Sentients in the Maze: Symbiont Wars Book II (Symbiont Wars Universe 2)

by Chogan Swan

  The screen changed to a montage that illustrated various dynamics in nature and economics as Galt continued. “But when working with natural systems, linear outputs, even with simple linear inputs are not the norm. So our instincts, as you can see,” the chart of their guesses came back to the screen. “are often off base.”

  Galt took a sip from a coffee mug stashed under the podium and continued, hanging on to the mug and moving away from the podium. “So that is item one, the perils of linear thinking—which comes naturally to us.”

  He grinned. “Nothing to be ashamed of, right, Dr. Archer?”

  “Of course not; we all have limitations,” Archer said with a smile.

  The screen changed and the bullet chart came back with a second entry added. “Item two: feedback loops. We have two general types when modeling systems: positive loops and negative loops.” A new slide came up on the screen with a circular arrow diagram. “They look the same when diagrammed, except for either a plus or minus sign on the arrow.” A plus sign on one of the arrows flashed as it changed to a minus sign then continued flashing as it switched back and forth.

  “The concept is simple. Are you ready? When everything else remains equal, a positive loop increases value in the system as the input increases, but a negative one decreases it as the input increases.

  “Example of a positive feedback loop…”

  Two arrows forming a circle came up on the screen; the first arrow by a drawing of a chicken; the second was next to an egg.

  “Now we won’t discuss which came first. . .”

  Chuckles filtered through the room.

  “But we can probably agree that the more chickens we have, the more eggs there will be. In addition, the more eggs we have…, chickens will tend to increase. The two factors influence each other and barring outside influence will create . . . accelerating growth. Okay, let’s show another loop.”

  Galt walked back to the giant screen and pulled out a laser pointer.

  ‘We’ve already got chickens here, so let’s say that when chickens increase, we will have more chickens crossing roads.” Another arrow appeared on the screen forming an arc away from the chicken and pointing to a cartoon of a road crossing sign with a chicken on it. “But, as the rise in risky road crossings go up…, the number of chickens will tend to go. . . ? That’s right, down,” said Galt, responding to the murmuring room. “So we have a negative loop balancing the positive loop. Questions?”

  He paused for a moment. “None? Okay, pretty easy so far, right?”

  Galt took another sip from his coffee mug. “That was good coffee this morning, eh?”

  Sounds of agreement came from around the room.

  Giving us a chance to digest before moving to the hard stuff.

  Dylan took a long swallow of his latte.

  “All right then,” said Galt. “Let’s talk about the inherent complexity of systems. I assure you, though it may not seem like we are at first, it will come clear soon.”

  Galt moved back to the podium and pulled a stylus from his pocket.

  “First let me clarify what we mean when we use the word ‘inherent’ in that sentence. Inherent complexity is not about the items that make up the players in a system. The interactions between the players are what create ‘inherent complexity’. Even a seemingly simple interaction like our chicken and egg scenario will show inherent complexity in real life. For example, dynamics like lags when baby chicks stay close to their mother for a time before going out to explore the highway will create outputs that will look like this.” A new set of graphs flashed on the board that showed the quantities of eggs, chickens and fatal road crossings the total chicken population fluctuating up and down from the lag between the nest and the road.

  “Okay, enough about chickens. Let’s talk about government. Why do we want governments?”

  “Protection,” volunteered Dylan.

  “Good. Can we call that safety, Dylan?”

  Dylan nodded. He glanced down supposing Galt had read his nametag, but saw his scarf was covering it.

  Must've seen it earlier.

  “What does safety allow us to do?” asked Galt.

  “Provide for ourselves and our families,” said Ron Glass, Dylan’s opposite number on the YoungReps side of the room.

  “Yes. Thank you, Ron,” said Galt. “So we have numbers one and two on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, and those are necessary to the others, correct? So let’s put them all up there.”

  The screen had already listed ‘Safety’ and ‘Physiological’, now it filled in below them with: ‘Social’; ‘Esteem’; and ‘Self-Actualization’.

  “Anything else?” Galt glanced at the audience.

  “What about rights?” said Dylan.

  Galt turned to regard Dylan, “Hhm. ‘Rights’ you say.” He tapped his fingers together as though musing. “What are these rights of which you speak?” he said with a raised eyebrow.

  Chuckles rolled around the auditorium. Dylan shrugged it off, feeling on safe ground. “The benefits of a society founded on the rule of law.”

  “So, more things than are on this list?” Galt pointed to the screen.

  “I’d say they are more specific guarantees that would come under those headings. Things like a woman’s right to govern her own body, the freedom of choice,” replied Dylan, trying not to sound as smug as he felt.

  “So, they come under these headings, but they’re specific, so we could say, for our exercise today, that we’re going to keep it at a higher level. . .”

  He paused and put his hands behind his back, rocking forward and back.

  Dylan nodded in agreement.

  Galt stared into space. “But I’m not going to,” he finished. “We should hash this out more. You’ve given me an example of what you call a ‘right’. But—other than saying it’s a specific thing that some people want—we know little. What is its source? What does someone mean when they say, ‘I have a right’?”

