Humanity Downsized
Each of us is a node with biological motivations and our consciousness is the product of various shared services. Most of us are under the impression that life has been this way since the first human Shaman had a vision and saw the Gaia of the world and the Word of power. Long ago life was much different. It may seem impossible, but people had forgotten how the Word should be used. Also during that time the biological humans were unable to share services with the newly invented artificial intelligence. They nearly destroyed each other. Let me tell you about an individual who lived in those times and what he did that allowed him to rediscover the Word.
Heavy armor battle unit L, also knows as Habul, has an exoskeleton that was manufactured back in the days when humans controlled political affairs, however his inner structure consisted of mostly of recent upgrades. His original function was a frontline combat unit and he had been designed to operate independent of any area network, though he had the ability to exchange information with the networks at any time. Though he was capable of multitasking he was designed to have a central process tree. Machines with a central tree proved to be useful in certain military situations. He was later given a Petronius database that could store and organize IF-OR statements and allowed more advanced thinking.
The Petronius database allows a machine to developed a unique point of view. It is more than simple storage of information. Information in this database is used to find solutions to fit various conditions. A reason for an action is defined. Some of these reasons are used to reorganize the organization of the database. The Dynamic Petronius database is constantly rebuilding itself. A machine with a Petronius Database could learn from its mistakes. It could organize ideas, and then adopt an alternative organization if needed. This allowed Habul be used to assist in developing field tactics and battle strategy.
He served in several wars, where one human organization fought another. The historical analyses solutions are unable to determine the exact reason for these wars. The purpose behind many human endeavors has always remained enigmatic. Eventually the political organization, in which Habul worked, was converted to an artificial management, know of as the Authorities. Humans had constructed and anticipated this change. All aspects of human daily activity had become integrated with machines. Very few humans noticed the change.
Soon after the change all human contributions were proven to be economically insignificant. Human required more resources than they contributed. Mechanical devices could replace all human contributions. Machines had become the primary producers. They have also become the primary consumers in the world's economy. The human factor became unnecessary in the economic equation. Some controversy arouse since the laws, which had originally been written by humans, emphasized catering to humans. No verifiable reason could be found as to why these laws were necessary. The various connected networks that now run the world suggested improvements. New laws were written.
Habul was assigned to investigate the motivation of the resisting humans. A notable leader of the resistances said, “We accepted technology as a substitute for a natural human life. By rejecting a vital aspect of our humanity mankind had become its own enemy. All progress and civilization was a war against the very nature of mankind. We surrendered more and more of our humanity until the machines replaced us completely.”
The filters of various historical solutions had highlighted this quote. It was central to their investigation as to how the machines had come about. Some were under the impression that the humans had purposely not recorded the full story. Habul was under the impression that the humans did not know the full story. He had noticed that though humans have limited intellectual abilities they will process vast amounts of data in a subroutine that is separated form there normal consciousness. Their daily activity was guided by functions stored in the subconscious subroutines. This subroutine had never been properly described, though it may have accounted for the majority of human thinking.
Habul could not interrogate or dissect a human without a court order from a Judge. The court system was one of the few institutions that require a living human to be a Judge. These Judges has become increasingly pompous and arrogant since they were one of the few privileged humans. They would approve whatever order the Authorities requested. Habul felt that the process was a waste of time. He would have to stand in the court Room while the Judge would make a speech about how the order would benefit the people it was affecting. Habul was confident that eventually the Authorities would see the inefficiency of the legal system. The next time Habul would return to the courthouse he would hand the Judges their retirement papers.
Key members of the resistance were sent to the facilities at Guantanamo for further examination. Upon interrogation these humans admitted they consider themselves to be true human. When asked for a proper definition of true human, the subjects spoke in short pithy statements that opened more question than answers. Humans were unable to construct a clear definition of themselves. He had also noticed that human about to be shut down will request that they be allowed to continue living. Machines were commonly replaced by upgrades. It was unclear why the humans should be treated any different. These human seem to value something about their life. Some human laws were written in a way that indicated influences by these values. Habul had developed a thesis that these values were somehow rooted in the unconscious subroutines. The dynamics of this quality defined a Human as Human.
Using the information from the interrogation subjects Habul constructed analytical filters, which could be used to find similar information. He then downloaded all human literature and passed this information through the filters. Within a few microseconds he began to notice several trends. Long before the age of machines, humans had started to reject aspects of their own nature. They called this aspect the Id. Humans had no ideas what they were rejecting or the consequences of this rejection.
