“It’s a natural extension to the self-adapting routines that we’ve been developing, based on the MIT system,” Corrigan said. “The channel simply becomes an additional subgroup integrated into the perceptual data stream routed to each animation designated as implanted with a chip. The evaluation and response matrixes would be generated by the modules we’ve already got.”
“You’re saying that your people could handle it, then, eh, Joe?” Pinder interpreted, just to make sure that Esmelius understood.
“Sure, no problem,” Corrigan said.
“Splendid.” Esmelius beamed. Godfrey made satisfied clucking noises. Pinder could have told them as much himself without bringing them over, Corrigan knew, but it was more reassuring to hear things like this direct from the source. Also, as Tyron had made sure would not be missed but which Corrigan was not too concerned over for now, if anything went wrong, it would have been Corrigan who had said before witnesses that everything would be fine.
The two visitors stayed a short while longer to raise some further points and view what there was to see in the labs, and then left with Pinder and Tyron to meet others for lunch.
As soon as the door had closed, Shipley swung around in his chair and shook his head at Corrigan exasperatedly. “Joe, will you tell me just what in hell you’re playing at? This all started out as a serious attempt to achieve AI. Now it’s turning into a circus. God, even in the last two weeks we’ve listened to one crazy from Madison Avenue talking about turning every home into a theatrical supply company; another who wants walking advertising machines pestering people everywhere; houses full of talking appliances—and now commercial TV in people’s heads. The management here ought to know better, but they’ve all lost their heads over the prospect of unlimited funds. This is getting crazy, Joe.”
Corrigan nodded. “Yes, you don’t have to tell me that, Eric. I know.”
“But you’re going along with it, for Christ’s sake.”
“I’m not going to be made to back down in front of F and F clients.” Corrigan leaned over a table to run an eye over the printout stacked on top. “That’s exactly what Tyron is trying to do: get negative reports sent back to the financial people in charge of the operation, who haven’t got a clue what’s feasible and what isn’t.”
Shipley nodded emphatically, as if that made his point. “Sure, I can see it—only too well. But what good are you doing yourself if you’re not going to be able to deliver? You’ll look plain dumb. And Tyron sure as hell knows that too.”
Corrigan turned, looking composed and self-assured. “Relax, Eric. None of this is going to be happening anytime soon. Only the first-phase objectives have been made firm, and they’re realistic. This other stuff they’re talking about hasn’t even been scheduled tentatively yet. It’s all politics. The important thing for now is to say what the people who write the checks want to hear, and not sound obstructive. Trust me. I’m beginning to see how this game works now.”
Shipley looked back at the screen that he was working on and shook his head. “Lies and deception. Promises that can’t be kept,” he muttered. “It’s not the world we used to know.”
“Well, you know what they teach in law school: If you can’t lie honestly, then fake it. Got to move with the times, Eric.”
“And what became of science in all this?”
“Nothing worthwhile was ever gained without some calculated risk. That’s true in science too.”
Corrigan opened out the sheets and stared down at them. Maybe it was all changing too fast for Shipley to keep up with. He thought about the opposition he was up against, and wondered if he could afford to keep carrying a deadweight. Nothing worthwhile was ever achieved without having to make some sacrifices at times, either.
Financial notables, brokers, celebrities from the media, even a couple of senators—all became part of the regular scene as money flowed from bottomless expense accounts. Parties and nightlife became as much a part of the routine as progress meetings and system tests during the day. From the original concept, Oz grew to a mammoth scale requiring hundreds of new specialists and thousands of square feet just for the equipment. To accommodate the project, Xylog acquired a newly completed complex centered around an eight-story main building on Southside, where some warehouses had once stood just off Carson Street. So the day came when trucks and packers arrived at Blawnox to move the labs, offices, and hardware that would be absorbed into the Xylog operation.
Corrigan was at one end of what had been the main EVIE lab, supervising the crating of the CDC mainframe that Tom Hatcher’s group used for associative array development, when Pinder appeared, ostensibly to ask how things were going.
“Fine,” Corrigan told him. “The installation at Carson Street is ahead of schedule. I’ll be going there first thing tomorrow to start getting it all on line, and we should have the section back in business by next week.”
“Excellent.” Pinder clasped his hands together behind his back and gazed around. Most of the lab area was bare, apart from discarded trash and wastepaper swept into piles. Lengths of disconnected cables protruded from underfloor distribution points and hung from overhead. A work crew was maneuvering the last of the large crates onto forklift palettes. “It’s like moving out of a house, isn’t it,” Pinder commented. “Full of ghosts and memories. Funny how places always look so much bigger with the furniture gone.”
“I thought this was the ultimate in modernism when I moved in,” Corrigan said. “But compared to where we’re going, it all seems quaint.”
“Look at the kind of money that’s going into Xylog,” Pinder answered.
“I guess so.” Corrigan had caught the quick, sideways looks that Pinder had been giving him as they spoke, and knew there was more to this than a casual visit. Such was usually the case when Pinder came over from the Executive Building.
