  • Description of users of technology: Primarily white males in their 40s-50s
  • Type(s) of presence experience in the portrayal: social_presence
  • Description of presence experience: Medium as Social Actor best describes the portrayed presence experience, because the characters are convinced that their physical, social, mental and emotional interaction with the clones is tangible
  • User awareness of technology during experience: There are times when the characters recognize that they are dealing with clones and times when they are unaware; once aware of the clones, the characters are initially skeptical of their appearance, behavior and motives but gradually more comfortable with these
  • Valence of experience: The characters have both positive and negative experiences in their interaction with cloned humans, much like their interaction with other humans
  • Specific responses: During their interaction with the clones, the characters experience such human conditions as exhaustion, fear, sadness, excitement, agitation, frustration, empathy, compassion, and joy
Long-term consequences:

The incubator that generates the cloned humans is destroyed out of fear that the creators will use it to make decisions that only God should make

Other:

Coder name: Melissa Selverian
Coder email: melissa.selverian@temple.edu
Coder affiliation: Temple University