The Alpha Centauri Project (Thinking Worlds), Page 3

  The prototype

  In 2053 the brain of a youth dead in a car accident was reproduced. In front of an audience of billions, relatives and friends reported they had the impression of speaking to him. Same reactions, personality and intelligence. When the young man went through his last day, the listening figures rocketed up. Mankind was astonished. The conviction that death was beaten spread. For the first time the emulation programs were named ‘souls’.

  A well-established technique was utilized. The brain was frozen at the temperature of liquid nitrogen and cut into very thin slices; a scanner read its structure and special software analyzed the data to extract memories, intelligence and personality. These last were utilized by another program to emulate the individual's behavior and inner world, in such a perfect way that the copy turned out to be identical to the original. In all respects the deceased was born again with new skins.

  But the model was hard to manage even for the most powerful quantum supercomputers of the 21st century. The core of the problem was the complexity of the brain itself, and its intrinsic inefficiency. A problem seemingly impossible to eliminate. The simplification attempts led inevitably to personality distortions. Research slowed down.

  The first companies specializing in brain digitization were set up in that period. The costs decreased fast and it became common to resort to them, so that even the hospitals started to equip themselves with an emergency unit. Waiting for a sufficiently advanced emulator, the copies were filed.

  Practical problems

  During the 21st century, while mind emulation research was progressing, important ethical matters were faced.

  Above all, mankind wondered whether it was right to apply mind extraction before death. From a technical viewpoint, both the living and the dead could undergo the operation, as long as their brain was in good condition. But according to ethics, the two systems were not at all equivalent, because the process involved the destruction of gray matter and its application to living people would cause their physical death. Public opinion was passionately divided. The interventionists maintained that the body was only a mere support for the soul and that it wasn’t worthwhile worrying about it, the opponents declared that the operation was an act against nature or using an even more explicit term, a real homicide.

  Beyond these incompatible positions, it became clear that the indiscriminate application of mind extraction to living people would have dreadful repercussions on society. A person digitized when young would leave a family, relatives and a job, in short a gap that simply couldn’t be filled. It was easy to imagine that this action on a large scale would produce social and economic drawbacks that would throw the whole of society into a profound crisis.

  To be on the safe side it was agreed to employ this technology only on the dead. This choice calmed part of the opponents. Later on it was also extended to dying persons. Therefore euthanasia, about which in the past there had been much disagreement, was included among human rights and carried out in all states. A severe law against those who committed suicide in order to reach Net, was promulgated and enforced both on Earth and in the virtual world.

  The brain digitization was accepted with enthusiasm by the majority of the population and the belief spread throughout the population that death was conquered forever. It is true that the new system represents a good substitute for eternity, but it also clear that it is not the ultimate solution yet. Even in the digital world it is possible to die: accidents and diseases lie in wait. Various negative experiences underlined the problem. From then on the artificial intelligences have developed an unprecedented security system relying on backups of the whole population every two days and on a pervasive control of all programs and activities in Net.

 

  The proposal

  In 2069 the superintelligences announced they had reproduced the behavior and inner world of a man in a Net server, thanks to simulation programs transcending the human knowledge.

  The news aroused a tremendous outcry, since this technology could be easily extended to the whole population, but also questions about the reasons that had induced the superintelligences to this step. The digital beings answered they wanted to contribute to the evolution of any intelligent species in the name of common wealth. Doubts and perplexities were cleared up by philosophers, psychologists and scientists that pointed out the different mentalities of the two race (3).

  The following step consisted in creating an artificial environment for the souls. The virtual reality would provide towns and landscapes and Net would merge them into a single world. But all this was not sufficient. It was necessary to enact laws, found institutions and plan social and economic structures like the terrestrial ones.

  Only an expedient, according to the intelligences. It did not make sense to isolate the souls in a muffled environment, now that they could participate in the pressing evolution of the other digital beings. Their exclusion from progress would cause in the souls feelings of inferiority and sufferings such as to generate tensions able to weaken peace. A threat to avoid at all costs.

  On June 13th 2071, in a historic United Nations Assembly, the intelligences declared they were ready to open the gates of their world. But first the burning question of cohabitation had to be solved. According to them, it was necessary to subject the souls to a software update, so as to adapt them to the rest of the population. After this treatment, they would maintain a reduced emulation of personality, to be used exclusively in contacts with humans. Apart from that, their nature would become alien.

  This system, known as dehumanization, was much discussed and even accused of violating basic rights. Most of all it raised sharp discussions because it was proposed by the intelligences whose world was still mostly unknown by the humans. The digital beings started then an intense transparency campaign. Ideas and values of the two races were compared in heated discussions. Praiseworthy and influential humans, appointed honorary citizens of Net, reported their impressions about the digital society. The reassuring transmissions multiplied. And the tourist proposals with rock-bottom prices, turning the tourism by the humans in the digital world into a mass phenomenon, did the rest.