  “They mean that they should be guaranteed these benefits,” said Dylan.

  Galt scratched his head. “Now let’s pretend that we are in tenth grade English for a moment. My English teacher said if you can add the phrase, ‘by zombies’ to a statement and it makes sense, it’s passive and needs editing. So, Dylan, are these benefits to be guaranteed by zombies?” Galt’s voice twinkled with good humor.

  “No, they should be guaranteed by society.”

  “So when someone says, ‘I have a right’ they mean that ‘society’ . . . I find that word a bit nebulous. How about ‘some person or persons’ have a responsibility to see that I get it whatever it is? Do I have that stated clearly, Dylan?”

  Dylan nodded uncertainly.

  “But if someone was convinced that this ‘right to choose’. . .” Galt waved at the screen. “I don’t know, maybe it comes under self-actualization. This ‘right to choose’ deprives another member of society, yet unborn, of life. . . safety. Do you mean the person who believes that would still be responsible to guarantee your conflicting ‘right to choose’? Personally? Because, Dylan—speaking as that person would—I would profoundly disagree. So, what happens when we use this passive, derivative construct we call ‘rights’ in discussions is that it ignores the zombies who are supposed to be delivering them. Now the relevance to all questions of governance . . . , and modeling simulations, is this.”

  Galt turned away from Dylan, faced the room and raised his finger. “I would suggest making a note of this everyone.”

  “Never… Ignore… The zombies.”

  His face remained serious. A few nervous chuckles in the room died out quickly.

  “Because maybe they won’t agree that what you call your right is their responsibility. Can you see how discussing responsibility allows for clarity, but staking your claim to something you call a right prohibits it? So, Dylan, thanks for raising the subject. We needed to talk about it. I suppose we might blame Thomas Jefferson for the rhetoric that started us off down this muddy path of
rights talk. When all along, we should have been walking out what our responsibilities are individually and corporately. But, isn’t it our responsibility to think and speak clearly? I can assure you that if you try to include a derived construct like ‘rights’ in a math-driven simulation you will confuse matters beyond measure. I suggest that this applies equally to the real world. Can you see that?”

  Dylan hoped his face wasn’t red from humiliation. In spite of Galt’s ‘thank you for bringing it up’, the implication that Dylan had not thought clearly was still on the table. As the room buzzed with discussion, anger sparked down inside him. This was a setback. Political careers shipwrecked on events like this. It was time for a gracious concession.

  “Mr. Galt?” his voice came out clear and sincere, just as he hoped it would.

  “Yes, Dylan?”

  “Thank you for pointing out the muddy spot in my thinking. I wonder, now, why I never looked at the matter clearly. Even if nothing else comes out of today, I’ll consider this time well spent.”

  “Well said, Dylan. We’re all guilty of muddy thinking in various areas. But, if everyone were as willing to put it aside as you, we’d be sure that much more would come out of today than a clarification of what we mean by ‘rights’. I’d almost guarantee it.”

  Dylan sat back in his chair, political career still on track.

  Jenny put a hand on his arm. “That was good, Dylan,” she said.

  Dylan smiled at her, but the spark of anger was still glowing in his guts.

  Galt walked back to the podium and took a few sips of coffee then put it back with a quiet thump like tapping a gavel for attention. “We’re going to come back to this subject in a few minutes, but I want to take care of some more mundane matters first…. Important in their own way though.”

  He raised a finger. “We’ve agreed that we want governments to help us satisfy certain needs. What are some of the matters we wish for government to attend to in our society?”

  “Healthcare,” called one of the faculty members from the side of the room. Laughter, catcalls and groans greeted this sally.

  Galt smiled and raised his hands then picked up his coffee, sipping while the noise faded. “We can at least agree that if government gets involved with it, we would like it to be done well. We allow government to provide some services that we pay for; some things we let them regulate. So I’ll restate my question, since I obviously didn’t uphold my responsibility to speak clearly the first time,” he grinned and shrugged as people chuckled.

  “Let’s deal with ‘Provide’ first. What does the government now take the lead in providing?”

  People began volunteering.

  “Defense.”

  “Legal system.”

  “Foreign Policy and Diplomacy.”

  As they called them out, the words appeared on the screen.

  “Planning for national infrastructure.”

  “Controlling currency.”

  “Economic and Tax policy”

  “Welfare and social security.”

  “Police protection.”

  “Okay, that is the first one that is both federal and local,” said Galt. “What about state and local governments? Let’s not leave that out.”

  “Public Education” said several voices at once.

  “Transportation infrastructure.”

  “Social Services.”

  “Public Libraries.”

  “Land use, zoning and public lands and parks.”

  Jonah held up a hand. “Okay. What we’ve just been doing here is the same exercise our project team did when we built this version of SimSociety. We wanted you to understand the method we used.”

  Galt pointed to the screen. "Let’s make things more complicated. Where do most of these items fall on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs? “

  “Near the base,” Jenny said thoughtfully.

