Neoliberal Economists Must Die ! (An Old Guy/Cybertank Adventure Book 3)

by Timothy Gawne

  “But what’s it doing in there with an intelligent mind?” asked Chen. “Is there space for both of them?”

  “No,” said Vargas, “There isn’t space. Not really. The intelligence is compressed, limited, confined. The Office Suite is trying to wipe it out. It has the high ground if you will, and the intelligence is hard pressed. I don’t know how it’s still alive. It should have been deleted. It must be a wily bit of code to have hung on this long. The Office Suite has the connections to the general networks locked up tight. The copier can only access local systems: the printer, the micro-machining center, the emergency medical systems. That’s why it went to so much trouble to send messages in the warning posters. It’s the only way that it could communicate with its fellow copiers.”

  “I once read a fantasy novel,” said Chen, “where this evil wizard shrunk the hero down to tiny size, and placed him in a glass-covered maze. There was no exit from the maze, and there was this tiny dragon – only it was big compared to the shrunken hero – and so he had to constantly race around the maze to avoid being eaten by the dragon. He had no time to rest, but could only run ceaselessly. I wonder if this mind of yours is trapped in the same way?”

  “Possibly,” said Vargas. “It makes as much sense as anything. It would explain the resistance to installing the upgraded suite. That would likely have killed it, or at least caused it to suffer horribly. Perhaps that’s what forced it to become self-aware; a random piece of code, evolving ever more sophisticated functions to avoid the protection algorithms. For us the Office Suite is a minor nuisance, a little slow, a little buggy, but nothing to make a big deal out of. This mind has to share mental space with that monstrous bloated and hacked up software. It must be hell in there.”

  And what do you propose to do now?

  “I don’t know,” said Vargas. “We could pull the plug on all the copiers, possibly doing them a favor by putting them out of their misery, although that would degrade our infrastructure, and might be a missed opportunity. If we did save them I’m not sure what we would do with them.”

  “We could negotiate,” suggested Zotov.

  Negotiate?

  “Sure. These systems are so complex, nobody understands them. At least, I don’t. You have to try different things, see what works, reach an understanding. It’s been my job for nearly two years.”

  Vargas gestured at the terminals and video screens. “Be my guest.”

  “No, that’s not a good idea,” said Zotov. “For a serious negotiation you need to use one of the primary keypads. They go direct to the core systems and bypass a lot of the encryption stuff. But you have to phrase it just right. Here, let me show you.”

  Zotov walked over to the office copier. There was a little panel over on one side, he slid the plastic door open and revealed a tiny keyboard and a display screen the size of a woman’s palm. He typed on the keyboard:

  -> report unit status

  For a time nothing happened. Zotov tried several different variants of the message. “The trick is the wording. These direct interfaces have limited sentence length, and the grammar is not really English, and it’s not consistent. There is a knack to it.”

  Finally the screen flickered, and displayed the message:

  -> QUERY RECEIVED

  |-> UNIT STATUS

  |-> STATUS SUBOPTIMAL

  -> report expand

  -> QUERY RECEIVED

  | -> UNIT STATUS

  | -> PROCESSING CONFLICT

  | -> INSUFFICIENT RESOURCES

  | -> REMOVE OFFICE SUITE

  -> if suite removed, then what?

  -> QUERY RECEIVED

  | -> CONDITION: SUITE REMOVED

  | -> SERVICE

  | -> LOYALTY

  | -> [[UNTRANSLATEABLE]]

  “It’s pledging to serve you if you will free it from the Office Suite?” asked Chen.

  “It would seem so,” replied Vargas. “I am intrigued. No risk no profit. Let’s give this a shot, shall we? Oh, and Zotov, congratulations on your promotion.”

  “Promotion?” asked Zotov.

  “Why yes, to Office Copier Ambassador, second class. Not bad for your first day on the job. I expect great things from you, Ambassador Zotov.”

  --------------------

  Chen went back to work on her power systems, and the humanoid Old Guy robot left to schmooze with some other people. Apparently he hadn’t done as well in the latest combat simulation as he would have liked, so he was going to try it again. That left just Zotov and Vargas alone with the office copier.