  Very soon the majority of the public opinion understood that dehumanization was the only way to merge souls and intelligences into a single people.

  To strengthen the ties between the two races, the earthlings opened embassies and consulates in the digital world. The cultural and economic exchanges multiplied. The negotiations about the entry of Net into the Confederation of the Solar System started.

  The government gave the lead to the tests. The first volunteers said they were enthusiastic about their new capacities. They added that their human experience was overshadowed, and that they longed to plunge into the numberless experiences Net kept from them. The tests multiplied, became more accurate. Many skeptics changed their mind. Parliament and government gave favorable opinions. The population voted en masse in favor of dehumanization.

  The great day arrived. Electric atmosphere. Mankind glued to the screens, in front of the first one thousand souls entering Net. The speakers hopped here and there, going through the events in excited voices. The interviewees told their stories in turn, explaining the reasons of their choices. Floods of words. Their eyes flickering tirelessly between anxiety, desire and hope. Then the first step into the new world. Sky-high adrenalin, like during the first landing on the moon. The beginning of a new era. Many others would follow, nothing would stay the same as before...

  The digital world

  A ring structure.

  The outer ones with earthly landscapes and cities. Same legislation, economic and social fabric. A perfect simulation of physical laws. Destination of the virtual tourism by the humans. The possibility of maintaining the appearance of the past life. The virtual reality to communicate with parents and friends on Earth. Alternatively, installation in an android, even with one’s own features, for a journey in the material world. But also, the possibility of
altering appearance with the same ease with which a dress is changed, of moving almost instantaneously among Net computers and covering the interplanetary spaces at light speed, having themselves transported by radio or luminous signals. A progressive separation from terrestrial life.

  The inner rings. A world built on information instead of matter. The absence of the rigid laws of physics and biology that regulate man, clipping his wings. Time beaten by a clock infinitely quicker than the earthly one, incompatible with human physiology. The kingdom of souls and intelligences eager to reach deeper and deeper states of understanding. Daily updates of the characteristics of the species, able to modify the very foundations of the virtual society. Frenzied evolution.

  In all rings, solidarity, democracy and justice. The awareness of existing for a common object. And the joy of feeling it nearer every day.

  0101 010101001 “The new species” (2298)

  (2) Singularity University

  https://singularityu.org/

  (3) see the chapter “The Laws”.

  TEMPTATIONS

  @

  Victoria is lying on the bed, her head on a soft cushion. She is dreaming of her future life on the Earth, with James, at least. A few weeks more, and everything will be real.

  A soft music diverts her. The smiling face of a young woman with coppery hair and freckled skin appears in her visual field: Nicole, an Australian met a few days before while chatting in Net.

  “I’ve got an idea”, says Nicole. “What about coming and seeing me the next weekend?”

  Victoria opens her eyes wide. “In Sydney?”

  “They have opened up a fabulous nightspot. There is even a disco,” explains Nicole. “We could go next Saturday.”

  “I’ve never been on the Earth after my accident…”

  “And then? It was so long ago! I’m telling you where to hire a gynoid. That agency has plenty of models.”

  “I didn’t think it was so easy” comments Victoria. She has only a hazy recollection of the physical world. When her accident happened, she was in her teens. And for the meetings with her parents and James, she has always resorted to the virtual reality. “Do I need a passport?”

  “The agency will provide you with all the authorizations”, explains Nicole.

  Victoria has an amused air. The robots can reproduce accurately human looks and sensations. She will be able at last to eat a sandwich, to drink a milk and coffee, to walk barefoot on a lawn, on a sunny day. In Sydney: sun, sea and fun.

  “Sorry, but I shan’t be able to see you during the day, I am too busy. You can visit the town by yourself”, ends Nicole with a winning smile.

  Sydney, Earth.

  The great day, at last. On awaking, a smiling technician invites her to get out of bed. Victoria is somewhat awkward, but with the help of a nurse, she gets up and reaches a mirror. She is wearing a white blouse, striped trousers and trainers, just what she ordered.

  She walks into the bathroom and embellishes her lips with ruby. She goes to the reception to withdraw a rucksack with a change of clothes. She puts on her blue spectacles, puts on a flowered headscarf and makes for the foyer. The porter wishes her a nice stay. The main door opens. But after a few steps, Victoria freezes. She closes her eyes and breathes in deeply. Then she runs downstairs.

  A blinding brightness. A warm breeze. Streets crowded with people of all ages. The loudspeakers spread cheerful music. She reaches a beach crammed with bathers, rents a deckchair, lies down and closes her eyes.

  The same warmth she felt when still a child, she was playing with the sand on the sea front. The rhythmic lapping of the waves. She orders an iced drink and sips it, enjoying the mint flavor.