  “That’s right Jenny,” Galt said, “Physiological, safety and some leisure and opportunities to improve in those areas. But, Jenny, let’s go back to the birth of our nation. Were the men who signed the Declaration of Independence people who lacked those basic needs?”

  “No. They were well-off,” Jenny said. Sounds of agreement filtered through the room.

  “Why did they start a revolution then?” Galt said. Why were they so concerned about what they called rights? I told you we would come back to this.”

  A tall, black girl Dylan didn’t know stood up several seats to his left. “Because the laws made them feel powerless.” She sat down again.

  Galt turned to her, nodding acknowledgement. “Thank you Octavia. Yes.” He turned to the room again. “How many of you here have felt powerless for some period in your life? Stand if you feel it applies to you please.”

  Next to him, Jenny stood right away. Dylan could hear people standing behind him all over the room, so he followed suit, trying to think of the last time he had really felt powerless. It had been long ago, surely. When you understood power and how it worked, you learned how to make it grow and when to use it. You built networks of shared advantage, dependencies, and obligations. It helped to know the skeletons in the closet, but a combination of charisma and making people feel as though you valued them were the best way to build a power base.

  Galt went on in a soft voice, looking directly at Dylan. “The system of government in this country was built on a foundation of mistrust in the abuse of power. It has checks and balances that we can point to and convince ourselves that power is under control. But sometimes people are smart, and like the wise man said, you can’t fool all of them all the time. No matter what the system, power will be abused. As the power-hungry learn to exploit a system, they will step on people.”

  Galt turned to look at someone else, and Dylan took a breath he hadn’t known he was holding.

  “The Magna Carta,” Galt said, “Our constitution with its Bill of Rights which—to paraphrase another president, ‘declares principles affirming the equality of each person … and the responsibility of government to secure the rights of all‘” He pointed to the screen where the full quote now appeared. “Do you see how responsibility is connected to rights here?”

  Another word appeared on screen. “All these things can be summed up as—Autonomy… the ability to control the important areas of our lives and contribute meaningfully where life matters to us… Don’t Tread On Me. People are much more protective of their autonomy than their other needs. Some will sacrifice safety and go without food to protect it. They will rally behind hopeless causes and fight to the death. This is the central challenge of government, and all of us need to remember that as we work to allocate resources and spend the money that citizens entrust to their leaders.” He walked back on stage. “Look around everyone.”

  Dylan turned his head to scan the room. Everyone was standing.

  “Thank you, all, said Galt. “You can be seated again.”

  Galt waited for everyone to settle and turned to the video screen where all the items they had covered now appeared. “It adds another layer doesn’t it? We need to both juggle resources AND our responsibilities to the people from whom the resources come.”

  The list disappeared from the screen.

  “Here is a representation of the game model we arrived at.” Causal loops began to fill the screen as Galt spoke. “We made educated assumptions about factors outside policy control. Those will remain constant functions, but factors that government can influence with policy controls will vary based on your decisions. In addition, we grouped the latter into categories and wrote helpful articles for you. The articles describe how the policy levers can influence each issue. Your teams can refer to them as you tackle the problems you will face with: resources, infrastructure, education, law enforcement, the national debt, the economy and all the rest.”

  Galt paused. “If you have ideas that don’t seem to fit the controls…” He held out his hands to the crowd, asking for indulgence. “We’ll do our best to help you use what’s available. You
r input might improve controls in the next version. We’ll reward individuals and teams for suggestions that end up improving the model, so please contribute your thoughts. Rewards could range from a few hundred dollars to scholarships, internships or job offers.”

  Galt waved his hand at the screen and it all disappeared. A timer set at ten minutes replaced it. “We’ll take a ten-minute break. When we get back, we’ll have the dividing wall in place so your teams will have separate space to make private preparations. Each team will have their own facilitators to familiarize them with the model and have a chance to make a trial run to get familiar with using them.”

  He grinned. “When it’s time to make your actual competition attempts, we’ll make your dreams come true, virtually speaking. Each team will control policy without interference from the other party for the next twenty virtual years. The team with the best score wins bragging rights, and we will publish the results with a write-up on the project website. It’s sure to attract media attention, so plenty of incentive to do well.”

  Galt nodded his head to both sides of the room. “I wish you all the best of success, and thank you for participating. The timer will start now.”

  Dylan stood and turned to his teammates. “Try to get back early if you can,” he said. “We might need every extra minute we can get.” He strode briskly toward the exit.

  When Dylan came back from his restroom break, three minutes later, the security guard welcomed him back and waved him to the left. A sign over the opening said, ‘Young Dems’. Dylan thanked him and hurried to his chair.

  Jenny and a few others were talking to a woman who’d been on the stage. Her nametag read ‘Hope Konawa—Facilitator’. Dylan remembered that her bio had said she was a data scientist. Hope was a young, dark-eyed woman with sleek, brown hair knotted into a careful bun. She was chatting with his team members about their interests and studies. Over her shoulder, Dylan could see her screen had a data table on each member of his team, including himself. Jenny was rattling off her courses in math and engineering, as she spoke, her table filled in the part of the table marked ‘Studies’ while Hope nodded.