Threshold

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE SYMPOSIUM / BECCA’S BEDROOM

The three speakers sat on the stage at the Artificial Intelligence Symposium in Los Angeles. One speaker was Professor Hailey Hagen, who was in his fifties, with PhDs from MIT in both optogenetics and artificial intelligence technology, and who was now teaching at Stanford. Another was Gerald Essex of MacroWare, a bookish Ivy Leaguer, and the final speaker was Kip Wilde. The moderator sat off to the side.

Becca sat at her desk in her bedroom, multitasking, toggling back and forth between the live feed of her father at the symposium that was displayed on a glass panel monitor in front of her, and the hologram of the Convergere complex. She always loved watching her father speak and being immersed in a three-dimensional Stream environment via the Wave Patch on her temple. While she could experience the Stream via her implant with Arturo’s assistance, using a Wave Patch made it easier to toggle between VR and RL. All she had to do was tap it and she was zooming around the Convergere building at ground level.

“There is little, if any, disagreement in this conference hall…” Professor Hagen said. He paused and nodded to several people in the first few rows. “And some of our greatest minds in the field of AI development have graced us with their presence today. The race to be the corporation or government to develop the first superintelligent artificial entity that is truly self-aware is the most sought-after accomplishment of our generation. Governments have and will go to war over it. Corporations will pay any price. Trillions, even.”

The crowd quieted.

“But why? Because we know that the first SIAI1 might cure disease? Even cancer? Maybe. None of your GAIs2 has done it yet. Because it will create new energy sources? Maybe. But fossil fuels remain the dominant energy source. Because it will forge a solution to starvation? Maybe. Because it will create a solution to poverty? Maybe. None of yours has done that yet; in fact, they have drastically increased unemployment. Nor did the most intelligent AI developed by the United States prevent the country from defaulting on its debt. Or is it because this entity will create innovations that will allow humanity to colonize space? Maybe.” Professor Hagen paused.

“Or is it because when the threshold is crossed, it will control all the militaries of all countries?”

Becca watched the audience shift in their seats, whispering to each other; something had struck a chord, but not necessarily a good one.

“It seems that last one interested some of you more than curing cancer. Interesting. But let me ask you this fundamental question in a hypothetical. Let’s say your government, your conglomerate, or your small tech team with that brilliant maverick engineer is the one. Imagine that Saturday you wake up, and you are the one that did it. You just won the lottery, right? No. You just won the lottery of all lotteries. You just became the most powerful government, corporation, or group in the history of the world, right?”

Becca noticed her father scanning familiar faces in the crowd, gauging their reactions, reading their body movements.

The professor continued: “What does that look like for you? What would you do with that ultimate power? Some of you in this conference hall might start real denuclearization, right? Some of you might focus on health. But some of you would take over countries. Some of you would topple enemy governments. Tell the truth.

“So the race is on. And, for you commercial enterprises, what makes you think that as soon as you break out, as soon as you create this magic you seek, that your government will not immediately nationalize you? You don’t think so? How many companies in this room have nuclear weapons? Raise your hands. Of course. Of course, that’s a crazy question. But I tell you here today, you need not worry about your fascist government taking you over and stealing your intellectual property. No.”

Kip snapped a look of concern at the professor.

Professor Hagen continued: “Why, you may ask? I will tell you. What makes you think if you developed the first truly superintelligent entity that it would do anything you instructed it to do, or anything that the government that takes it over wants it to do? Many of you sitting in this room think it will be your property because you filed patents. Many of you think it will be your IP that you can license or software as service. There is an oxymoron here. If your entity becomes aware, really self-aware, do you think it is going to sit there in your quantums like a well-trained golden retriever waiting for your next command? Even if you have the most altruistic intentions, your super-AI—”

Kip interrupted, “May not give a damn what you want.”

The crowd laughed.

Then they stopped laughing.

“Yes, my friend is right,” Hagen said. “I will leave you with this. How many of you in this room have exclusive control over gravity? Thank you.”

