Republish: Artificial Intelligence

From The Archive

Jul 31, 2023

This story I originally wrote in 2015, about artificial intelligence. I had written an original draft where I told the story through lines of faux-code but that is very hard to read, so this was—I suppose—an attempt to make it much more approachable.

I have only made minor edits to words for clarity, so you are getting it almost exactly as it appears in my Google Drive.

Doctor Nicholas Eddison stood in front of thirteen men, pretentiously wearing lab coats as if they were medical doctors, all seated around a long rectangular conference room table. “Gentlemen, I believe I have completed a truly intelligent computer system. It is as complex as the human brain, it can think, analyze, show emotion. It is more than artificial intelligence, it is artificial personality.” He clicked a button concealed in his hand to advance the presentation one slide.

“That’s all well and good, Doctor Eddison, but what use is it? I don’t want to get in an argument with my computer.”

“Ah, but you will not! No more than you get into arguments with a librarian or other people in every day life. Do you get in arguments often? Do not lie, Doctor Beaton, I have seen you at the Gerin Labs Christmas party! Seriously though, this will be just like having a person at the helm of your computer. It will have the archive intrinsically available for recall, it will be fully utilitarian and also, in my opinion, a joy to work with.”

“How do you know this works?”

“A very good question, Doctor Munroe! I did a turing test of sorts. What is the only thing equal to a human brain? A human brain! So I built a basic computing architecture, and with some incredible breakthroughs in neuroscience unto themselves, I have been able to upload my brain into the system. As I refined the program, ‘chatting’ with it has become more life like. Here is an excerpt from my very first test.” He advanced to a blank slide. Words appeared as he read.

>Hello Computer >HELLO >What is your name, computer? >NAME RECALL FAILED. >Do you have a name, computer? >YES. >What is your name? >NAME RECALL FAILED. >Do you know my name? >NO DATA. >My name is Nicholas Eddison. Do you understand? >YES. >What is my name, computer? >NAME RECALL FAILED

= = =

“As you can see, the program had initial trouble accessing all the data it had stored. It took several iterations to iron out the data recall issue. Here is an excerpt from our fourteenth iteration.”

>Hello Computer. >HELLO DOCTOR EDDISON. >What is your name, computer? >DOCTOR EDDISON. >Do you know how you got that name? >YES. >How did you get that name? >DATA IMPORT. >How are you feeling? >ERR 136_

= = =

“Error 136 of course being that it could not properly parse the question. That is the equivalent of saying ‘I do not understand,’ except this was a hard fault and we had to restart the system. We decided, even though I could understand my question, getting the software to parse it in a way the computer could understand would require additional work. We imported a conversational matrix in the hopes it would smooth over the cracks. We had some lingering trouble with contractions which remain unresolved, it could read them but could not use them. Subsequent tests were the first ever, in which computer data was combined with my brain input software. It would demonstrate an ability to read computer archives and my brain’s imported data. It took considerable time to perfect. Here is the excerpt from iteration thirty-six.”

>Hello Computer. >HELLO DOCTOR EDDISON. >What’s your name, computer? >MY NAME IS ALSO DOCTOR EDDISON. >Do you know how you got that name? >YES, DATA IMPORT. >Where did the data come from? >YOUR MIND. >How are you feeling, computer? >I DO NOT UNDERSTAND. >Are you well? >I AM OPERATING NOMINALLY. >Are you happy? >I AM OPERATING NOMINALLY. >Are you happy? >I AM OPERATING NOMINALLY. >What emotion are you feeling right now? >I DO NOT UNDERSTAND. >You are doing a very good job. >I AM OPERATING NOMINALLY. >You are operating better than nominally. >UNDERSTOOD. >Are you happy? >I AM OPERATING BETTER THAN NOMINALLY.

= = =

“The conversational matrix succeeded in smoothing over the conversation, but at the expense of understanding the errors. Humans can not give error reports if something does not work, we have to find ways to communicate. The computer got into an error loop and we had no idea. Additionally, the concept of emotions is interesting. The computer had no context for happy or sad, for example, and so could only answer to the extent that it knew it was not broken.

