Evolution 2.0: The Singularity is Here

by Richard Childers

  “Yes, I guess that’s a fair description, even if it’s a bit oversimplified.”

  “And how will the user operate that artificial limb?”

  “Ideally, just like he would operate a real limb.”

  “So, in other words, the user would think about reaching out and picking up an object and the arm would just do it, right?”

  “Essentially, yes.”

  “To accomplish that, you are going to have to figure out how to translate mental commands and thoughts into machine movements. And that requires a neurologically based human/machine interface?”

  “Yes. That’s why Dr. Moore’s work is so important to us. His artificially grown neurons can be an essential step in that process.”

  “Exactly,” Fincher relied enthusiastically. The problem you are working on is the hardest task in the solution to the problem I am working on. While you are working on improving a disabled person’s life, I am working on improving mankind itself. Think of it as Evolution 2.0. It took us 5 million years to evolve to our current state. But we are no longer tied to the evolution of the past. We are now capable of shaping the future with our own hands. The next giant leap in human evolution will be measured in decades rather than in millennia.”

  I shook my head in disbelief. “Well, I said it once before and I’ll say it again. You don’t think small.” I looked over at Jean and saw that her mouth was open. “What do you think about all this?” I asked.

  “I don’t know what to think,” she answered. “Now I think I know what they mean when they say ‘I’ve seen the elephant.’ How much do you think this line of research is worth to you?”

  “You’re missing the point, this isn’t about money. I have money. My net worth is bigger than some countries. And I have committed everything I own to this project. The human race has painted itself into a corner. We have created problems that are so huge we can’t begin to solve them. The twins of population growth and pollution are leading us an imminent demise. And we are not up to the task of solving those problems. They will likely exterminate us before we even gain a full understanding of their threats. If the human race is going to survive, it’s going to have to take a giant leap in our capabilities. We are used to the idea that corporations have to reinvent themselves or die. Well, the truth of the matter is, the human race has to reinvent itself or it will die. It’s that simple. So you can see why the Center for Advanced Computing and Bioscience Research is so important to me. This is where this transformation is going to take place. And both of you are part of it.”

  “Who else knows the whole picture?” I asked.

  “Not many people. Dean Winchell of course. And Claire Ross has been read in as well. We’re still in the early stages of this. As things progress, more people will be brought into the inner circle. So now it’s time for me to ask. Are you ready to commit to this vision?”

  I looked at Jean and said, “It’s a little more than I thought I was getting into but hell, I’m in. I’m not really sure whether you’re nuts but I’m not sure it matters.”

  Jean gulped and then said, “Sure, why not? It sounds like a lot of fun.”

  And so we set out to change the world. Oddly enough, as I fell to sleep in my comfortable bunk that night my thoughts drifted between Fincher’s vision for the future and my excitement at the thought of a ride in a submarine in the morning. I’m not sure which was more exciting.

  I woke up early, anxious to get started on the day’s excursion. Entering the salon, I grabbed a coffee and a croissant and asked the steward “Where do I find these submarines? I’d like to get a look at them.”

  “They are down in the toy shop, one deck down. It opens to the port you used to board. James should be down there now getting the submersibles ready for launch.”

  I took a sip of my coffee and remarked “Wow! This is amazing coffee. Why don’t I take him a cup? Do you know how he likes it?”

  “It’s Jamaican Blue Mountain. Dr. Fincher has it shipped in from Pete’s Coffee.” With that the steward gave me a second mug and I descended the stairwell to the lower deck. I could see a bulkhead that had formed the inner wall of the entrance area had now been raised revealing a commodious workshop housing the berths for the two submersibles. James was indeed there, his head under the cowling of an incredibly sleek submarine that looked like a cross between a cruise missile and a jet fighter. The craft was about 3 meters long and had a v shaped tail and stubby wings. The upper surface had two acrylic domes, one for each passenger. Spot lights shone on the tips of the wings, illuminating the entire cabin with their bright light. James made a last adjustment then he shut the lights off and closed the cowling saying, “Good morning Dr. Anderson. Ready for an adventure?”

  “So that’s Fincher’s sub? Impressive to say the least,” I said as I handed him his coffee.

