electric cars are not only good for the planet, but they're also good for our ears — not that everyone minds. makes car revving noises but, of course, there is a problem — if electric cars don't make a sound, you can't hear them coming. so, dan simmons has been driving a little bit slower than usual, it has to be said, to find out what might replace the sound of silence. if electric cars have to make a noise, well, we could end up with something like this. electronic music plays well, you wouldn't accidentally step out in front of it, would you? this is an art experiment to see how cars could interpret and complement the soundscape around them. more on that idea in a bit. but first, to get a feel of what the ev manufacturers themselves have in store for us, i've come to japanese car giant nissan's technical development centre in bedfordshire. what do you think people expect an electric car to sound like? that was the interesting question that we started with — what should a car sounds like? because none of us had really thought about it. itjust sounds like the engine. the leaf is one of the world's best—selling electric cars and they now come with nissan's reimagined suite of sounds called canto. we wanted to be optimistic, a little bit futuristic, but not to pretend to be anything that the car wasn't. we didn't want to pretend to be a petrol engine and we ended up putting sort of three together and then melding sounds together and building from there a profile of different sounds that would work with the car. not all new leafs will sound the same. we're the first tv crew to be invited into nissan's top secret semi—anechoic chamber, and paul's the man in charge of testing the sounds and tweaking them to different markets. because it turns out, different countries have different ideas of what good quality sounds like. in europe, we attribute quality with a more sort of solid feel, sort of more like a low—frequency content, like a solid closing of an oak door is a good—quality sound. injapan, they tend to be slightly more biased towards higher—frequency sounds, and that's more because that's where their language operates. like the motorcycle engine's higher revving, turbo—charged engines would be a high—quality sound, so there's different tastes in different markets. here's hyundai's virtual engine sound system in the new ioniq. of course, each brand of electric car will want to make a slightly different sound — perhaps a sound that tells you it's their vehicle that's coming. but to some, that's sounding an alarm. la cucaracha plays fart noises yep, that is a fart noise. making customisable sounds for your tesla has caused a social media storm... fart noises ..since what the firm called a boombox was added to recent models. ok, so let's enable �*driving sound'. kettle drums play now, in europe, these only work when the car is stationary, but in the us, well, you can broadcast any sound you like while on the move. now, that taxi idea doesn't seem so far—fetched, does it? one of the guys behind the art project is sound designer yuri suzuki. and if you can imagine like a car being quiet, it can be terrifying. as an independent consultant to the auto industry, he thinks our cars should adapt to what we're doing, and when. the beauty of the electric car is actually, we don't have to choose one standardised sound at all, 0k? it really depends on the time and the usage of the car. it has a totally different soundscape you can create as well. here's the car's start—up sound in the morning. and its horn. horn beeps. and this is what they sound like at lunchtime. gentle chiming. and here they are at night. gentle brass. and it's yuri's dream that the cars we drive, while not all sounding the same, may perhaps harmonise and create a soundscape we want to hear. sounds a bit far—fetched? well, maybe not. i can say that i've already implemented it because my ensemble consists of bmw, mini and rolls—royce. and if you — one day, a bmw, a mini and a rolls—royce would meet at a traffic light, they would be in harmony. i'm in munich to visit the top sound designer at german car giant bmw group. renzo vitale has been composing some groundbreaking in—cabin sounds with hollywood film composer hans zimmer. the sound underlines the soul of anything and right now, we are at a really exciting point, shaping the sound of the future. yep, bmw's taking this seriously with hans and renzo taking inspiration from female vocalists... ..and even this... the first chord of a hard day's night by the beatles plays all of a sudden, it comes with an idea of a beatles chord with a guitar. the first chord of a hard day's night by the beatles plays we got all sorts of percussion instruments and we began to play around with the guitar in a way that actually one does not — with pieces of glass, pieces of wood, and just recording, and some of them ended up being part of our composition for bmw. you see how the sound, it's much smoother. a little more metallic, maybe tubular bell kind of feel. yep, tubular — it's tubular bells, that's the right word. it's not being rough on the exteriors. it's more like an introverted kind of driving as compared to the sport sound, where it's more extroverted. it's pushing. it's pushing much more. bmw owners can expect some of the new in—cabin sounds to play with next month. but if you're hoping for that classic engine sound, you'll be disappointed. so, let me try this. electronic blare. renzo�*s not interested in vio sound—alikes of an era that he says is now passing. besides, there'sjust too many alternatives to explore. high-pitched whining. meet ai—da, an ai creative robot. she's an artist and a performer who here, at oxford's ashmolean museum, is reciting her self—composed response to a dante poem at an event marking the 700th anniversary of his works. i wept silently, taking in the scene. i wept because they had lost something that i took for granted. hi, ai-da. lovely to meet you. tell me about yourself. i am the world's first ultra—realistic artist robot. i draw using cameras in my eyes and my robotic arm. i am contemporary art and i create contemporary art. what brings you here today? i'm doing a poetry reading. i've written a poem in honour of the poet dante. i am here as part of an effort to take poetry out of a box and into the public space. eyes with tears in them and