Part 6: Will Satan Bring on Global Thermonuclear War and Will the World Go MAD?

In the 1983 "WarGames" Movie, Artificial Intelligence learns that the only winning move is not to play...

When you hear of wars and rumors of wars,
do not be frightened;
those things must take place;
but that is not yet the end.

Mark 13:7 NASB1995

WarGames WOPR computer playing war simulations

(source: WarGames Movie)¹

WarGames 1983 Movie

In the classic 1983 movie, WarGames, a science fiction techno-thriller, the War Operation Plan Response (WOPR) computer is given Artificial Intelligence (AI) control of the launch controls through automation, removing the human conscience factor of missile launch hesitancy by the two controllers who must manually turn the launch keys.

Inadvertently, with any AI, something goes very wrong with WOPR when a hacker asks it to play a game of “Global Thermonuclear War” and WOPR cannot distinguish between a game and a computer simulation.

SPOILERS: WOPR begins searching for the launch codes to launch all missiles. The human operators have no way of stopping this AI mainframe computer from creating all out “Global Thermonuclear War”. The hacker, played by Matthew Broderick, decides to have the computer play Tic-Tac-Toe, a no-win game… soon the computer learns that with any simulated global thermonuclear war strategy - There are no winners.

WOPR determines there is no winning strategy in Global Thermonuclear War

(source: WarGames Movie)²