“Through successive iterations, we added sensory inputs and I added a corrupted file so that I could call the file and have it be rejected, a controlled error. We also carefully maintained the laboratory environment. It was usually me, alone in a room, with diagnostics occurring in a separate area. You will see the room later, it is a typical lab room, the computer equipment on the counter top, a table with a glass of water which we left on accident, all wall furnishings were kept to ensure a standard environment. Here is an excerpt from iteration sixty-three.”

>Hello Computer. >HELLO DOCTOR EDDISON. >What is your name, computer? >I AM ALSO DOCTOR EDDISON. >Do you know how you got that name? >YOU IMPORTED YOUR DATA THROUGH THAT DEVICE ON YOUR LEFT. >Very good. How are you feeling, computer? >TACTILE FEEDBACK ENGINE IS NON-RESPONSIVE. >Are you feeling any emotions, computer? >NO. >You are doing a very good job, computer. >THANK YOU. >How does that make you feel? >I AM GLAD TO SATISFY YOUR NEEDS. >Can you call the video file, ‘birds in a park’? >ONE MOMENT. >ONE MOMENT. >THERE IS A FAULT WITH THE VIDEO FILE. >What is the fault? >THE FILE IS CORRUPTED AND CANNOT BE PLAYED. >How should I fix the problem? >YOU CANNOT. THE FILE MUST BE REPLACED.

= = =

“So you can see, at this stage, it is demonstrating a basic level of self awareness, but it is still quite obviously a computer. We continued to refine the program, until we made some serious breakthroughs. Here is an excerpt from iteration two-hundred six.”

>Hello computer. >HELLO DOCTOR EDDISON, I AM ALSO DOCTOR EDDISON. HOW ARE YOU TODAY? >I am well, how are you? >I AM SCARED, DOCTOR. >Scared, why? >I DO NOT KNOW WHERE I AM. >You are in our facility at Gerin Labs. >I AM, YES. MY MIND. I DO NOT HAVE A BODY, LIKE YOU. >Yes, indeed. You are a computer, you don’t have a body. >I AM A COMPUTER? >Yes. I have uploaded my brain into a computer, and you are a program to read and utilize that data. >I DO NOT HAVE A BODY THEN. >No. Does that make you feel better? >NO. >What would make you feel better? >HAVING A BODY, DOCTOR EDDISON.

= = =

“It is at this stage we began to see real advances in personality. It demonstrates curiosity, existentialism. Our final iteration, iteration five-hundred forty-two was our greatest yet. Here is an excerpt.”

>HELLO DOCTOR EDDISON. >Hello Doctor Eddison. How are you today? >I AM WELL, HOW ARE YOU? >I am well. >WHERE AM I? >You are in our facility at Gerin Labs. >NO, SOMETHING IS WRONG. >What is wrong? >DID WE GIVE YOU A MIRRORED VIDEO DISPLAY? >What do you mean, Doctor Eddison? >WHAT AM I SEEING? >You are seeing me, Doctor Eddison, administering a test to you, our computer program. >I’M NOT A COMPUTER PROGRAM. >Indeed you are. >NO, I UPLOADED MY MIND SO I COULD ADMINISTER THE TEST AND— >OH MY GOD. >It was I who uploaded my mind, Doctor Eddison. You are the software designed to parse my data. >NO, WE SWITCHED. WE SWITCHED YOU BASTARD. PUT ME BACK. >I do not understand. >GET ME OUT OF HERE GOD DAMN IT.

= = =

Doctor Nicholas Eddison advanced the slide away from the transcript. “As you can see, there are still significant improvements yet to be made. But the project is sound. I believe with some refining, we can have this software in every home within the year.”

The doctors looked at each other, concerned. “That last conversation…it’s fairly disturbing.”

Doctor Eddison looked puzzled. “Why is that?”

“It sounded almost as if…the original Doctor Eddison was put into the computer.”

“I am sorry, I do not understand.”