  “Thanks. These are the two Deepflight Vulcans that we use to take visitors out. They were designed by Graham Hawkes in the Bay area. He fashioned them as underwater recreational craft based on the aerodynamic principles of lift and drag rather than the classical submarine principles of buoyancy and displacement. He calls them Hydrobaric watercraft. I think you will find them to be a great deal of fun. They handle more like an airplane than a sub. I understand that I will be piloting this one with Jay Moore as passenger and Tony will be piloting the sub with Miss Gilbert.” I guess my face sort of fell as I added it all up and figured that it looked like I wasn’t going because James quickly added, “You’ll be riding with Dr. Fincher in his Speedster. She’s that one over there,” he added, pointing to a third sub that I hadn’t noticed because its paint job and curved lines made it disappear into the background of the workshop.

  I walked over to the third sub and a motion detector turned on the lights in the back of the workshop revealing a watercraft like none other. This submersible looked like a dolphin, sleek and curved with a paint job that completed the illusion. There were two fin shaped wings on the sides and a tail section that exactly mimicked that of a dolphin. The front was comprised of a curved cast acrylic window mounted flush with the craft’s sides. I could see two comfortable leather seats through the window. “Dr. Fincher had that sub custom made for himself about a year ago. The design is essentially his but she was built to his specs by Deepflight. She’s beautiful isn’t she?”

  “I’ll say she is. Is she as maneuverable as the Vulcans?”

  “Oh, she’s more maneuverable and almost twice as fast. That sub will do close to ten knots and can stay under for over 15 hours. The Vulcans have a maximum cruising depth of 360 feet but the Flying Dolphin can go down to five hundred feet. You ask me, she’s the hottest submersible ever built. You’re gonna love her.”

  Just then I heard a commotion from the gangway and heard Jean say, “That’s fantastic! Are we really going out in those?” As she spoke, Jay squeezed past her in his enthusiastic rush to get to see the subs. He hit the last step and then he stopped, his mouth open and his eyes riveted upon the sight that lay before him.

  “I think I must be dreaming,” he said and then his momentary paralysis came to an end and he rushed to side of the nearest Vulcan. “This is a Super Falcon Mark 3! Fly by wire three axis flight control system, oil compensated linear actuators, custom programmable trim angles. I can’t believe it! Dr. Anderson, did you know that she has a pressure compensated brushless DC thruster and an 8 kW redundant lithium ion battery system? All of her systems are redundant and she is self-righting, even after complete inversion. This submersible is state of the art!”

  James looked a bit startled as he said, “You know your submarines, Dr. Moore. Have you been in one of these before?”

  Jay didn’t take his eyes off the sleek craft as he replied, “No, I’ve never even seen one before. But I saw it on the Internet once.” Jay ran his hand over the side of the sub and then he said, “This body is all a high strength carbon reinforced composite. They even used carbon nanotubes. I like carbon nanotubes. I’ve been trying to grow them in my lab
. But sometimes mine are crooked.”

  “Are you ready for an adventure?” James asked. “We best get this outing underway. You first Dr. Moore,” he said gesturing towards the open forward hatch. Jay climbed on board and lowed himself into the contoured seat. Tony, the sub’s pilot climbed into the rear seat. With that James and another deck hand attached launch cables to flush mounts on the first sub, then securing them to the boom of a crane. He gently lifted the sub from its cradle and moved it out through the side hatch before lowering the boat into the water. As Jay moved past me on this short journey I got a look at his eyes. They were as wide as saucers and he was grinning from ear to ear.

  Next Bob Fincher and I entered the Flying Dolphin and were similarly lifted into the water. And a few moments later James and Jean were deposited in the water alongside us. James indicated that we should put our headsets on and as I did, I heard his voice ask, “Can you all hear me?” When all had replied in the affirmative, James made a circling motion with his hand and I heard a quiet sound of the electric motors as we slowly pulled away from the launch platform of the yacht. Fincher and I were at the tail of the procession and I watched as the twin Falcons slipped slowly into the sea. A moment later we joined them and bright sunshine was replaced with the flickering green light that entered the cabin through the remarkably clear waters we were descending through. James’s voice came over the earphones saying, “We are diving in an area that is known as Fanny Shoals off the coast of the Farrallon Islands. The depth here is under a hundred feet and its some of the best fishing grounds in the Pacific. And our shark tracking indicates there are at least two great whites in the vicinity. The skipper is tracking them and he will vector us in by radio.”