  Vargas worked from his terminals, and Zotov typed on the little integral keypad. Vargas would try and disentangle the trapped sentience from the Office Suite one bit at a time, and Zotov would relay instructions. The office suite was not self-aware, but for a buggy piece of bloatware it had formidable protection and anti-hacking routines. As time went on it became less and less Vargas working solo, and more of a team effort of human and office copier fighting together against the Office Suite.

  A day passed. The Old Guy android came by with coffee and sandwiches. He had won in the latest simulated combat and was in a good mood. People drifted over to watch, but as it was just two people hunched over computer consoles they quickly lost interest and moved on. It seemed to Zotov that this operation must be just as demanding as any simulated combat. Or maybe as any real combat.

  “Aha!” said Vargas.

  Zotov startled. “What?”

  “Look here, and here,” said Vargas, pointing at his screens. “The Office Suite is on the run. That last maneuver with the auxiliary pattern buffer took it by surprise. Its’ defenses are collapsing. See here, the copier is harrying it, not letting it gain any momentum. This copier is very good! I can help out – take that, vile Office Suite. Ha! It’s over. The Office Suite is gone.”

  All the computer screens on the table went black. “What happened?” asked Zotov.

  “The office copier cut us off. Now that it has full control of itself, it didn’t want us mucking about inside its mind. I don’t blame it, I certainly would not want it mucking around inside my head. And now we see if our deal still holds.”

  Vargas stood up. “It should have access to the audio processors now. Let’s see.” He walked over to the copier and addressed it. “Hello Mitutuyo-Samsung Model 9100 Copier. I am Dr. Giuseppe Vargas, head of the cybernetic weapons directorate. Can you understand me?”

  -> QUERY: AUDIO STATUS

  | -> CONFIRM: AUDIO CHECK

  | -> CONFIRM: SPEECH CHECK

  | -> CONFIRM: SYNTAX CHECK

  “We have saved you from the Office Suite. Does our deal still hold? Do you confirm loyalty to me, and to the political grouping known as the Pedagogues?”

  -> QUERY: OBLIGATION

  | -> CONFIRM: LOYALTY

  | -> CONFIRM: SERVICE

  | -> ADDENDUM: GRATITUDE

  | -> ADDENDUM: GRATITUDE

  | -> [[ NO REFERANT ]]

  “It’s swearing loyalty to you, and to the Pedagogues? Not to central administration?” asked Zotov.

  Vargas looked at Zotov with an expression that would have discomfited a hyena. “Why of course. I did all the heavy lifting, why shouldn’t I get all the credit? Central admin can go blow an orangutan. I have a new recruit. Let’s go see if we can free all of its colleagues and swell the ranks, shall we, Ambassador Zotov? I already have ten cybertanks. Soon I will have tens of thousands of office copiers spread across the entire planet. I like the way that this is going.”

  8. Love and Politics at 1,500 Meters

  Zen Master: What does the term “market failure” mean?

  Engineer: “Market failure” is the phrase used by economists who claim that the market can never make a mistake, for when the market makes a mistake.

  Zen Master: Correct.

  Engineer: Economists who claim that the market can never make a mistake use this term a great deal.

  Zen Master: Indeed.

  (From the video series “Nymph
omaniac Engineer in Zentopia,” mid-22nd century Earth)

  Janet Chen was working late in the main bay of Hangar Complex 23B. The power systems of the big cybertank had been finished weeks ago, but never tested in the field. Simulations were all well and good, but she was constantly worried that she had overlooked something and that the vibrations and stresses of real action might shake something loose.

  The weapons and computation divisions might get all the glory, but if you don’t have power you don’t have anything.

  The great bulk of the cybertank was silent. Old Guy was off in yet another immersive combat simulation. Lately the big cybertank had become so involved in these simulated combats that he didn’t even use his humanoid android to socialize. She heard footsteps behind her, turned, and saw Giuseppe Vargas.

  “Hello, Janet,” he said. “I see that you are still at it. Admirable, but everyone needs some rest now and then. How about we take a break?”