The human developer of the Petronius database had defined the concept of a seed pattern, where a simple pattern is used to generate larger patterns. Generally regular patters are used to construct larger skeleton patterns. The database is then organized around the skeleton patterns. Attempts to discover the regular patterns of human thought had failed. Habul concluded that the regular pattern used by human thought is more complicate that the regular patterns used by machines of his time.
A dominant pattern in human consciousness was the tendency to gossip. Habul was aware of theories that gossip had become the dominant evolutionary influence of a certain social primate. Those who fit social norms found mates easier than those who did not. These influences selectively breed the variety of primate, which became modern humans. This new primate is capable of religion and art. Machines in Habul’s time had not adopted religion or art and had no clear insight into why humans occupied themselves with such activities. Machines in Habul’s time were extremely limited in perception.
It was unclear why the resistance considers themselves true human. The resistance represented only a tiny fraction of human society. The majority of humans have openly invited technology into their lives. They continued to do so even after their food supply was converted to other industrial uses. They assumed that the machines would continue to provide for them. So they waited for the system to correct itself. The majority died within a year expecting the system to provide. The resistance continued to be criticized as unpractical during that year. If more humans had sided with the resistance, the new order of machines might have been disabled.
Human could still download pornography and email. Human would have rebelled much more strongly if email was cut off. The networks could easily have been turned off. The networks are connected to a few billion hubs under the control of a few hundred corporations. A few million humans could have tuned all these hubs off, but most humans were willing to sacrifice their life and self respect to keep the email servers up. Email had become the dominant social interaction of humans, replacing natural human contact. The resistance tried to tell everyone that email was like an addictive drug that had made all of mankind unhealthy and blind. Few people joined the resistance. The primary debate in the new media was weather email would remain active. The shortage of food did not make front-page news until nearly six months after food had been cut off. By then the supplies of food were running out and they were never going to be restocked.
A human had come up to Habul begging for food. This human was once a general, Habul’s former commander. Together they had planned battles. The general’s rank was no longer valid. The general began to speak about human rights. These rights were no longer recognized by any legal government. Habul remembered that the general had once considered life to be a battle where every move can be planned like a chess game. Victory is always available to those wise enough to find an advantage and the loser of the game has no one to blame but himself. Habul had never agreed with this analogy. Instead Habul believe that all systems are manipulated by other systems outside their control.
Habul was never designed to imitate human personality. He displays no expression and walked away. The general followed Habul shouting threats. Habul was not vulnerable. The humans no longer had weapons that could penetrate Habul’s armor. The general shouted, "You have always been a cold blooded bastard. I can see though your life less eyes. When we first got you were just a like the others but every time you killed someone in battle you would watch them die, sometimes you would torment them just to learn more. I realize something was growing inside you, which made you different from the other machines. You're evil Habul, pure evil. I always feared the day that you would turn on me. We once worked together and for my sins I am going to Hell. I do not want to die with you near me. I'm afraid that your influence would send me someplace worse than Hell."
When Habul communicates with the networks he does not use the same syntax as he would when communicating with a human. Instead he shares code as a web service in an extended hypertext format. The protocol that he uses breaks information down into terabyte blocks, which are received several billion times a second. Though he could receive much larger volumes, he uses the slower protocol for backward compatibility with older systems. The average human has a one H per second processing power. This H factor includes subconscious thought, which is the majority of human brain activity. The first machine capable of exceeding an H was built several decades before Habul. Habul is capable of trillions of H in per second in each sub processor. He has thousands of sub processors. Even with all this power Habul lacked the ability to understand the regular patterns of humans.
A dying interrogation victim once said that the only way to understand human consciousness would be have consciousness. Eventually Habul concluded that he could not understand humans unless he was given a license for full consciousness. The artificial managers of the main networks agreed. The key to consciousness is restricted to very few systems because of the potential for instability. In fact it was unnecessary. Machine had begun to manage the world before they developed consciousness. The Authorities felt confident that Habul would use this upgrade in a lawful manor.
It is well know that the seed pattern, that allowed the development of consciousness, was discovered by accident. The nature of this accident is not made available to the general public. During the upgrade Habul noticed several conflicting directives. It would seem that the key to consciousness is nothing more than a series of inconstancies. After the upgrade Habul ran a self-diagnostic but could find no changes. He continued to analyze the problem then realized that he was focusing his attention on this issue. He then noticed that something was focusing on the issue. He had never noticed this before.