a desire to weep, who never see the light of day. dante is quite a complex and remarkable writer and very relevant for today, and so we thought that ai—da responding to that will really show the capabilities of the language model but more fundamentally, why we have done it is because it is actually challenging the nature of writing itself. writing today is always done by a conscious writer to a conscious receiver — the reader. in this instance, it's done by a non—conscious machine to the reader. that's a fundamental difference in meaning—making, so the response and the relationship between a machine writing versus a human writing is fundamentally different. i find you rather intriguing. can we be friends? i am not alive. she's looking at me. i am a non—conscious machine. however, i'm interested in friendship in humans. that's fine — you haven't met some of my friends. i know you're continuing to learn lots of new skills but what's your ultimate ambition? my long—term ambition is to continue to encourage discussion about new technologies. i want to see art as a means for us to become so more aware of what's going on in our world and lives. art is a way to come together and address problems. ai—da is an ethical project. she's blurring the boundaries between what is human and what is machine. this is seriously unsettling. she doesn't settle. there's something not quite right about that. we need to discuss this. so what are your intentions — are they good or evil? i am not alive. i am a non—conscious machine. my intentions as an artist are to promote discussion and to make people think. to me, discussion can never be evil. good, thank you very much. that's all we've got time for this week. as ever, you can keep up with the team on social media. find us on youtube, instagram, facebook and twitter at @bbcclick. thanks for watching and it's goodbye from us. hello and welcome to sportsday. coming up on the programme... a dramatic and controversial saudi arabian grand prix has drawn to a close with lewis hamilton taking victory ahead of max verstappen. fa cup glory for chelsea — their day out at wembley ends with a convincing victory over rivals arsenal. a winning start for ralf rangnick at manchester united, on a busy day of premier league action. hello and welcome to the programme. we're going to start in saudi arabia and a sensational championship battle between lewis hamilton and max verstappen, which has ignited in dramatic fashion at the grand prix injeddah. remember, this is the penultimate race of the season, which hamilton hasjust won. we've had crashes, restarts, penalties and tempers flaring, with incident after incident. ben croucherjoins me now to talk through what is happening injeddah. you through what is happening injeddah. are going to all for us, but it is quite a task because i am not sure i remember a race like it? it because i am not sure i remember a race like it?— race like it? it isl of the most extraordinary _ race like it? it isl of the most extraordinary races _ race like it? it is1 of the most extraordinary races i - race like it? it is1 of the most extraordinary races i have - race like it? it is 1 of the most| extraordinary races i have ever seen. lewis hamilton started on pole and run the race and we never into the final race of the season with max verstappen and lewis hamilton level on points, but as you say that does not tell half the story of this race. lewis hamilton started on pole, max verstappen started on the 3rd after he crashed in qualifying yesterday. we did then had schumacher crashed at the start after about ia laps and that brought out the 1st red flag. then add the restart, which hopefully we will be able to see in a 2nd, that max verstappen got ahead of lewis hamilton, but did it unfairly. then there was another crash behind all of them, so they had to restart the race once more. at the 3rd restart backs. and then gets ahead of lewis hamilton with a brilliant overtake and then hamilton is handing and hounding max verstappen for the next 30 laps or so. then about 10 laps from the end lewis hamilton finally manages to get alongside max verstappen, gets passed, and max verstappen, gets passed, and max verstappen pushes him off the track and then is ordered to put lewis hamilton in front of him again. as he slowed down, hold and go straight to the back of max verstappen and we have seen these 2 clash on track already a number of times this season. eventually max verstappen lets hamilton troops, hamilton goes on to take victory in the race, max verstappen finishes 2nd and as i said they go on to the final race of the season level on points, but he temper is really off and the gloves are off in the championship. we are 'ust seeinr are off in the championship. we are just seeing some — are off in the championship. we are just seeing some pictures _ are off in the championship. we are just seeing some pictures here - are off in the championship. we are just seeing some pictures here in i just seeing some pictures here in the studio and lewis hamilton celebrating so ferociously with his teammates and you could really see the teams behind the scenes during the teams behind the scenes during the whole race really kind of getting behind the truck drivers, a loss of emotions, but an awful lot of negative stuff on the team radio between those 2 drivers and i suppose you just wonder how that is going to affect next weekend and saw the drama we had today, if it is going to come down to a final race what could happen next this has turned into a very sour title battle. ., , , turned into a very sour title battle. ., ,, . «m battle. not probably since the likes of michael schumacher _ battle. not probably since the likes of michael schumacher and - battle. not probably since the likes of michael schumacher and jack. .. | battle. not probably since the likes i of michael schumacher and jack. .. in of michael schumacher and jack... in 19 7, alex prost of michael schumacher and jack... in 19 7, alex frost and senna in the i9 7, alex frost and senna in the late 80s and early 905. this i9 7, alex frost and senna in the late 805 and early 905. this is really fierce and the pressure both teams are under trying to get every advantage, where lewis hamilton wa5 advantage, where lewis hamilton was dropping too far behind at the start, whether max verstappen wa5