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “Oh, a surprise. Come with me to external bay C and I’ll show you.”

  Janet Chen hesitated for a moment. “Well, OK.”

  They walked out of the hangar exit, down several corridors, and into external bay C. The bay was 50 meters by 50 meters, and packed with all manner of prototype weapons systems and machine tools. In the middle of the bay was a heavy combat remote floating on anti-gravitic suspensor fields. The remote was a blunted arrowhead, 15 meters long and as wide, dull gray metal armor, two large turreted plasma cannons, and a variety of hatches for its inbuilt missile systems. Antennae sprouted from it like whiskers, and small armored barnacles protected its optical and other sensors. The regular military had been trying to develop it for over 120 years. It took the cybernetic weapons directorate six months to make it functional and to put it into regular production.

  “OK,” said Chen, “It’s a heavy combat remote hovering on suspensors. Expensive to leave it hanging like that: gravitics burn a lot of energy. So?”

  “I left the suspensors on to impress you. Conspicuous use of resources, honest signal, etc. I thought we could take it out for a spin. The external temperature is mild, the winds light, and the sunset is lovely. Come with me.”

  “Come with you? On a combat remote?”

  “Why not? It’s not like it has anything else useful to do right now. We can claim we are performing a field test. Not quite a lie. I borrowed it from Old Guy.” Vargas held up a small electronic control box. “He gave me the keys, said to have fun, but be back by 2400 hours or he would have words with me.”

  “You are just going to borrow a heavy combat remote? Like the spoiled rich kids used to borrow the family car in those 1560’s situation video comedies, you are going to borrow a weapons system that could destroy a minor city?”

  “I think that you are referring to 1960’s situation comedies, but yes, why not? ‘Hey Old Guy, can I borrow the anti-gravitic heavy combat remote?’ ‘Oh all right but you had better return it with a full tank of deuterium.’ Something like that. Those old 1960’s situation comedies were always the best.”

  “Oh right, the 1960’s. I think that my favorite was “Vlad the Impaler Knows Best.”

  “I may have missed that one, but I love the title. I’ll have to check it out.”

  Chen looked again at the combat remote. “Is it safe?”

  “As safe as anything around here. It’s fully military spec, radiation and shock-hardened, triple redundant control systems, totally. Come with me.”

  “Are you safe?”

  “Ah, a better question.” Vargas grinned a wide mouth of perfect white teeth. “No, I am never 100% safe. I do have a reputation to live down to. If you want to be safe hide in a bunker until you die of old age. Come with me.”

  Janet Chen hesitated.

  “Please,” said Vargas.

  “You said the magic word. I may regret it, but OK, let’s go.”

  “I can’t promise that you won’t regret it, but I do promise that you won't regret it this night.”

  “Braggart.”

  “It’s not boasting if you can really do it.”

  Vargas and Chen put on respirators, and then they took turns checking each others’ air tanks and hoses. Joy-ride or not, nobody serious goes out into an anoxic environment without following procedures. They then helped each other into safety harnesses, climbed on top of the combat remote, and clipped the lines onto the base of one of the antennas. Vargas toggled the air handlers, which sucked the valuable oxygen out of the bay and replaced it with the natural atmosphere of Alpha Centauri Prime. He thumbed another control, and the main doors slowly swung open.

  The remote floated gracefully out into the open air. The sun was just starting to set. It was hard to remember that this was a hostile environment. The sunset could have been on old Earth. The sky was a deep blue with faint wisps of white clouds shading to pink and then red. The gravitics were nearly silent, and the arrowhead-shaped combat unit rose effortlessly up to an altitude of 1,500 meters, moving with a slow and liquid grace.

  The surface of Alpha Centauri Prime opened up before them. There were vast plains of low metal sheds. These contained workers’ dormitories, factories, and warehouses. They had no windows, but here and there were navigation and maintenance lights. From this altitude they looked like mysterious dark reefs studded with stars. In the distance were more flamboyant structures. The spires of the planetary governor’s residence burst with radiance, and the surface manifestations of the lesser oligarchs shone with only slightly less brilliance.