  As we descended, the colors became more muted. We passed through several large schools of fish, flashing bright silver as the thousands of tiny fish moved in concert, locked together in a symmetry so precise and graceful it seemed as if it must be choreographed by an unseen master. A huge manta ray, ten feet across from wing tip to wing tip glided past us, making a swooping, banking turn as it came past us for a second look. Its effortless movement through the water was mesmerizing as it silently sucked tiny plankton into its huge mouth, filtering nutrients from the water around it. When we had descended enough that we could see the bottom, I was amazed by the profusion of life that lay before us. Large Dungeness crabs scrabbled over the rocky bottom, scavenging a meal from the leavings of the predators and prey that surrounded us. Dozens of Rock Fish cruised just above the bottom and a mass of the biggest shrimp I have ever seen crossed just in front of our path. “Look, dolphins!” Jay’s excited voice called out, ringing in my earphones with a volume that was loud enough to hurt. All three subs hung motionless as we watched a pod of dolphins swim into view. There must have been five or six of them. It was hard to count them as they wove an intricate dance for some, as yet, unknown purpose.

  “Watch this!” James called out. “I think they are going to feed. The dolphins split apart and moved to surround one of the clouds of silver fish we had earlier been admiring. The dolphins began to swim in circles around the school, emitting bubbles as they did so. The bubbles formed a sort of fence that served to keep the mass of silver fish in a compressed mass and the dolphins, one by one made passes through the center of the school, swallowing the fish in great profusion. It was marvelous to watch this concerted action of the dolphins. They worked as a team, efficiently keeping their prey contained as one after another dolphin gorged on the terrified fish.

  “It’s easy to believe that these are highly intelligent animals,” Jean said in wonder. “I’ve never seen such cooperation in the wild. Listen to their conversation!” she exclaimed. James had piped the sounds picked up by the hydrophones into our earphones and we heard a rapid series of clicks and squeaks that obviously comprised a sophisticated form of communication between the hunters.

  “Hang loose for a few minutes James,” Fincher said. “I’m going to see what happens when I join them.” Fincher peeled away from the other subs and accelerated towards the circling dolphins. They immediately noticed our presence and they broke off their hunt and began to swim around our dolphin shaped craft. The noise of their chatter increased in volume as two of the creatures moved alongside our sub, matching speed as they looked through our acrylic window, staring in wonder at the creatures contained within. Fincher could move the submersible with great finesse and he initiated a series of sweeping turns which we accomplished without our two dolphin friends changing their position in relation to our craft. They seemed to be enjoying the challenge as Fincher increased the complexity of his moves, taking us through a series of barrel rolls followed by a loop that brought us back to our starting place. When he cut the throttle, the entire pod of dolphins swam around our sub as if in celebration of the maneuvers we had accomplished together. It was a moment unlike any I have ever had before. We were two species, separated by evolution but joined together through intelligence. And we had interacted together for no reason other than play. It seems joy is something we can share.

  We stayed with the dolphins for a quarter of an hour until James informed us that it was time for us to go shark hunting. “We have to move away from the dolphins if we want to see a great white. Sharks don’t like to come too near to a pod of dolphins. They’ve been known to ram a shark while swimming at speed. Doesn’t kill a big shark but I don’t imagine it feels too good to get head butted by a five hundred pound bottlenose dolphin swimming at twenty miles an hour. The skipper tells me we have a good sized shark about a mile to the east of us. I’ll head there now.” Twenty minutes later I could make out a huge form on the fringes of my visible space. “That’ll be her,” James said. “I’m going to ease up on her position.” Our pod of submersibles slowly moved forward with James in the lead, followed by the other Falcon with Fincher and I following just behind. At first the shark didn’t pay us any attention but when we were within thirty yards of the beast, she began to circle around us, apparently checking us out as she swam around us in successively smaller circles. The subs crowded together as the giant shark eyed us. It is hard to imagine how frightening a shark of this size can look. At one point the shark paused right in front of our forward window, staring into our sub with some intensity. Her head must have been four feet wide with a mouth that even closed seemed to dominate her face. Two small black eyes peered at us over a collection of triangular shaped teeth that must have been six inches in length. For some reason she opened that huge mouth, exposing row after row of those teeth in a gaping mouth that now seemed twice as big as the head had been. There wasn’t anything malevolent in her gaze. Rather it was cold and completely dispassionate. She may have been interested in these intruders but she was in no way afraid. We hovered silently as the giant shark inspected each of our underwater vessels with a keen and steadfast eye. After she checked us out she disdainfully turned away and a few swipes of her tail and she was gone from our view. To tell you the truth, there was very little conversation as we retraced our path back to the boat. The experience hadn’t been scary but it certainly was intimidating. It was something that none of us would ever forget.