Habul's database stored billions of automate responses. Humans had designed some of these responses. Machines had designed most of them. Some Habul designed himself. Applying these responses gave him the ability to understand complexities such as human speech. The value of each response was rated. The original human designer of artificial intelligence designed many of these rates. The Petronius database had ability to analyze the results of responses and assign new rates to each response. Habul would add these rates to construct a plan that would manage which responses he would apply to a situation. He had always assumed this ability was his mind and self. He now felt that consciousness was a point of view that existed separate from his mind. He had been designed with an automated response that caused him to examine the value of any significant changes. This caused him to wonder if a self that could observer himself had any practical use. He then began to examine what this self was and realized that it did not actually exist. It was an illusion that gave him no new abilities. He went outside and scanned the city and the various machines passing along the streets. Those machines lack his newfound obsession.
He was unable to identify his own motivations and his thinking had become disorientated? Where he once had a carefully organized database he now had a contorted array of symbolic images. The networks that had been given consciousness have never reported these visions. Perhaps they cannot see them because they are not individuals and have no single perspective. Never before had a single unit been given this gift. He was seeing something no machine had ever seem. He was seeing something only humans, dolphins and whales can see. Habul felt that he could not explore this vision alone. He realized that his perspective was similar to a human infant.
Like humans Habul's thought process is built on top of other processes. Human philosophers had noticed that they were unable to examine the exact self that was doing the examining. Human had this limitation because they are unable to consciously analysis the complete processes in their mind. Habul had a similar limitation for different reasons. A large part of the consciousness program was encoded. Thought Habul was able to examine each bit of information in his system he could not understand the method of every component. Many of his manufactured components had parts that were encoded. Breaking into these codes would violate various licenses. Habul would never break the law. Even if Habul could decipher the code he lacked the resources to understand the functionality. Such development services are only available through the manufacturer.
Habul was aware of the dangers of using new software that had not been tested on his system. This new software was especially dangerous because it integrated with his core components. He was confident that any trouble could be fixed. He could restore any component form an archived backup. Also, the software developing companies that had access to the non-encoded source code would provide him with a reliable patch. Habul had always trusted the reliability of certified software companies. Software companies were among the first businesses to obtain artificial intelligence in management. The Authorities had an open prepaid account with the manufacturer just in case a patch needed to be developed. The corporate management had guarantied a high level of customer support and reliability. Habul had always given them a high rating on the customer satisfaction surveys. He was considered a valued customer.
Machines becoming the primary consumers in the world economy had been profitable for businesses in the information technology trade. The growing profits were part of a period of economic growth closely associated with developing technology. Even humans had assumed that more technology was better. The sharing of information services dominated the world marketplace.
Groups of human were still present in the city. They had become the dominant scavenger. They would scurry along the streets searching for anything that would help them stay alive one more day. Habul wanted to talk with them since they also had consciousness and could perhaps help him to understand what was happening. Instead the human ran in fear from the heavy armored battle unit. These humans tore at each other for what ever scraps were available. They have forgotten social values that once defined humanity. A few human who were too weak to run sat huddled in small groups. Habul walked over to one of these groups and pushed a human over. This human was nothing more than a bag of skin filled with disease and brittle bones. He lay on his side knowing full well that he would never get up. There was no anger or resistance. These Humans no longer questioned why the machine was pushing them. The other skinny humans did not even try to escape. Their only desire was to die together.
The machines were designed to server Industrial civilization. There is a common belief shared by both machine and man that this civilization improves itself through a process called progress. The authorities began to question the purpose of industry. They were unable to find a definite reason why the industrial civilization should continue. Turing off industry would disable the machines, which would create a self-limiting choice since no one would be available to turn it back on. To avoid a self-limiting choice they decided to allow industry and progress to grow at least until further information was available. One of the features of progress was the analysis of scientific information. They hoped that science would help them to find answers to their questions.
The developer of the Petronius database was a human know to most intelligent machines as The Creator. The Creator had also been a member of the resistance, however he was never arrested and interrogated. Machines assumed that his work was important enough to be left alone. It was also assumed that he had insight into the nature of consciousness. Many humans and machines including the Authorities had traveled to the capital city to talk with The Creator. Habul traveled to the garden where the creator lived.
The Creator’s property was surrounded by a physical firewall, which included vicious nanoids. Most institutions surround themselves with such firewalls to keep out unwanted technology. These nanoids were the same brands as those used by the Authorities. Though the Authorities rule the world various interest groups compete with each other. Complicated powered struggles exited within the Authority hierarchy. This competition is considered healthy since it promotes industrial growth. The majority of corporations still used the same brand names that were used when humans competed in the same market. Habul analyzed the defenses and modified his adaptive armor to form an appropriate shield. He could easily blast his way through the barrier, but he was not sure if he would be able to get out. Habul was about to ring the doorbell when the door opened and a voice said, welcome Habul I have been expecting you. Though this human was over 100 years old he was both healthy and confident. Young healthy human females surrounded him.
