The NOVA episode Smartest Machine on Earth chronicles the four-year-long effort of a team of computer scientists at IBM to build a machine named Watson (after IBM's founder) that can play Jeopardy! -- a TV quiz show that represents for many the essence of human intelligence.

Working on this episode has caused me to reflect on a time many years ago when I made a NOVA called "Mind Machines." That film, like this new NOVA, is a reflection on the quest to create machines that can think like we do - in other words, artificial intelligence. In those days, that quest was just beginning and the results were pretty primitive. My film demonstrated a machine that could understand natural language well enough to manipulate different colored objects in a small world of blocks. It showed Eliza, a computer program that could respond like a psychiatrist, but was really just filling in the blanks based on what a "patient" had just typed in. The film began with a clip from Stanley Kubrick's classic "2001: A Space Odyssey," with its unforgettable scenes of the engaging but psychotic computer HAL running amok.

Artificial Intelligence, or AI, back then inspired two kinds of reactions: faith that it could be done and fear that it would. Most of the computer scientists I consulted were among the faithful. One accused me of being a "human chauvinist pig" when I expressed doubts. On the other hand, a few experts and most ordinary people worried that smart computers, like HAL, would get out of control and start running the world. What would happen to human values, these people asked, if silicon brains were more powerful than our own?

A lot has changed since then. First, a little thing called the Internet has come roaring into our lives. Unlike anyone I knew at the time, all the experts at MIT, Stanford and Carnegie Mellon that I interviewed had computers on their desks and could communicate with each other through cyberspace on a system called the ARPANET. A few years later, it's not just the experts who are benefiting from these innovations. Computers have become relatively cheap and accessible. Many of us have not one but several of them. We can communicate with each other across time and space and have a world of virtually limitless information at our fingertips.

And that's why, I believe, the fear factor has declined. We're used to computers. We know how dumb they are. We understand that they are limited to a narrow range of tasks we program them to do. The versatility of small children - the way they pick up language, navigate around obstacles, and learn to play games - is still out of reach for machines. And that's why, when we watch a computer named Watson compete against Jeopardy! champions, our admiration is less for its silicon brain than for the human ones that labored so long and hard to create it.

Publicist's note: Smartest Machine on Earth will premiere Wednesday, February 9 at 10pm on most PBS stations. Please check your local listings to confirm when it will air near you.

I definitely should have known better than to take on fans of Spider-Man whose knowledge of the story, including Peter Parker's background, is so much greater than my own. Trust me, in the Broadway musical, any scientific interest on Peter's part was so minor it was virtually imperceptible. And since this musical is today's incarnation of the Spider-Man story, I think we need to concern ourselves with what, if anything, it says about attitudes toward science now. I maintain that the evil scientist is such a convenient villain because it plays on a stereotype that is deeply embedded in our society. And it's holding us back from getting us where we need to go to create an innovation economy that will assure that the standard of living we enjoy today will be maintained for future generations of Americans.

Some readers felt that Spider-Man reflects the precarious balance between good and evil in science. Yes, as I said, there is ample evidence in the Nazi experiments, Tuskegee, and the ever-spiraling arms race, to name just a few examples from the past, of the evil uses to which science has been put. Even when intentions are golden, scientific advances often have unintended and unforeseen negative consequences. But I think a good case can be made that the good to which science and engineering have been put far outweighs the bad. But whether or not you accept that, it's undeniable that our future is linked to innovation, and innovation is a direct outgrowth of basic science.

I have a picture on my office wall at NOVA brought to me by producer Doug Hamilton when he returned from shooting our documentary First Flower in China. It shows two Chinese children watching television, and across the screen it says "Love Science." That image is symbolic of a society that sees its future and the future of its children in knowledge and innovation. President Obama recently described this time as a "Sputnik moment" for our own society, but will we rise to the occasion? I may be over-thinking a comic book character brought to the Broadway stage, but attitudes are important. If when we think "scientist" we could think less nerd and evil and more progress, innovation, and wealth, maybe we would be further along the path to an economically sustainable future.

Just some food for thought, along with fervent wishes for a speedy recovery for Christopher Tierney, one of the actors playing Spider-Man, who fell from a platform during a performance on Monday when his safety tether snapped.

I recently went to see the Broadway musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. The show was still in previews. The opening had been delayed because there were so many technical problems. In fact, the matinee I attended had to stop while the main character, Peter Parker, Spider-Man's alter ego, hung from a rope, wanly waving at the audience. Despite that, the show was a spectacle, with exquisitely costumed creatures rising up from beneath the stage and flying around the enormous theater. A couple of times, I thought Spider-Man might wind up in my lap.

If this show can get itself together, it will be a technical tour de force and provide some imaginative entertainment for kids and their families as well as old Spidey fans nostalgic for their hero. I will leave comments on the story and acting to more qualified critics, but I do have a bone to pick with this show--the choice of villain.

Spider-Man has a long tradition of "mad scientist" super-villains, starting with the comic books, going through the movies and now, the musical. I say it's time to get over it and to update this anachronistic obsession with evil scientists. But why be so bothered with a harmless fantasy? Well, anyone who has seen the latest results of international testing should be, considering that U.S. students ranked 23rd in science and even lower in math in the latest results of the international educational assessment PISA. If our future lies in the innovation economy, based on products that emerge from science and technology, our students need to step up their game. And to help make that happen, not only does our society need to invest in science education, we need to create an environment more receptive to scientific ideas and one that inspires boys and girls of all ethnics groups to consider science and engineering careers.

The Spider-Man super-villain scientist may be fantasy, but it is rooted in a distrust of science that pervades our society. To be sure, some wariness is justified; there's certainly ample evidence throughout history that science can be used for evil as well as good. But science and engineering have brought us longer and healthier lives, enabled us to learn about worlds beyond our own, and given us all the electronic gadgets we love so much, including the one I'm typing on right now. And if we want this progress to continue to improve our lives and to bolster our economy, let's stop picking on scientists and find another villain. There are certainly plenty of real ones out there.

One day more than a decade ago, I had lunch with Bob and he told me about an upcoming trip to Scotland's Loch Ness.  In 1972, Bob had what he always believed was a sighting of an enormous creature in Loch Ness, and ever after, one of his greatest passions was searching for the so-called Loch Ness monster, aka Nessie.

With his talent for drawing the best and the brightest into his circle, Bob assembled a team of faithful followers and lots of high powered electronics to help him in his search. On the team was my husband, Sheldon Apsell, like Bob an MIT alumnus and an inventor. Sheldon accompanied Bob to Loch Ness for many years, and he was there in 1999 when, as a result of the enthusiasm generated at my luncheon with Bob, we made a NOVA documentary about the search for Nessie.