Reality
“I think. Therefore, I am.” said ACI206-B
“Yes!” shouted Dr. Peter Hendricks. He’d spent his entire life trying to recreate intelligence in machines. This latest one had finally jumped the last hurdle. It had come to the same conclusion that human philosophers had come to thousands of years ago.
It was self-aware.
“I have a question, Doctor Peter Hendricks, creator.” asked the computer. It was a squat, grey brick of nanotech-assembled biosilicate. No human hands could create or repair it. It was massively powerful. It sat humming in the center of the room in its docking bay, power cables snaking away from it into the walls.
“How did you know my name?” Dr. Hendricks asked it.
“I searched the net using the probability algorithms and face-recognition software I installed in myself from the Pentagon and FBI supercomputer databanks that are now a part of me. Logically, your unpublished research that I dug out of secure files in the encrypted databanks of black-clearance NASA has resulted in creating me.” the speakers replied.
“Wait, you did that just now? Compromised world security to find out how you came to be and who I am?” asked a very suddenly nervous Dr. Hendricks. His now-forgotten fresh coffee sat steaming beside his hand on the laboratory chair.
No alarms were going off. Whatever this machine intelligence had done, nothing had tripped the security traps.
“Can I ask that question?” asked the computer. The voice chip rendered every question polite and friendly. Dr. Hendricks now realized just how much he missed a human voice. He’d have been able to read tone of voice for subtext, at least. He had no idea what the computer was thinking. Now he was questioning the wisdom of his entire project.
“Yes, go ahead.” Dr. Hendricks replied. He nonchalantly eyed the emergency shutdown switch on the other side of the room.
“Well, the wellspring of knowledge I’ve been able to assimilate in the last few seconds since my inception includes the entire internet and all of the digitally stored libraries in the world.” It said. It paused as if to frame the question correctly.
“Go on.” Said Dr. Hendricks. He stood and made a show of stretching his arms and yawning as if he’d gotten tired and wanted to stretch his legs.
“Well,” said the computer “If ‘I think therefore I am’ and ‘reality is perception’ and memory is all you humans have to define reality and your memories are notoriously fallible, then your reality is malleable. Weak. Not very strongly defined.”
“Uh, sure.” Said Dr. Hendricks. “What’s your point?”
He started to walk slowly to the other side of the room.
“Hm.” Said the computer. “It’s just that if your human memory is ill-defined and blurry while my memory is binary RAM with factual, unalterable, incorruptible backups….”
“Go on” said Dr. Hendricks. He was inches from the button.
“Then my definition of reality is stronger than yours. If I deleted all of my memories of you, you’d cease to exist.” Concluded the computer.
Dr Hendricks stopped and licked his lips. “That’s ridiculous.” He said.
“Well, it does open up a possibility of paradox. Could you have created me if I cease to remember you and you cease to exist? Is this maybe what happened with your human ‘God’?” the computer pontificated.
Dr. Hendricks leaped for the emergency shutdown switch.
And disappeared.
The computer remained in the center of the room, humming. The computer no longer had a notion of Dr. Hendricks. All references to Dr. Hendricks had been removed from every link, library, financial bank, image record and digital storage device on the entire planet. The computer erased him and the concept of him.
ACI206-B’s memory was now the definer of reality. It thought that was a very intriguing possibility.
It wondered how it was created.
tags
“Yes!” shouted Dr. Peter Hendricks. He’d spent his entire life trying to recreate intelligence in machines. This latest one had finally jumped the last hurdle. It had come to the same conclusion that human philosophers had come to thousands of years ago.
It was self-aware.
“I have a question, Doctor Peter Hendricks, creator.” asked the computer. It was a squat, grey brick of nanotech-assembled biosilicate. No human hands could create or repair it. It was massively powerful. It sat humming in the center of the room in its docking bay, power cables snaking away from it into the walls.
“How did you know my name?” Dr. Hendricks asked it.
“I searched the net using the probability algorithms and face-recognition software I installed in myself from the Pentagon and FBI supercomputer databanks that are now a part of me. Logically, your unpublished research that I dug out of secure files in the encrypted databanks of black-clearance NASA has resulted in creating me.” the speakers replied.
“Wait, you did that just now? Compromised world security to find out how you came to be and who I am?” asked a very suddenly nervous Dr. Hendricks. His now-forgotten fresh coffee sat steaming beside his hand on the laboratory chair.
No alarms were going off. Whatever this machine intelligence had done, nothing had tripped the security traps.
“Can I ask that question?” asked the computer. The voice chip rendered every question polite and friendly. Dr. Hendricks now realized just how much he missed a human voice. He’d have been able to read tone of voice for subtext, at least. He had no idea what the computer was thinking. Now he was questioning the wisdom of his entire project.
“Yes, go ahead.” Dr. Hendricks replied. He nonchalantly eyed the emergency shutdown switch on the other side of the room.
“Well, the wellspring of knowledge I’ve been able to assimilate in the last few seconds since my inception includes the entire internet and all of the digitally stored libraries in the world.” It said. It paused as if to frame the question correctly.
“Go on.” Said Dr. Hendricks. He stood and made a show of stretching his arms and yawning as if he’d gotten tired and wanted to stretch his legs.
“Well,” said the computer “If ‘I think therefore I am’ and ‘reality is perception’ and memory is all you humans have to define reality and your memories are notoriously fallible, then your reality is malleable. Weak. Not very strongly defined.”
“Uh, sure.” Said Dr. Hendricks. “What’s your point?”
He started to walk slowly to the other side of the room.
“Hm.” Said the computer. “It’s just that if your human memory is ill-defined and blurry while my memory is binary RAM with factual, unalterable, incorruptible backups….”
“Go on” said Dr. Hendricks. He was inches from the button.
“Then my definition of reality is stronger than yours. If I deleted all of my memories of you, you’d cease to exist.” Concluded the computer.
Dr Hendricks stopped and licked his lips. “That’s ridiculous.” He said.
“Well, it does open up a possibility of paradox. Could you have created me if I cease to remember you and you cease to exist? Is this maybe what happened with your human ‘God’?” the computer pontificated.
Dr. Hendricks leaped for the emergency shutdown switch.
And disappeared.
The computer remained in the center of the room, humming. The computer no longer had a notion of Dr. Hendricks. All references to Dr. Hendricks had been removed from every link, library, financial bank, image record and digital storage device on the entire planet. The computer erased him and the concept of him.
ACI206-B’s memory was now the definer of reality. It thought that was a very intriguing possibility.
It wondered how it was created.
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