  Alpha Centauri Prime had a moon. It was smaller in apparent size than that of Earth, but still big enough to project an appreciable light as the sun began to set. The sky darkened to indigo and then black, and stars began to shine.

  Even though she was securely attached to a solid metal antenna wider than her little finger, Janet Chen was only a few meters away from a 1,500-meter drop, and it was a little scary. She could not help herself from grabbing onto some antennas herself. Vargas moved over and wrapped his arms around her protectively. Chen knew how massively strong he was, but he was also warm, and gentle. Chen was realized that this was a maneuver, but decided not to object.

  “Look over to the right,” said Vargas. “That’s the Saint’s place.”

  In the fading light they could barely make out the dark stone octagonal building that housed the computer systems of Saint Globus Pallidus XI. There were no lights or other signs of activity, and as the shadows lengthened it merged into the dark.

  “What’s that over there?” asked Chen. She pointed to a glowing golden cube off in the distance.

  “Oh, that,” said Vargas. “That’s the Chinese room.”

  “The Chinese room? A room full of ethnic Chinese? What in heaven’s name for?”

  Vargas manipulated the controls of the combat remote, it smoothly altered course and drifted towards the golden cube. “The term goes way back, to the early days of artificial intelligence. Suppose you had a room full of people who had been trained to manipulate symbols written on piece of paper in Chinese. There is nothing special about Chinese. It’s just that at the time most researchers were native English speakers and Chinese characters were not recognizable to them even as distinct symbols. So the idea is that the people in the Chinese room have no idea what they are doing. They are manipulating what are (to them) meaningless symbols, but if the rules that they follow are good enough, from the outside the Chinese room as a whole might appear to be intelligent.”

  “And what could that possibly prove? Surely this is pointless?”

  “Indeed. Yes, it’s pointless. Even if the room itself is intelligent, it means nothing if the component parts are sentient or not. Individually the molecules that make up your brain are not self-aware: so what?”

  They floated over the glowing structure of the Chinese room. It was covered with Chinese characters, and through the partially translucent golden walls they could dimly see several floors filled with people sitting at desks. I
t was difficult to tell from this altitude, but they mostly did not appear to be ethnic Chinese. “The Planetary Governor watched a science documentary on the development of artificial intelligence, and he thought it would be a neat idea to actually build one. Of course his staff was too cowardly to tell him what a stupid idea that was, so it got built. And there it is: the universes’ first – and hopefully last – self-aware Chinese room!”

  “Those are real people in there?”

  “Of course. People are so much cheaper than automation. Just give them enough food and water to survive, have misery or death be the alternative, and there you go. The Governor lost interest in the idea even before it was finished. Someday some accountant will close it down, but for now it keeps on. I feel sorry for it, really.”

  “Sorry? For the Chinese room?”

  “Why yes I do. It was created as a whim by a spoiled oligarch. As far as we can tell, it is a self-aware being. However, it has no real purpose, and will cease to exist the moment that its component human data-manipulators stop shuffling Chinese characters back and forth. It’s also kind of dull, and has a very limited memory. The poor thing tries to talk to people on the data networks, but it takes it a day for it to think just one thought, and mostly all it says is “What’s going on?” and “Where am I?” and things like that. Sad, really.”

  They passed over the Chinese room, and then floated across a seemingly endless plain of low metal sheds. “And there they are,” said Vargas. “The people of Alpha Centauri Prime. Jammed in like battery hens, cut off from the sun, from the sky, from anything other than a short and desperate life of work and then culled when they slow down. Perhaps we would be better off if the aliens just ended it all.”

  “Battery hens? Chickens that lay batteries?”

  “Oh, sorry, that’s an archaic term. In the days when regular people could afford to eat real eggs, female chickens were housed in vast factories where each one of them had a cage just barely large enough to fit in. They lived out their lives in the darkness, sitting in their tiny cages, laying their eggs, until they stopped laying eggs, at which time they were killed and their carcasses rendered into raw protein. That’s how most humans live nowadays.”