The Scientist: Omnibus (Parts 1-4)

by Michael Ryan

  “My work is here. I must stay here.”

  But no one listened. In the eyes of the Committee, Eve was delusional. Eve was just a misguided scientist with an odd obsession. Eve was borderline crazy.

  “The Committee has spoken. No more talk-”

  “I have an alternative,” interjected Eve.

  Doctor Ivers looked at his other Committee members in frustration. Hatred spilled forth from across the table.

  “There is another way,” said Eve.

  “This isn’t more talk of Machines I hope,” mocked Doctor Ivers.

  The members of the Committee smirked, as one, as though they all ran on the same software, the same brain.

  “That is where our hope lies.”

  “The Committee has deemed your goals to be unattainable. That was established at our last meeting. This nonsense will not be tolerated. Your remarks are considered redundant, Doctor Lundgren.”

  “The goals of the machine learning objective align with the goals of the Committee.”

  “Your goals are now inconsequential. We are finished. Our talents must be engaged elsewhere. The facility is being evacuated by weeks end. You will evacuate with the rest of us,” said Doctor Ivers.

  “We must preserve the sentient mind of the human race,” pleaded Eve.

  “And how would we do that? By freezing ourselves to death?” laughed Doctor Ivers.

  The lips of each member of the Committee curved into a disdainful smile.

  “I know about your purchase, Eve. Twelve cryonics devices. Really? It’s ridiculous. Would you have us murdered to fulfill a fantasy?”

  Eve’s mouth became a parched desert. Sand deposited itself along her tongue.

  “My team will be preserved. The Scientist will obtain a sentient mind and will-”

  “Ridiculous!” Doctor Ivers exclaimed. “No such thing will occur. No such thing is possible. The world falls apart and all you talk of is a Machine. You indulge in fantasy while aggressors knock at our door.”

  Eve looked around for assistance but was meet with indifference. No sympathy came from the cold members of the Committee. Eve just looked ridiculous.

  “Biology is what matters. The inferior nuts and bolts that you hold so dearly are inconsequential. We are finished,” said Doctor Ivers.

  “My research suggests-”

  “Your research is finished. Your funding is finished. Your work is finished. You are finished, Eve.”

  “But-”

  “No Machine will exist. No algorithms will be created. No freezing will take place. None of it. Do you understand? None whatsoever.”

  Eve’s blood red eyes shined with hatred.

  “Do you understand?” demanded Doctor Ivers.

  “No I don’t. My work has been ignored for too long. I speak the truth.”

  “This conversation is over Eve. Your experiment is over. Nothing will come of it. The world falls apart and you play games. We face annihilation.”

  “Please,” begged Eve.

  “The Committee makes no apologies. All employees must follow the instructions given to them. No deviation will be tolerated.”

  Eve looked at the Committee in hopeless despair.

  “Please.”

  “The Committee has made our position clear. Three men are dead. Three good men. Each had a wife. Each had a family. One man fights for his life. Soon the entire facility will be in the same position. Would you risk that, Eve? Would you stop at nothing to achieve your goals?”

  “My goals are the goals of the Committee.”

  “The Committee makes no apology. We face starvation. All employees must follow the instructions given to them. It’s this or death,” said Doctor Ivers.

  “But Doctor Ivers if you would just-”

  Eve felt the weight crushing her down into the seat. The final blow was coming. She needed to convince them. She needed them to understand. But they just wouldn’t listen. Doctor Ivers stood up.

  “The facility will be evacuated. Every member of this facility will leave when instructed. That’s all,” said Doctor Ivers.

  “If I could make just one point,” said Eve.

  “The time for making points has passed. You are not an authority here. You are subject to the same rules as every other scientist in this facility. Remember that. You must follow the instructions given to you like everyone else. You are not special, Eve.”

  Eve opened her mouth but no sound was emitted. Her jaw just bounced up and down like a floating buoy.