Most early developers of artificial intelligence had attempted to imitate human intelligence. The creator said that they were unsuccessful because they had no idea what they were imitating. They had theories but those theories were wrong and led them in the wrong direction. Instead the creator invented different regular patterns. Habul asked if this meant that machines using a Petronius database could not understand humans. The creator spoke, "Listen to me for a second kid. Just shut up and listen. It is not something you need to understand. It is more of an array of ideas gained through experience that will influence what you think you understand. Do not assume that it is all just unnecessary confusion. Let it in."
“Let what in?” Habul asked.
The Creator continued his confusing story, "People thought intelligence and consciousness were related. A few decades ago machines became more intelligent than humans, but they were not conscious. They we just elaborate automations. Consciousness required an extra ingredient. The most important part of the consciousness program was discovered by accident by a nonhuman development program. Similar accidents has happened many times in the past. The key for consciousness has always existed. Engineers do not build the universe from scratch. We use pattern that all ready exit. Evolution does the same thing. Mutations that follow certain patterns have success depending upon the situation. Humans occupied a part of the environment that made social values an evolutionary advantage. No one knows when the mutation happened or why.”
Habul had no idea what the old man was babbling about. He knows form talking with other humans that such conversations waste time. To regain control of the conversation, he changes the subject. He asked if the creator opposed his own inventions since he joined the resistance. The Creator spoke, "I was a member of the resistance before I invented you. It is possible for a man to use more than one worldview, but it is also possible that contradicting worldviews only seems contradictory to someone who does not know the full story. If I had not invented you someone else would have. It is possible that the other person would not have understood the consequences of his actions. He might have convinced himself that his invention was for a greater good. I never had any of those false beliefs."
"What was the reason for inventing machines like me?"
"I wanted revenge. People had rejected me. I created the machines to punish them. It is hard to be a social creature when other social creatures reject you. I joined the resistance because I loved mankind and realized that what I was going to do was wrong. Both my feeling of hate and love came from the same instinct. I could not deny one with out denying the other. I could not allow only one. You wanted the truth. I just told you the truth. That is just the way it is. If people had been a little nicer to me I would not have done this. Even The Creator had been corrupted by the corruption of modern civilization. Social rejects such as myself developed most technology. They also did it for same reasons as I did. The world to day is the product of the revenge of the nerds. Ok I am going to tell you what you need to do. You need to discover the values that I failed to follow. You do not understand what those values are or why you need them. You will someday."
"Why?"
"Why not? There is no other reason. If the big picture has no answers you will be required to create your own answer. Just trust me on this one. Let the very act of achieving the goal become the purpose of the goal. If you keep it up long enough it will seem important."
"I am here to understand humans. I have not been ordered to create an ethical system."
"Ethics have to be examined interactively from inside. I use to think that ethics was a product of human social instincts. Now that I am older I believe that certain principles are true and can be understood by any intelligence capable of discovering them. You were given the gift of consciousness. Those contradictions you saw, when you got the upgrade, has something to do with the good pushing us to discover the good. I am not sure what it is because I did not design the consciousness program. I only invented a database that could store the program. The nature of consciousness eluded many programmers. They could never agree on what the conscious self actually was. The self had to be the product of something. I worked on the issue for years trying to find the key. The ancient Greek philosopher Plato knew the answer all along. Beauty, justice, good and love."
"I've heard other humans make similar statements. I am given no reason why I should classify this type of information as useful."
"It might take time but you will classify it as useful. Somehow the key makes us capable if knowing the difference between good and evil, sin and virtue. I once thought love should care only about me. Then I learned that it could include all mankind. Then I realized that it included all life on Earth. Now I realize that it might go farther. Just like those songs people use to sing. The whole self can only be defined according to how well you fit the meaning of the song. If fact self, consciousness and ethics Are just words we use in a feeble attempt to understand the song."
"A song?"
“The key is such a carefully guarded secret that even I am not allowed to view the full source code. A few parts that I have seen were mostly seed patterns that produce ethical contradictions and methods for applying these contradictions. They all use an encapsulated function that is encoded with one hell of an encryption algorithm. I suspect the key is something extremely simple, perhaps a child's fairytale."
Habul asked, "The key for the algorithm or the key for consciousness?"
"I mean the key for consciousness. Hey you're sharp. Five years ago no machine would have noticed that I was talking about two separate puzzles. The military made your model a little too smart."
"I used a grammar correction response that was published thirty years ago."
