Five years after Samuel and Henry met, R&D was on the verge of delivering a techno-social revolution. Significant to this were the sets of technologies aimed at the mind and body. The medical industrial complex was set to be reconfigured and largely disestablished as simple, effective and cheap technologies would provide continuing, home-based healthcare provision by managing the full rejuvenation and the maintenance of optimal cellular and systemic health and vitality through a variety of synthetic biological applications; this eliminated age decline and, importantly, the massive expenses and limitations associated with the soon-to-be-obsolete healthcare system, particularly in old age. Furthermore, awaiting approval were artificial intelligence technologies: nasal sprays were to deliver nanotechnologies that would find their way to the cortex, multiply and develop into multi-layered networks, and interface with cortical regions, supplementing intelligence in any and all dimensions required and preferred. Semantic web interfaces were to provide access to preferred niche areas of content on demand that would interface directly with and be digested by the cognitive enhancement applications; the information would then be made available through attention/consciousness duplication programs that were to allow subjects to sub-divide and multi-task and re-merge as requested, providing the user with the subjective experience of total information capture, integration and consciousness expansion all at once. All this entailed that the educational institutions would need to be transformed accordingly in order to accommodate not just the enhancements in learning but also the creativity and productivity potentials of students.
While these technologies and more in other key areas were still in development, Samuel and a few select colleagues had access to prototypes of the new cognitive and semantic web applications. It was during this experimentation phase that Henry and Samuel had the following remote conversation:
Samuel: Henry … you there?
Henry: Sure.
Samuel: I want to continue where we left off discussing the rollout of the nano- and AI technologies.
Henry: Go for it.
Samuel: After doing some modelling, it seems that we need to revise down our restrictions on technology distribution still further.
Henry: That’s not totally surprising. What are your results?
Samuel: Here you go.
Henry: Oh, I see… That really does provide a massive reduction in the potential for turbulence.
Samuel: I know. We just have to work out how to provide a series of intermittent augmentations that edge gradually towards the thresholds without ever actually reaching them, and …
Henry: As long as the augmentations are perceptible and satisfying in terms of the new functionalities provided, they have a chance of being accepted as being genuine developments — they’ll need to be propagandised intensively and extensively as we go, of course.
Samuel: Let me simulate that… My results indicate that this will provide us with an extended window of opportunity to make adequate preparations with minimal risk.
Henry: In fact, your results demonstrate that this approach is safer than maintaining the scarcity model as well.
Samuel: Substantially.
Henry: It’s the space in between.
Samuel: It appears so.
Henry: It’s still just probability.
Samuel: That’s all we have.
Henry: I know. Let’s take it for what it is, then.
The rollout of the new technologies made available for the general public proceeded quickly due to thousands of dedicated production facilities with extensive regional distribution channels that had been put in place in preparation for the event. The augmentation of personal and social life, physical and mental health, and cognitive functioning that resulted from the new technologies was staggering to many: healthy and fit, indefinite longevity with a range of intellectual enhancements dramatically transformed the lives of hundreds of millions of sick, disabled and elderly people all over the world. The publicly available technologies were promoted as being cutting-edge, and further enhancements were scheduled on a specified timeline; importantly, the AI augmentations contained built-in programs that modulated perceptions and judgments in certain sensitive topic areas — particularly those regarding the state-of-the-art technology available to the establishment — which assisted in placating the majority’s curiosity. This allowed the general acceptance of the reasons for the relatively slow rate of techno-social progress elaborated on in the five-year plans of the World Representative Democracy, much of which was informed by the information and technological resources provided to it by the Global Domination Corporation.
As far as transitioning towards a post-scarcity world system was concerned, a range of developments in the sourcing of raw materials and the building and re-building of the general infrastructure of society was made available worldwide under the purview of the World Representative Democracy at its local, regional and global levels. Centrally controlled nano-infrastructure programs provided the computational power via quantum computing developments and the propagation proficiency to guide a range of nanotechnology to source, deconstruct, and restructure elements and compounds as required and at scale, allowing the worldwide redevelopment of urban, rural and natural environments. The rollout of the full set of technologies occurred over a six-month period, after which city environments, for example, were programmable and alterable according to urban planning and community values, evolving needs, and environmental protection standards; this ultimately resulted in the provision of adequate housing and a global standard of living, albeit with idiosyncrasies associated with the local environment, multiculturalism and historical roots.