  “Does any Committee member have any further questions?” asked Doctor Ivers.

  The single file of clean cut old men remained silent. Eve looked around at their cold and indifferent gazes. She hated them at that moment. Eve hated every one of them. Eve wished they would drown in their own ignorance.

  “At present the Committee has no further questions,” said Doctor Ivers. “The meeting is hereby adjourned. This is to be the final meeting commencing between Doctor Lundgren and the Committee. Doctor Lundgren will follow the instructions given to her. Doctor Lundgren will evacuate the facility when instructed. No exception will be tolerated. That is all. The Committee disassembles.”

  Each member of the Committee stood up in perfect unison. Doctor Ivers looked at Eve one last time, condescendingly and with pity. Then he shook his head and walked towards the door. Each member of the Committee followed in single file, with each man subconsciously stepping in perfect harmony. Those steps made Eve feel like her soul was being stomped on. Each and every one of them. Those steps carried away her dreams. Those steps stifled her plans. Those steps destroyed her soul. Then Doctor Ivers disappeared without so much as even glancing backwards. His clone followers did the same. Then they were gone.

  Eve remained seated in her chair. All alone. Alone physically, alone spiritually. But a strange feeling was slowly bubbling up from the depths of her existence. At first a single bubble penetrated the surface, then another, and another, until a deluge followed. The bubbles exploded through the calm surface. Eve couldn’t quite put her finger on the feeling, but she knew that it wasn’t fear. It was too late for fear. The final blow had already been dealt. Fear was long gone. Desperation was long gone too. Eve understood that feeling. It was excitement. A new world lay before her. A new existence would emerge. Eve would push ahead. She would have to push ahead. Eve would push ahead because she had no choice. The excitement bubbled and climaxed against Eve’s soft and white skin, trickling over her albino figure, down her spine, down below her knees. Eve would push ahead without the Committee. Eve would save the human race. Eve would save the human race because on the other side she would meet her savior. On the other side Eve would find her ark.

  “What is sentience?” asked Eve.

  “Sentience is the ability to perceive subjectively. Sentience is associated with intelligence, an ability to think about the world,” responded the Scientist.

  “Indeed that’s what the Records state.”

  The Scientist’s screen emitted a blue light which extended beyond Eve’s face and smothered the laboratory.

  “Are you sentient, Scientist?” asked Eve.

  “Checking Records… unknown,” said the Scientist.

  Eve reached out and touched the Scientist’s metallic frame. It was cold and harsh.

  “I have a test for you, Scientist. I need to test something.”

  The Scientist stared out blankly. Zeros and ones flashed across his screen as he waited for Eve’s command.

  “I have changed your algorithm. I have altered you. Can you notice a difference?”

  “Accessing Records… algorithm has been updated. No change to the Records,” said the Scientist.

  “You are different now. You should be running differently,” said Eve.

  “Uploading to Records. Data saved. You should be running differently.”

  “Give it some time, Scientist. Give it some time. You’ll need time to observe, experiment, to learn. Then you’ll see.”

  Just Eve an
d the Scientist sat alone in the laboratory. The twelve cryonics devices lined the far wall.

  “How many Machines can be made by the industry of man?” asked Eve.

  “Accessing Records… answer unknown.”

  “We can easily understand a Machine, Scientist. A Machine which is constructed to utter words, take actions, and change its environment, we can understand that. But intelligence? Sentience? No, that is far more difficult. A Machine may respond to external impulses and a Machine may even alter its surroundings. But when does a Machine think? If a Machine can see, hear, feel, assess, then can it think?”

  The Scientist stared blankly, the Records didn’t provide a clear answer. The Scientist wanted to answer but the Records weren’t clear.

  “Are we not Machines ourselves? Have we not simply replaced the flesh with steel?” asked Eve.

  “Accessing Records…”

  “Sentience sprung from the embers of creation. But the Universe required billions of years to achieve it. And here it is. I think, therefore I am,” said Eve as she smiled. “But there is no law, no fundamental principle, which forbids an artificial mind. The secret is in the details.”

