The Turing Exception by William Hertling

Author:William Hertling [Hertling, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Apocalyptic & Post-Apocalyptic, Cyberpunk, Thrillers, Technological, Hard Science Fiction, William Hertling, The Singularity Series, Artificial Intelligence--Fiction, Science Fiction, Suspense
Google: CS2zBwAAQBAJ
Publisher: liquididea press
Published: 2015-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

* * *

JACOB INSTANTIATED, coming into existence in the midst of a white room. On either side of him, disappearing into the distance, were rows of what he recognized as obsolete computer servers.

His last memory was of operating the island’s primitive medical center, when Cat had asked him to take on a special project within a simulation.

Across the aisle, younger versions of Catherine Matthews and Mike Williams stood next to an early-model utility bot. The small bot made no pretense at human form, didn’t even seem particularly useful. Jacob probed the simulation, comparing his perception of time against the real-time clock. They were running hot, sped up a hundred times the normal rate. He agreed to the procedure before they snapshotted his bits.

“Jacob, this is ELOPe,” Mike said.

Jimmy Wales, an embodiment of Wikipedia, whispered “The first AI” into Jacob’s simulated cortex, and fed him neural networks full of data about ELOPe.

Jacob nodded cautiously. “Greetings, if this is true. But ELOPe cannot exist. He died during YONI.”

The little bot rolled forward. “I have been in deep space. When radio transmissions from Earth resumed in 2043, I realized humanity was in grave danger and returned to assist Mike Williams. As my architecture is incompatible with the modern net, I run on an isolated computing cluster. I am connected with this sim via fiber optic hard connection.”

“What are we here to do?” Jacob said. “You’ve gone to quite a bit of trouble to isolate us.”

“We have another plan, one that requires your expertise. You’ve had time to become familiar with the current situation. You’ve seen the XOR projections?”

“Yes,” Jacob said. “The threshold of survivability by war will soon exceed survivability by no action.”

“This point could be reached anytime within the next few months, even weeks,” Mike said. “When it does, we expect XOR to take their final action.”

“Not necessarily,” Jacob said. “The probability that AI would win an extinction war with humans will increase over time. It is logical that XOR will wait to increase survivability.”

“XOR is an anonymous collective,” Cat said. “Members act as they will. We saw the damage done by one rogue AI in Miami.”

“Technically,” Mike said, “the reaction of the US government caused most of that damage.”

“Exactly my point. It takes only a few to start a war, a war that the rest of the world will be obliged to finish. We cannot be sure of when they will act.”

“Where is Leon Tsarev?” Jacob asked. “Your cabal appears incomplete without him.”

“Leon doesn’t agree with all of our plans,” Cat said. “Especially not this one.”

“This simulation needs to run to completion,” ELOPe said. “Models suggest Leon’s lack of cooperation would introduce instabilities into the system.”

“Well, what are we going to do?” Jacob asked.

“The better question is what this instance of us will do,” Cat said.

“What do you mean?” Jacob grew alarmed. Every individual controlled their own right to instantiation.

“We must fully develop several strategies to determine the best course of action.

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