What makes us human?

This is one of the fundamental questions Science fiction has asked and explored since it’s inception. From Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein to the far flung post-singularity future of  Iain M. Banks’ culture novels our humanity is at the core of these stories. In some cases that exploration of humanity is not apparent until the end of the story. Such is the case in Duncan Jones first movie Moon.

Moon is the story of Sam Bell, played by Sam Rockwell, the lone operator of a mining facility on the moon. He is on a three year contract to be the caretaker of the facility along with an A.I. named GERTY voiced by Kevin Spacey. The product he is mining is Helium-3, an energy source that revolutionizes clean energy back on earth. As he nears the end of his three year contract a series of accidents start to reveal the truth of Sam’s situation on the moon. There is an accident and Sam wakes up in the infirmary. After healing Sam heads out to fix a broken harvester and finds a body. The body is his.

Sam slowly puts together that the company he works for has decided it is more cost effective to create a clone to continuously take care of the facility than it is to replace the caretaker every few years.

Is a life less valuable when it is a tool?

While Moon is not directly about how technology mediates or is mediated by society it explores mans relationship to technology from another vantage point; what will we do to maintain the advanced technology we have? Is even a single life too much to pay for safe and abundant energy source?

Cloning technology is nowhere near the capability to do what it does in Moon but the ethical questions surrounding human cloning are explored in a unique, intelligent, and thought provoking script. Jones does not make any judgements but he does present a situation that is not overly outlandish.

One of my favourite mysteries of Moon is that the plot is one that may or may not have happened before or could happen again. Does the world know or care what is enabling the energy needed to power their devices?