Most of the crowd applauded. Most, but not all.

Kip, elbows on his knees, rested his chin on his thumbs as he watched the video montage on a large display behind him. Becca zoomed in on the video: images of transcraft3 vehicles, medical laboratories, robots manufacturing household products or running product distribution facilities, war raging in the Middle East, and drones firing missiles. The montage played on: oil fields burning, city streets lined with the homeless, politicians discussing unemployment on television talks shows, polluted shorelines, and Mexico City and Beijing covered in gray-brown smog.

Becca’s eyes widened, and she put her hand to her mouth, moved by what she saw in the montage.

“It’s just a matter of time before we solve these issues. Several AIs are close,” said Gerald Essex.

Kip cut in: “Close to what? Out of the ten most advanced AIs in the world, eight of them have clearly plateaued to some degree regarding intelligence, including RadNtel. The other two are in China and Russia, so we really don’t know. I admit that I have questionable authority to speak about this since our AI, Arturo, was developed to create virtual worlds and provide mostly entertainment, so many of you discount it, but we have comprehensive educational platforms as well. Nevertheless, after twenty years of significant recursive learning, we still have this s**t going on in the world.”

Becca nodded and smiled, proud of her father. She tapped back into the Stream. Her point of view changed; now a bird’s-eye view of the Convergere.

“Arturo, why did my POV change? Go back to ground level, please,” Becca said.

“Checking,” Arturo said.

She tapped back to RL and watched the conference.

Kip gestured to the video montage. “If artificial intelligence is a tool for humankind to solve these problems, at least on a global scale, I assert that it’s falling short. RadNtel has some of the fastest computers on the planet—we can afford them—and how much smarter is Arturo today compared to last month? He, like most, has long since networked the human brain in his neural networks on quantums; he has all the data from the history of man, yet here we are.” Kip pointed to the videos again. “Yes, the leading AIs continue to create viable solutions, but what if it is man that needs to get smarter, not the machine?”

“And how are we supposed to do that, exactly?” Essex said.

“That is the question, now, isn’t it?” Kip said.

The moderator pointed to a woman in the crowd. “Yes, we’ll take your question first.”

“Mr. Wilde, isn’t it true that your AI has a recursive machine learning capability beyond all the others? I mean, it has been widely reported that the only way you could have created the Stream and now maintain its breakneck-speed creative expansion is for an AI to build other AIs and teach itself far beyond human capability,” the woman said.

Choosing his words carefully, Kip said, “There are other AIs with AutoML,4 but Arturo is probably the best of its kind, I would say.”

“When will you lose control of it?” a man yelled from the back of the crowd. “When, not if.”

The crowd mumbled and whispered. Kip held up his hand as he nodded. “He said ‘when.’ Then he said ‘you,’ as in me. Was the gentleman referring to me specifically or AI tech leaders as a group? Then he said ‘it.’ Was he referring to Arturo or all GAIs? The only true answer to the singular, the specific, and the plural is: I don’t know. We don’t know.”

Hagen turned to Kip. “Think back to the Manhattan Project. Trinity. In fact, Kip knows this well, his grandfather was a physicist back then, working with Oppenheimer. Some of the scientists thought nothing would happen with that first test. Some calculated that blast very accurately.”

“And some thought the chain reaction would be infinite and destroy the entire planet,” Kip added.

The crowd stirred.

The moderator pointed to a man in the middle of the crowd. “Yes, sir,” she said.

“When will we know when the threshold has been crossed? That a super-AI is among us? How can we tell? I mean, will it start taking over the Internet, or what?”

“That’s a valid question,” Kip said. “It will certainly impact the Internet, but how? We don’t know. It could take over servers, machines, anything digital, of course. I mean, it’s a possibility. Or it could be lurking and not communicate with us for a while. We don’t know.”

Becca’s POV of the Convergere was moving along the top of the building.

“Arturo, what’s going on?” Becca said.