While the world watched on, forests and other natural areas were regenerated with mathematically diverse, healthy and sustainable ecosystems that proliferated outside and throughout urban areas; the vertical forests of apartment complexes and the multiplicity of environmental, architectural and infrastructural diversity in urban environments saw cityscapes take on a new shape, complexity and scope for the lifestyles of inhabitants.
Moreover, food production practices changed markedly. Although experimented with on a minor scale prior to this, vertical farming complexes were established in zoned areas and became part of the urban environment, thus excluding weather and the limits of arable land as a variable to productivity. There were two main forms of farming: 1) quick-growth crops that were cultivated hydroponically with the help of nano-accelerants; and 2) nano-manufactured ‘laboratory’ crops and meat that were grown and/or assembled into a mature form from raw materials. The latter obviously bypassed the need for industrialised animal farming but was also particularly useful for crops that traditionally required a large amount of surface area, such as the various grains.
These developments were aided by a fusion energy revolution, which was nurtured to fruition after those working in the related fields were brought under the umbrella of the state’s Energy R&D Facilitation Programme. A variety of energy generation technologies had been developed and brought into wide use over the first half of the century, some of which Henry had been involved with years earlier, albeit only through his consultancy and funding service for emerging companies and start-ups since it was such a competitive and fund-thirsty area, and it was ultimately ancillary to his main expertise and strategic positioning with synthetic oil; his activities did prove to be quite lucrative and facilitatory, however. These technologies included massive space-based solar farms, which provided power to space stations, the covert space metropolises of the pre-revolution space programmes, shuttles and the surface-to-orbit ferries; further, on Earth, in addition to the increasingly powerful niche areas of solar, wind and ocean power, the main developments came from geothermal and fusion power due to output potentials and reliability. Although the most powerful, the fusion generators prior to the energy revolution were large, unwieldy and expensive facilities, so their proliferation was generally limited to a select group of developed cities and regions around the world. A
s a result, much of the underdeveloped world was still struggling to meet energy needs with old-fashioned technology, such as nuclear and coal. Even though there had been many well-intentioned attempts to provide alternatives over the years, the outcomes were quite limited and fell well short of total coverage and the growing demand. The advent of compact fusion generators, however, was game changing in that they circumvented the limitations and the cumbersome complicatedness of the global energy situation: economies of scale associated with the new nano-tech, mass-production capabilities, combined with the political will of the World Representative Democracy, enabled the swift distribution of these light-weight units around the world and the extension of the proliferation of mid-to-large-sized fusion generators to meet the infrastructural needs of built-up areas. This massive eighteen-month undertaking resulted in the world’s energy supply far exceeding future demand trends by thousands of years and also provided an effective solution for the World Space Programme.
Despite the augmentation that the technologies provided, the new developments weren’t received without significant resistance or complaint, both publicly and privately from individuals and groups, such as anti-trans-humanists of various kinds, including religious and secular varieties. Although there was no hope of stopping the systematic restructuring of society that was occurring all around them — which caused a small percentage to become isolated survivalists — several hundred million citizens either refused to take up the mind and body augmentations, due to ideological commitments or mere fear, or ceased experimenting with them after a short time, choosing instead to go it alone … perhaps until falling ill; otherwise, some chose to rely on primitive healthcare provision that found a niche beyond the apparatus of the state, while others avoided anything other than basic treatment inside the home. Further, apart from the millions of the people who refused to take up or severed the link with the soft perception-modulation programs, there was a small suspicious yet curious minority who were able to take adequate precautions and use the augmentations with the aid of defensive programs that allowed them to explore with a clear head the particularities and the limitations of the available AI and infrastructural technologies and speculate about the reasons for them and how they might be overcome; some of these agents were in a position to attempt to make technological progress on their own terms and in the direction of their own choosing…
Eighteen months after the distribution of the first wave of the augmentation technologies, the policing apparatus of the World Representative Democracy had identified and incarcerated nearly five thousand underground networks of cyberterrorists and scientist-technologists in their underground science labs and technology workshops. All were working on high-level technology projects with the ambition to surpass the level of the state’s technology. The well-founded fear held by the establishment was that there were more yet unknown.
In anticipation of these emerging circumstances, Henry and Samuel relocated to a purpose-built orbital research facility several months earlier. As a necessary security measure, the facility was essentially isolated from all connectivity on the ground and the rest of the network of space stations and space metropolises, most of which had been constructed before the revolution. Facility 7, as it was plainly called, soon became home to nearly four thousand scientist-technologists and their immediate families, a population totalling 10,236 at its peak. The primary purpose of the operation was to develop the covert space programme that had been established nearly twelve months earlier by Henry and Samuel after they had decided that it was necessary to diverge significantly from the direction of the official World Space Programme.