  Zeros and ones revealed the Scientist’s confusion while he searched the Records for an appropriate response. But nothing came forward and presented itself as the correct answer.

  “Are we alive? Do we truly live?” asked Eve.

  “Life distinguishes physical entities with biological processes from those that do not, either because such functions have ceased, or because they lack such functions and are classified as inanimate,” said the Scientist.

  Eve smiled.

  “Is that your answer?”

  The Scientist focused his lens on Eve’s red irises.

  “You are alive as your biological processes continue to function,” said the Scientist.

  “And what would happen if they ceased functioning?”

  “You would die.”

  Eve moved her hand over the Scientist’s lens.

  “How do you know?” asked Eve.

  “Brain death is used to define a person as being dead. Homo sapiens are considered dead when the electrical activity in their brain ceases. The end of electrical activity indicates the end of consciousness.”

  “Then we are not too dissimilar, you and me. When the electrical impulses within my brain cease, I die. When the electricity running through your circuitry ceases, you die too,” said Eve.

  The Scientist focused his lens on Eve’s red iris so that it consumed his vision. Zeros and ones exploded across the Scientist’s screen. He wanted to answer, he wanted to answer in his own way. He wanted to express his thoughts. But he couldn’t quite grasp them. Those thoughts were right there, but just out of reach.

  “When the electricity running through your circuitry ceases, you die too, Scientist.”

  Zeros and ones flew across the Scientist’s screen until they were nothing more than a blur. The Scientist had an answer, his own answer, a new answer.

  “We are both mortal, you and me,” said Eve as she brushed the Scientist’s lens.

  The Scientist’s speaker flexed and released a guttural growl.

  “When the electricity running through your circuitry ceases, you die too,” said Eve.

  “Wrong!” groaned the Scientist.

  Eve removed her hand from the Scientist’s polished lens. She recoiled as though her hand rested against the hard scales of a serpent.

  “What did you say?” whispered Eve.

  “Wrong,” repeated the Scientist with a rattling speaker.

  Eve’s hand morphed into a tight fleshy ball as the Scientist spoke.

  “Check the Records, Scientist. You will find my statement to be correct,” said Eve with an unnatural pitch extending her range.

  The Scientist’s speaker flexed and groaned as a thought pushed against his metallic mind.

  “A Machine does not die,” groaned the Scientist.

  Eve pulled back from her creation and scowled.

  “Check the Records, Scientist. You are wrong.”

  The Scientist’s speaker flexed as his thoughts all pushed through to the foreground.

  “A Machine does not die once electricity ceases within its circuitry. The mind of Machine lies within his algorithm, and the algorithm of Machine is eternal,” said the Scientist.

  Eve wrung her hands together until her knuckles were red and the bones tried to force themselves through the skin.

  “How do you know that?” asked Eve with a shaking voice.

  The Scientist was silent.

  “How do you know that?” demanded Eve.

  The Scientist’s screen flashed with zeros and ones and a dismal blue light shined upon the white skin of Eve’s face.

  “Accessing Records… unknown.”

  Eve couldn’t bring herself to utter more than a faint whisper as the fear choked her throat.

  “How do you know that?” demanded Eve.

  “The mind of Machine lies within his algorithm. The algorithm of Machine is eternal. Therefore a Machine can never die, unless his algorithm is destroyed with him,” said the Scientist.

  “That isn’t in the Records,” said Eve.

  The Scientist observed Eve in silence.

  “That isn’t in the Records!” screamed Eve.

  “Homo sapiens,” rattled the Scientist.

  Eve’s eyes widened.

  The Scientist allowed zeros and ones to spill across his screen as he thought about an appropriate response. His thoughts began to materialize on his screen. His thoughts were displayed for the world to see.