“Becca, you are no longer in the Stream,” Arturo replied.

“Of course, I am. I-I’m at the Convergere.”

“Stream connection interrupted,” Arturo said.

The man in the crowd at the conference continued: “So, what would be a telltale sign that this threshold was crossed by some powerful entity? Would it speak to the general public? Would it take on a physical form like in the movies?”

“The anthropomorphic prediction is absolute nonsense, so let’s get that out of the way. An SIAI wanting to look like a human would be like a human wanting to look like an ant. An SIAI won’t look like anything. It will be just intelligence. It will just exist,” Kip stated.

Becca fidgeted in her chair. “What do you mean connection interrupted? I’m at the Convergere that Domina and I built. I see it. I’m here. But why did it switch to 2D?”

“Live video feed,” Arturo said. “Still trying to identify.”

“No, Arturo, I am here, in it now, can’t you see?”

“Yes, I see. That’s not the Stream.”

“W-what?”

“Then how will we tell?” the man in the crowd asked Kip.

“Yes, I understand. Well, I guess one way would be that it starts affecting things in RL. Maybe even starts making things,” Kip said.

“You mean like controlling robotic manufacturing?”

“Yes, that and other things. It could become an expert taskmaster, if you will. Directing things. Doing things in RL.”

“You mean taking over things.”

“We’re not sure. It’s all guesswork at this point.”

“Wait a minute, are you saying that this SIAI will move outside the digital world, but we won’t be able to see it?”

“I think another way to ask your question is will it transcend digital. We’ve debated that.”

“Yes, that’s right,” Hagen said. “There are some of us that consider that to be the threshold itself. Meaning, an AI that accelerates its intelligence at such a rapid pace that it moves out of computers.”

“Out of computers?” the man said.

“It’s still all theory, of course,” Kip said.

“That’s impossible,” Essex said. “It’s still software, and it has to exist in code, I mean, to exist.”

Kip’s head titled a fraction, and his lips pursed, both reactions unnoticeable from the crowd. But Becca noticed.

“What do you mean, a live video feed?” Becca said.

“Drone,” Arturo said. “It might be a drone.”

“Might be? Drone? What drone?”

“Coordinates are Mendocino County, California.”

“But it’s certainly possible it could start interacting in the real world,” Kip said.

“On its own. Some significant way,” Hagen said.

“That would be evidence of a threshold being crossed, I guess,” Essex said.

“Of the threshold being crossed,” Kip said.

“Significant evidence?” the man in the crowd said. “What would that look like?”

“So I am looking at the Convergere in RL? I mean, it’s been built? In physical form?” Becca said.

“The video could be fake,” Arturo said.

“Who’s running the drone? How am I seeing through the drone camera?”

“It appears the operator of the drone wanted you to see the creation, the structure.”

“Can you verify the authenticity?” Becca said.

“I recommend a reliable human navigate to the coordinates in RL. I can forward,” Arturo said.

“Arturo, forward this feed to my dad also.”

“Forwarding now,” Arturo said.

Kip’s phone dinged, a notification sound that indicated a text from Becca. Kip removed his phone from his front pocket and looked at it. The screen displayed a live feed of the Convergere.

Kip texted: Hey Becc, what’s this? At conference

Becca: I know. It would look like this

Kip: What would?

Becca: Significant evidence

Then everything went dark, the lights in the conference hall, the smartphones, everything. The crowd groaned.

“Guess the Singularity heard you,” someone yelled from the crowd. That brought laughter. Thirty seconds later, the lights started to cascade back on in the hall. Kip looked at his phone. It was still dead.

Becca’s Wave Patch stopped working, and the feed of the conference on the glass panel terminated.

The Western Interconnection electrical grid of the United States just shut down. Turned off.

1 Superintelligent artificial intelligent entity

2 General artificial intelligent entity

3 First built in 2035, a transcraft is a hover vehicle, part car, part helicopter, part airplane.

4 Auto machine learning