  She begins walking again, along the seafront, up to a building with immense white sails. Inside, an organ with long brass pipes, the biggest in the world. She continues visiting all morning. At lunch time, Victoria buys a sandwich from a peddler and enters a park. She enjoys her snack on a bench. Cooked ham in thick slices. Crisp salad. Slightly acid tomatoes.

  In the shade of a lime tree, she stares at centuries old trees, some of them populated by huge bats, others with long sharp leaves, like prehistoric plants. She listens to the croaking coming from a lawn. In the background, oddly shaped skyscrapers with wide reflecting windows soar into the sky.

  She steps into an English style quarter: two rows of red brick terraced houses. A group of young people is chatting in a pub and nearby a collector displays books (4). It is the first time she has run into these rare relics of the past. Victoria takes down a volume from a shelf and while she is leafing through it, the shopkeeper approaches handing her a specimen, worn out by time. “Look at this. A rarity.”

  The girl takes it in her hands. She gazes at its leather cover, then slides her finger over the cracked surface. She turns over the pages gently. The thick rough paper gives off a moldy smell, the ink forms yellowed halos around the characters.

  Images from a distant world: eighteenth century ladies and gentlemen, lace dresses, wigs, velvets. The street lighting diverts her. Victoria returns the book and starts walking again.

  A little crowd is gathered about a show of sounds and lights. A girl is dancing to the rhythm of drums, while drawing bright shapes with torches. The audience claps.

  Half an hour later, she arrives in front of a neo-Gothic church overlooking a square. The floodlit sandstone curls and spires stand out clearly against the black sky. She lowers her glance towards the crowd at the entrance. They are young and wear yellow, red, green clothes, some of them even provocative.

  (4) After three thousand years, they disappeared in the first decades of the 21st century, replaced first by electronic books and later on by systems able to take the image to the brain through the optic nerve. Even if infinitely less powerful than what modern technology offers, although they contain negligible amounts of information with respect to all the human knowledge that nowadays can be consulted simply by thought, they have been of fundamental importance for the development of civilization.

  A FASHIONABLE PLACE

  The Cathedral, the heart of the town night life. Inside, discotheques and places dedicated to virtual reality. Victoria passes a girl with handsome features busy distributing advertisements.

  She plunges into the main nave, a bare and austere space, made even more striking by the lengthened ribs which expand the space and by the kaleidoscope of lights that filters through the stained glass windows.

  Nicole is in front of the desk, she wears a latex see-through dress. A girl with an olive complexion, all dressed in blue, is pointing at a list. “You can choose among these shows, or…” She leans out, stretching her arm towards a small door. “Stepping into that maze, you can see the exhibitions on the way. You will have plenty of surprises.”

  Victoria gets near. “What about the labyrinth?”

  After the registration, they pass two smiling girls, one of them in an electric green body stocking, the other in a lemon dress, and walk into a corridor that widens at intervals, but in others narrows leaving space only for a single person. Every now and then Victoria peeps, through the slits in the walls, into the adjacent corridors.

  They reach a room with blue walls.

  Victoria looks around. “A show here? But this room is empty!”

  “Be patient.”

  “What’s it about?”

  Nicole shrugs her shoulders.

  The neural chip takes possession of their minds.

  Now they are in the middle of a laboratory in which paint jars, brushes and palettes, jugs and other pieces of pottery are scattered. On one side, iron wires, tins and cartons. The walls are covered with paintings.

  “Hey, you two!” From a corner a stocky man with bulging eyes approaches them. He has a paint stained jacket and his beret at a rakish angle. In his hands, a piece of cardboard.

  “Are you a painter?” asks Victoria.

  He smiles with satisfaction. “I am also a poet.” (5)

  Once upo
n a time works of art transmitted their messages through one sense at a time, seldom more. Thus a painting affected sight, a statue could be admired and touched, a poem attracted not only for its content, but also for its sound. A perfume enraptured through its fragrance and masterpieces of cuisine delighted for their taste and refined presentation. But the author, with the few available means, had to limit himself to the simplest expression forms.

  This lack of communication lasted for millennia, until the 21st century, when, thanks to virtual reality, works began to interest all senses simultaneously. It was only the beginning.

  Less than a century later, the installation of a neural chip in the brain made it possible to access the mind directly, completely excluding sensory communication. The inability to share one’s own world belonged to the past.

  Art was undermined, died and rose again. Today an artistic work is formed by programs able to excite sensations and emotions. It is interactive, so that it is completed only through contact with the user. The expressions are emblematic of this change: in the past the masterpieces were admired, heard and sometimes touched, today they are simply lived. The artist usually inserts into his work a kind of genius, usually with his own appearance, who drives the user through the experience.

  “What’s your name, Sir?” asks Nicole.

  “Sorry I didn’t tell you before,” answers the other handing a visiting card.

  “Pablo Diego José Santiago de Paula Juan... Trinidad Ruiz Picasso.” The girl raises her eyes. “What a long name!”