• • •
Reflecting on the state of their programme and the situation down on the surface, Henry and Samuel stand alone looking out towards Earth through the long windows of a hallway in Facility 7. After a long silence, Samuel glances at Henry, who now looks to be around forty years of age. “I’ve been obsessed with Earth for so long — most of my life, really — that I think I missed the big picture in some ways. I really am sick of trying to contain things — I was much happier working towards our objectives in the pre-revolution days; it was clear and kind of simple back then. Containment is tiring, I have to say… I think I’m ready to hand the job over. Actually, I’m really looking forward to exploring new territory and getting out of here … at least for a while.” He points with his head towards Earth and continues, “Leave them to their own devices to work it out for themselves.”
Henry nods in understanding but responds on a tangent, “When I think back to my wildest dreams as a kid, I didn’t seriously believe that we would actually see and do the things we have over the past few years … and, ironically, I was into speculative fiction. But this path we’ve been going down for some time now … it may look like we changed directions with the revolution and augmented the world system into another dimension, if you will — in some ways we did, of course — but, as you well know, some of the big things, some of the intractable things have still stayed the same, like the general direction of the progress of science and technology, and the dynamics of social change, persuasion and resistance … and also the set of phase transitions. It’s these types of qualities that have not only helped us achieve what we have but have also severely limited us at the same time.”
“Yeah, I remember thinking early on that the kinds of changes we’ve made recently would have more of an effect than they seem to have … then I realised where I was.”
“Apparently, we just have to keep walking the tightrope while hoping we make it to the next level in the game … without really knowing if or how or when we’re ever going to get there.”
Samuel thinks about the agenda of the World Space Programme. “It’s certainly not just spreading out widely to ensure adequate levels of redundancy and the survival of a few, although that’s part of it. I really didn’t realise until after we met just the extent of the massive changes in just about everything that are really required in order to make it to the next level. When I think about what I considered a large-scale change to be in the pre-revolution days compared to now … it’s completely different … completely different scales and unimagined concepts about what’s possible … and required.”
“You’re right — it’s been clear for a while that we need different rules; new rules can only come with a radical new set of conditions, though.” Henry points casually towards Earth. “Convincing them of the need for that is another thing. It must seem like we’ve done a lot already — perhaps, too much even — but really we’re still only part way there.”
“A small fraction of the way, actually … but the leap may be quick.”
“True. Very quick,” agrees Henry with a grin.
Samuel stays quiet for a moment. “You know, I was quite surprised when I did the modelling that it’s apparently so difficult to get through the turbulence… You know, we may not have even paid the heavy costs yet, Henry. I just wish I could feel like I knew Earth was in good hands and would develop in a manner that … well, that was healthy. We’ve played with development plans and have factored in umpteen key components, and we still can’t get an adequate probability out of it.”
“Yeah … you did take your obsession with that to the limit there a few times.”
“The psychotic episodes didn’t help… Well, they did, I suppose.” Samuel laughs. “Too much abruptly injected brain power… ‘Oh, let’s just increase it by tenfold this morning and see if I can’t see past the horizon … bring that damned thing closer!’ Gee.”
“There’s an intensifying tension between facilitating optimally and pushing it too far and fast. It’s a general upward curve, but it’s not exponential. It’s more dynamic than we realised — it oscillates … sometimes intensely. I just hope we’re getting close.”
“We know what we’re heading for, at least.” Samuel reflects on this and asks, “Do you think we’ve made the right decision?”
“You mean experimenting with ‘New
World Dynamics’ elsewhere?” asks Henry, guessing the context.
“Mm … at least until it’s defined, stable and broadly scalable.”
“Sure. We’ve stabilised things here as much as we can for the time being — I mean, it was your model. Once we’re ready, those who want to … well, they can come along, but, you know…”
“We can’t force them. Of course.”
Henry places his hand on Samuel’s shoulder. “No matter what happens from here, Samuel, we can be sure it wasn’t our decision to make.”
Samuel laughs bleakly.
Five days later
During a meeting in the main conference room, which has a direct view of Earth through a room-wide window, Henry stands staring out at the Pacific Ocean analysing the cloud formations while Samuel and one of their teams of research managers go over the finer details of their progress to date and their future timeline. They all fall silent as their train of thought is interrupted by a cognitively represented streaming video of Earth flooding in from high-magnification cameras attached to a network of surveillance satellites that are solely connected to Facility 7.
NEW WORLD TRILOGY (Trilogy Title) Page 26