Pinder glanced around. There was nobody in their immediate vicinity. He motioned with a nod of his head for Corrigan to follow, and walked slowly along by the outside wall until they came to a window overlooking the rear lawns and parking lots. “I’m a bit troubled by Shipley’s ultracautiousness,” he said, directing his gaze straight ahead. “I know it’s good science and so on, but that belongs in the labs. What worries me is the negative impact that it’s likely to have on the financial backers. At a time like this we can’t afford that.”
It was too close to the way Corrigan’s own thoughts had been running for some time for him to be capable of making much of a show of surprise. Mainly out of curiosity to see where this was leading, he replied neutrally, “Has somebody been complaining?”
Pinder made a sucking noise through his teeth. “Not in so many words. But I’ve seen the looks and glances. And it’s something that stands to affect you personally as well, Joe. I think you owe it to yourself to give some thought to a side of things that you might not have considered very closely.”
“Oh?”
“Look at it this way. Eric has done some first-rate work in the past, I know—and I wouldn’t want to belittle any of that. But I have to ask, is he really suited to a senior position in the new style of organization that’s taking shape? You said it yourself—it’s a streamlined product of the times. And running it is going to require a management team who all share a common level of enthusiasm, personal ambition, and a conviction that the job can be done. One dissenting note could create discord throughout. Your own future hinges on the success of this in a big way, as I’m sure I don’t have to spell out. . . . So give me your opinion, straight. It’s not a time to let notions of personal loyalty obscure sound judgment.”
Corrigan stared fixedly out at the rear facade of the Executive Building opposite. Pinder had said it—all the things that had been swirling around in Corrigan’s mind, but which he hadn’t been able to bring himself to admit consciously. Even so, now that the opportunity was not only there but being pressed, a deeper-rooted reluctance to wield the knife prevented him from being blunt. “I don’t know,” was a
ll he could muster. “As you said, it’s something that I’d probably have to think over.”
Pinder waited a few seconds longer, then sighed. “All right, I’ll come out with it straight. Borth has seen it too, and he isn’t happy. He’s told Ken Endelmyer that he doesn’t want Shipley in the venture. Management’s view is that his former DINS work is part of the past now, and largely irrelevant, and they have concurred.”
So there never had been anything for Corrigan to give an opinion on. Pinder had simply been casting for a way to make him feel implicated. But if Corrigan had any protest to make, this was the moment to do it.
He turned and looked around the place where they had worked together, remembering feet propped on untidy desks; solder guns and birds’-nest tangles of makeshift racking; grubby diagrams tacked to pressboard; scratched keyboards and gray metal shelving. He thought of the future and Xylog: of glass-paneled corridors, deep-pile executive suites, and gleaming machine-halls. And he said nothing.
Pinder heard the silence and went on. “There is a core group from the DINS section that I’d like us to retain. Frank Tyron agrees that they’re good and wants them transferred to COSMOS, but I think there’s an equal case for integrating them into your side of the operation. I’m giving you first choice. What do you say?”
An offer of alliance, wrapped around the handle of the knife. He couldn’t do anything to change the verdict now, Corrigan told himself. Only Tyron would benefit if he refused. It was a time for realism.
“Sure, I’ll take them,” he said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The sign in gold indented lettering on a polished wood ground facing the elevators read:
Floor Six
OZ PROJECT SOFTWARE SYSTEMS DIVISION
ANIMATIONS ENGINEERING
ADAPTIVE ENVIRONMENTS GROUP
DATABASE MANAGEMENT
SUPPORT SERVICES
“Good morning, Mr. Corrigan,” one of the two clerks waiting with bundles of files greeted as Corrigan emerged carrying a black Samsonite.
“Hello, girls,” he returned, nodding, and headed toward the double doors leading through a glass divider to the sixth-floor reception foyer.
“Good morning, Mr. Corrigan,” the receptionist said from her desk as he passed.
“ ’Morning, Betty. You’re looking very smart today.”
“Why, thank you.”
“We’ve got some important people coming today. Keep it up.”
“Good morning, Mr. Corrigan,” the young man in a charcoal suit going the other way said, halfway across the open-plan floor of work spaces and conference areas leading to Corrigan’s office.
“Hello, Chris. Did we get those specs integrated for Bolger?”
“Completed yesterday. Run and checked out last night.”
“Good lad.”
Judy Klein was already at her desk in the partitioned outer area in front of his office. It looked like part of a set for the flight deck in a space-fiction movie, with its curvy furnishings and multiscreened computer side-table.
“Hi, Judy. ’Tis a grand day for living, to be sure, to be sure. What have we got?”
“Hello, Joe. Let’s see. The arrangements for those people from Chase that Borth is bringing are confirmed. And there’s a message from Amanda Ramussienne at F and F saying that she’ll be coming too.”
“Fine. And where have we fixed for lunch?”
“Delio’s for twelve-thirty.”
“That’s great.”
“Roger said to let you know we’ve signed off on the two new TMCs. There’s a list of calls to be returned on your desk. And Pinder has put the meeting with Quell back to ten-thirty instead of ten. I said it would be fine. It doesn’t clash with anything.”
“Okay. Anything from Tom Hatcher yet on those referent transfer patches?”