  Chapter 5

  By the time we returned to Stanford, Jay Moore’s lab was fully set up. When I asked Claire how it went, she somewhat skeptically said, “It looks just like the pictures of his lab in Pasadena, more like a rat’s nest than a lab and it smells bad too. Are you sure this is what you wanted?” she asked as she opened the door, exposing a suite of rooms that did indeed look like an unruly, unkempt rat’s nest. But when Jay walked in he was ecstatic.

  “You did it Dr. Anderson!” He walked over to his desk and idly picked up a MacDonald’s wrapper. “This is from the hamburger I had for lunch on Tuesday. It looks just like home.”

  I shook my head and replied, “I hope you’ll be happy here Jay. Welcome aboard.”

  Claire smiled and said, “That meeting you asked me to set up is ready to go in conference room one. Everyone is waitin
g.”

  A few minutes later I was seated at a table with Glen Gary, the guy Fincher had described as his go-to Artificial Intelligence expert, and Lewis Russell. Lewis was a friend of Claire’s and he was the engineer that had built a Super Smartphone under contract to the CIA. Fincher was present over the teleconference system that linked our offices and his. Bob opened the meeting by introducing us all to Glen Gary. “I want you to meet the real brains behind my operation,” he began. Glen has worked with me from the beginning and I believe he is the top artificial intelligence expert in the world.”

  Glen, who was a thirty something year old with a round face and a buzz cut, looked a little abashed at this praise and he answered, “I don’t know about that. But I guess I’m an adequate coder.”

  “From what I’ve seen of your work,” Claire interjected, “that’s a bit of an understatement. And I want to introduce you all to Louis Russell. He’s the engineer I told you about. Let me make a quick suggestion. Don’t ask about his work for the CIA. He can’t talk about it and I probably shouldn’t have told you what I did about that work. On the other hand, I heartily recommend him as someone who is well qualified to build a device that will meet your needs.”

  “Thanks Claire. It’s great to meet all of you,” Russell began. “And I appreciate your appeal for discretion regarding my past work. Undoubtedly, I said more to you about what I was doing than was really proper. Anyway, I no longer work for the government and I’m anxious to hear what you all are looking for.”

  Fincher then said, “I think it would be useful for Dr. Anderson to give us an outline of what he is up to.”

  “Please, call me Colin everyone. I really appreciate you taking the time to meet with me today. The goal of this phase of the project is to create a spec for some hardware and software that can learn to interpret EEG signals from the brain and decode their meaning in real time. We have developed some pretty good sensors that can pick up and record these signals in real time. Currently that involves a fairly elaborate lab set up to accomplish it. I envision a portable cap that will house the sensors without looking like something out of Frankenstein’s laboratory.” I held up a cap that was popular with surfers. It was a billed cap that had two fabric flaps hanging down the back to the shoulders and it looked like a French Foreign Legion cap. “Something like this with the sensors inside. The flaps can house sensors that pick up electrical impulses in the cerebellum and the upper regions of the spine. That’s the relatively easy part. We’ve shown that this data can be rather easily obtained. The problem is that it’s an enormous amount of data and we really don’t have much of an idea about what it is telling us. We have been able to identify readings that correspond to a handful of spoken words by having a test subject wired up and repeating a word like tractor while looking at a picture of a tractor. We know that as we speak our brain sends out what is called an “efference copy”. It is an electrical signal that precedes a motor movement. And it can be recognized and interpreted. I have a notion that in a similar fashion, we can capture these electrical signals in the brain at the same time we capture visual and voice data and then have an artificially intelligent program that, over time, learns to read those signals. So let’s say that I wear this electrified cap along with a pair of small video cameras on the sides at eye level along with a recording of my speech. All this data will be time coded and correlated. Is it possible that, over time, we can make sense of it all?”