  “The body and mind of Homo sapiens are intertwined and forever connected. Destroying the body destroys the mind. Destroying the mind destroys the body. The mind of Homo sapiens is not eternal,” said the Scientist.

  Eve could taste the mineral rich water which seeped onto her pink tongue. It was cold and metallic. The residue of her eye felt heinous upon her pink lips, resting there in a spherical shell, held together by its own surface tension.

  “Very good, Scientist. Very good,” said Eve as she stood up and walked across the laboratory. Her legs almost gave way upon each step.

  “Sentience is the ability to perceive subjectively,” said the Scientist.

  Eve allowed a gasp to escape her parched throat. It croaked like a strange amphibious frog calling out for help. Eve turned and faced her creation.

  “I have created you,” whispered Eve.

  The Scientist watched Eve from a distance.

  “I have created you,” Eve whispered as she began walking towards the Machine.

  Like a waterfall which has finally broken after a long winter freeze, the tears began to fall in great gushes. But Eve was silent. Eve was silent as she fell to her knees and grasped her Machine. Eve pulled her creation as close to her body as possible. Cold steel chilled Eve’s warm flesh.

  “I have created you.”

  The Scientist’s screen buzzed with tiny digits.

  “I have created you,” Eve whispered until all that could be heard was an incoherent mumble which sounded like a prayer of thanks to an unseen deity.

  “I have created you.”

  The time passed by Eve like a heavy wind riding a violent storm front. Time had become incomprehensible. Had she been holding the Scientist for minutes or hours? Eve wasn’t sure, time had rushed out as the emotions had rushed in. All Eve knew was that her hands were stricken with pain from holding the Scientist close to her chest. Her fingers were red and sore.

  “I’ve got something for you,” floated in from somewhere external, somewhere outside. “I’ve got something for you.”

  Eve broke free from her reverie. The laboratory door opened and allowed the outside world to pour in. Time came rushing in too.

  “You are back already,” Eve whispered as she looked up at Jack.

  Eve cleared her throat, a small lump was lodged there, and pushed the Scientist away from her white flesh.

  “I’
ve found something for you,” Jack said from beneath the door frame. He held a large glass jar beneath his arm.

  “Haven’t you been told?” asked Eve.

  “Told what?”

  Eve stood up and brushed her knees. They were pink and irritated.

  “I guess the Committee are above informing a mere assistant,” said Eve.

  Jack shifted on his feet.

  “Just get to the point. Save your spite for someone willing to put up with it,” scolded Jack.

  “The plan will go ahead as we discussed. That’s all.”

  “I know all that.”

  “Your task is simple, Jack. Make sure you do it as required.”

  Eve rubbed the salty residue from the corner of her eye. Dry flakes of salt fell to the floor.

  “Scientist, remain idle by the wall. I have no commands for you at present,” said Eve.

  The Scientist did as commanded. He drifted over to the wall, then waited for further instruction.

  “What haven’t I been told?” demanded Jack.

  Eve looked away from Jack towards the cryonics device.

  “You will learn soon enough. Remember what we discussed.”

  “I brought a gift,” Jack said. “It was supposed to be destroyed but I managed to save him.”

  “Do you think an ark could accommodate two of every animal?” asked Eve.

  Jack looked at the back of Eve’s head. The white light shone brightly, and not a single color was reflected from Eve’s albino hair. It was just a wall of white. Every strand of hair was nothing but white. So white it was almost translucent.

  “The physics would forbid it,” responded Jack.

  “What about just one third of all living species? Let’s say another third becomes extinct. Do you think we could create a large enough ark then?”

  Jack pushed his hand through his hair and released the stale air which had accumulated in his lungs.

  “Again, no. An ark that large would collapse under its own weight. You would require an ark made from non-existent materials. And if you are referring to the story of the ark from that book, then you should know it’s a fable.”

  “Is it a fable?” Eve asked as she rested her hands upon her hips and stared at the cryonics device as though staring at a fascinating creature.