“Yes. You’re due to see him in half an hour with Charlie Wade and Jorrecks. He said he’ll have the information then.”
“Fine. I’ll clear the calls first. If anything comes up while I’m down there, just put it through.”
“Will do.”
Corrigan went through to his own office and set the briefcase down on one corner of the broad sweep of curved, walnut-topped desk with its terminal, onyx pen-holders and neatly arranged piles of papers and reminders. The floor-to-ceiling windows formed a corner of the building, presenting fine views of the downtown Pittsburgh vista along the opposite shore on one side, and the meeting of the three rivers with the Ohio Valley beyond on the other.
The last few months had seen an intensification of the realscaping program for capturing every facet of visual imagery over the entire Pittsburgh area. Camera teams had been out every day, touring and recording all the streets, expressways, parks, and trails; from vehicles and on foot, from helicopters overflying the city, from boats out on the rivers. Back in Xylog the machines were running day and night, reducing and compiling the encoded scenes into crosslinked hierarchies of field definitions in the huge database that took up half a floor of high-density crystal-array recirculator memory cubicles. Hatcher had told Corrigan that they could reproduce any aspect of any scene out there, from any viewpoint, in any direction. Corrigan had studied the figures and experimented with some samples, and he believed it. The results of the similar but smaller-scale program that Himomatsu had carried out in Tokyo were now incorporated into the main Oz database, as was a part of the Inglewood area of California and a few other places, following experiments by SDC.
Having reviewed his priorities for the day and disposed of the calls, Corrigan went through the mail with Judy and gave her a list of follow-up actions for the morning. Then he went back out to the elevators and down past the Primary Operations Level, where the main banks of massively parallel processing lattices took up almost the entire floor, past the Interface Level with galleries of COSMOS coupling hardware for up to fifty real-world surrogates, past the Monitoring & Control Center, from where the whole operation was directed, and came out on the second floor. Finally he came to a door marked FINAL EVALUATION & TEST, which was where Tom Hatcher’s group ran newly completed system modules prior to operational integration.
Hatcher’s concessions to the new order of things amounted to switching to regular pants in place of jeans, acquiring a jacket, and, on special occasions, adding a necktie. But underneath, the old, easygoing casualness remained unaffected, and he was still more at home sprawled in front of a terminal with his coffee in a Styrofoam cup than listening to investment plans being expounded over pâté de foie gras. When Corrigan arrived, he was waiting with Charlie Wade, one of the old crew from Blawnox, and Des Jorrecks, the head of Xylog’s applied psychology department. There were two broad areas to discuss:
First, results of tests to evaluate different strategies for creating animations that would best emulate people. Like people, the animations would shape their lives and personalities by pursuing goals. The intention was that these goals would arise internally, according to the animations’ individual natures and experiences, rather than be imposed from without. But real people rarely formed distinct goals that they pursued consciously and deliberately all the time, such as to become a doctor, lawyer, physicist, or actor, or to head a country or win an Olympic gold medal; for the most part, they simply lived their day-to-day existences following unconscious drives and desires, and the bigger things just “happened.” How, then, should such a nature best be simulated? What mix of drives, fears, ambitions, aversions was needed, with what kinds of relative weightings? How should such factors be represented as a statistical distribution across a whole population? Opinions on these questions changed constantly, and the short answer was that nobody really knew. A lot would be learned when the first runs were done in full-system mode, with the animation and environmental modules finally on-line and interacting together.
The other thing on the agenda was a subject that it seemed could never be laid to rest: the question of suppressing the surrogates’ memories when they began the full-s
ystem tests. Those in favor argued that it would ensure greater authenticity of behavior. Those against, who included Corrigan, maintained that they were scientists running an experiment, and scientists needed to know what was going on. “All we have to do is play role models to a bunch of dumb machines. We’re not trying to impress a panel of Shakespearean critics,” Corrigan said after they had been through the technical arguments yet again. “And on top of all that, it will make it a more exciting experience for everyone: the thought of launching off into the unknown—a bit like going up on a space flight to another planet, or something.”
“Aw, I don’t know that it would get anybody that excited when you get down to it,” Hatcher said. Hatcher was for suppression but resigned to a lost cause. Corrigan had vetoed the idea, there was not enough time left now to change the decision, and that seemed to be that. “These things tend to creep up on you so gradually, day by day, that you get used to it. I asked an astronaut the same question once. He said that they trained so hard for a mission that by the time it actually happened they couldn’t tell the difference anymore. But then, that was the whole idea, I guess. Pretty much the same as what we’re doing.”
It wasn’t just a matter of authenticity. There was the question of being better able to cope in an emergency, too. “What if something did screw up in there, Tom?” Corrigan said. “We’re going straight into people’s heads, interacting at deep perceptual levels that wire into emotional centers. And with the speedup, if anything unexpected did start happening, it would be hours out here before anyone knew about it.
Hatcher knew all that. He thought over it briefly, failed to come up with anything that hadn’t been said a hundred times already, and shrugged. “Well, that’s what the surrogates are being paid all that money for. We know there’s a lot we don’t know, and so do the volunteers who are coming in from outside. What else can anyone say, Joe?”
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