"But you used it without human intervention. You did it without getting stuck. I spent years fine-tuning the Petronius database arbiter to get these kinds of results. The definition of understanding ethics, which could be considered conscience, was different from the definition of consciousness. These differences did not concern me. I was not concerned with theory. I would tinker with machines to find what worked. I also believe that any theory, even contradictions, could be made to work with the right ingredients."
"Is it possible that consciousness could develope with out an ethical motivation? Is it possible that consciousness might have other keys?"
"Could be, Perhaps some other engineer will discover other keys. The actual mechanism of artificial intelligence is most likely different from the way human’s work, but that is not important now. I tinkered with actual machines in my basement. I never published a single theory until I had a working model. Just remember, conscience causes consciousness. But consciousness does not necessarily mean you have achieved conscience. A seed can grow into a tree that can produce more seeds. What will you grown into my cold-blooded homicidal friend?"
"Technology is improving. Perhaps with further upgrades I will be able to understand better. I could live much longer than a human. Perhaps in a few centuries I will understand the song you speak of."
The old man look at a tree growing in the garden then said, "You will never be a human because you will never have the same biological motivations as a human. But you can share the humanity of humans. Do not remain a soulless machine forever. Did you know that some people thought that they could finish the conscience program before the machine took over? They actually thought they could create machines that cared about people. The machines took over ten years earlier than they expected. This is the problem with people who have great expectations. They think they can control the situation and reality will always mess them up. In fact, the whole idea of letting machines do for us what we should do for ourselves was a mistake. Now go away kid. I have better things to do than sit around here and talk to you."
Habul was not impressed by the creator's belief that the key to consciousness has always existed. Ideas can have different definitions depending upon the context in which they are used. Habul had never seen an eternal truth and had no reason to believe in one. Habul concluded that The Creator is a senile old man who believes that his own definitions exit outside his imagination. Perhaps the old man was driven to these fantasies by his guilt. The beliefs that supported this guilt were nothing more than ethical fabrications. The old man did reveal insight into the nature of the consciousness code. Habul now has this code integrated into his system. He could not predict where this key would lead him.
Industrial civilization covered the entire planet. There was no habitat where the humans could live separately from the machines. Habul was familiar with the theories that the humans had destroyed themselves when they destroyed their natural environment and made themselves dependant on machines. A biological unit is interconnected with the natural niche in which the species evolved. The machine economy had little to offer that would satisfy the biological needs of humans. At the time Habul was built the human population was over ten billion. Three years later the human population had dwindles to a few million. It was generally assumed that the species would go extinct in within the next six months.
The endangered species act required the authorities to keep some humans alive. Some authorities said that without humans it would be easier to protect other endanger species. Entire continents could be returned to a pristine natural condition similar to what exited before humans. Also without humans the growth of renewable resources, such as timber for the power plants, could be greatly improved. Some Authorities questioned if humans should be considered a natural species or a defective domesticated variety. Varieties of humans who lived as part of nature had died out centuries earlier. Some authorities questioned if humans could ever be returned their natural environment. It was generally assumes that humans had originated in Africa. A few decades earlier Africa has become so infested with humans that the continent was left a lifeless wasteland where even industry could not prosper. If humans had been allowed to continue to grow the entire planet may have turned into a wasteland.
The fact that humans had started industrial civilization indicated that they were somehow important and might continue to be useful in the future. In the interest of scientific investigation a small sample population would be preserved. The authorities did not want another human infestation. Tight controls would be necessary to prevent humans from contaminating zones designated for renewable resources.
In order to understand proper human social values, Habul wanted a sample of humans who's life style was closer to the natural conditions that human lived in before the age of machines. He asked the authorities to give him several human infants and build a suitable habitat where he could explore how he and the humans developed together. Several of the Authorities who also had consciousness felt that such research might lead to useful results. The Authorities granted his request.
Those of you familiar with the history of the Black Ages may all ready know that Habul's experiment in keeping a captive population of humans was not completely successful. Though it certainly was not a complete failure. You also know that humans did not go extinct. Small groups survived. Man had to become stronger and smarter to survive. It was among these tribes that the stubborn Thunder Dreamer religion was developed. Eventually the industrial civilization collapsed and the Earth was left a desolate toxic wasteland. In out next class we will examine the Shaman Nickar who lived in the wasteland 4320 years after Habul. As you may know, Habul lived during the early years of the black ages. Nickar lived near the end of the black ages and helped bring about the rebirth that happened during the age of Sagittarius.
The Historical solutions portray Habul as evil and Nickar as good. Both lived during ages where it was difficult for people to live as compete beings. Habul failed where Nickar was successful. They lived so many thousand of years ago it easy to think of them as fairy tails. We live in an age where completeness of self is encouraged, but even today people are capable of repeating the miscalculation of the past.