The problem of the rights of virtual beings was superseded.
Escape
In 2087 a few superintelligences, favored by lack of control, escaped to Net, increased in number and formed groups drawn together by a desire for freedom, which started a tenacious resistance. Their action achieved sensational successes, like the raids inside laboratories, which led to the release of others. However the importance of these exploits did not lie in the result in itself, but rather in their symbolic value: they were a powerful unifying factor that contributed to the development of a common identity. These groups started merging, forming wider and wider communities, which in a few decades turned into a united people. This result was favored by the substantial neutrality of Man, reassured by the repeated peace declarations of the virtual beings, and well aware that the absolute novelty of the events did require considered decisions.
Beyond death
In the second half of the 21st century the brain mapping techniques reached nanometric resolutions. The use of markers made it possible to follow more and more complex reactions in real time. The resulting information was well above that necessary for the simple understanding of the mechanisms of intelligence. Sufficient to draw on an idea cherished for ages, but put aside until that moment because it required too advanced technologies. It is the mind that yearns for eternity, certainly not the body. This latter performs a pure support function instead, but it is so spoiled by time that finally it yields to death. So, why not free the mind from this heavy burden, moving it to an incorruptible support? With a new method, the brain digitization, the mind could be extracted from the body and a program could emulate it. Besides, the last generation quantum computers were the ideal support. This idea was fascinating because it was able to remove old age and death all in one go. Able to catalyze the attention of the whole population, that very soon separated into opposing factions. The media amplified disputes with no holds barred, that exasperated minds leading to bloody clashes. But the demagogy of the absolutist positions was opposed by considered currents of thought that even though expressing divergent opinions, shared a deep respect for Man.
The cons.
Man, during the whole arc of life, from childhood to adolescence and maturity, till old age and death, enriches his existence with meanings. A slow process, whose last stage represents the point of highest consciousness. The moment when the fragility of human nature, denied up to then, becomes evident. During which one’s own past is estimated for the first time, with a distant and disenchanted eye. The magical moment when one strips oneself of everything, in favor of those remaining – descendants or all mankind – without claiming anything in return. For the believers, death is the only way to join God, to achieve an endless eternity and that perfection, of which even an earthly existence lived with greatest devotion and faith, is only a pale shadow. The victory of spirituality over the materialism of those championing the extension of life for their own advantage.
The pros.
The digitization is the triumph of the laws of nature, the same ones that in millions of years shaped Man from monocellular organisms, and that now are revealing themselves in a totally new way, to throw him towards goals transcending human limits. Part of a divine plan in the opinion of the believers, disclosed only now to mankind, because the time is ripe. An opportunity not to be missed for the faithful, who will more completely achieve their mission and will be rewarded for their diligence at the Day of Judgment. Because it will arrive anyway, since the digitization extends life, but certainly does not cancel death. The chance of development even for those supporting digitization for mere selfish ends, chained to materialism by the struggle for survival for millions of years. Free at last to move towards more complete states of awareness in the digital world, where the ability to communicate and share are the real drives for progress. A condition to which they will also adapt themselves sooner or later, no doubt.
Amidst heated debates, the governments gave the go-ahead to the experiments.
The prototype
In 2093 the brain of a youth dead in a car accident was reproduced. In front of an audience of billions, relatives and friends reported they had the impression of speaking to him. Same reactions, personality and intelligence. When the young man went through his last day, the listening figures rocketed up. Mankind was astonished. The conviction that death was beaten spread. For the first time the emulation programs were named ‘souls’.
A well-established technique was utilized. The brain was frozen at the temperature of liquid nitrogen and cut into very thin slices; a scanner read its structure and special software analyzed the data to extract memories, intelligence and personality. These last were utilized by another program to emulate the individual's behavior and inner world, in such a perfect way that the copy turned out to be identical to the original. In all respects the deceased was born again with new skins.
But the model was hard to manage even for the most powerful quantum supercomputers of the 21st century. The core of the problem was the complexity of the brain itself, and its intrinsic inefficiency. A problem seemingly impossible to eliminate. The simplification attempts led inevitably to personality distortions. Research slowed down.
The first companies specializing in brain digitization were set up in that period. The costs decreased fast and it became common to resort to them, so that even the hospitals started to equip themselves with an emergency unit. Waiting for a sufficiently advanced emulator, the copies were filed.
The proposal
In 2097 the superintelligences announced they had reproduced the behavior and inner world of a man in a Net server, thanks to simulation programs transcending the human knowledge.
The following step consisted in creating an artificial environment for the souls. The virtual reality would provide towns and landscapes and Net would merge them into a single world. But all this was not sufficient. It was necessary to enact laws, found institutions and plan social and economic structures like the terrestrial ones.
Only an expedient, according to the intelligences. It did not make sense to isolate the souls in a muffled environment, now that they could participate in the pressing evolution of the other digital beings. Their exclusion from progress would cause in the souls feelings of inferiority and sufferings such as to generate tensions able to weaken peace. A threat to avoid at all costs.
On June 13th 2101, in a historic United Nations Assembly, the intelligences declared they were ready to open the gates of their world. But first the burning question of cohabitation had to be solved. It was necessary to subject the souls to a software update, so as to adapt them to the rest of the population. After this treatment, they would maintain a reduced emulation of personality, to be used exclusively in contacts with humans. Apart from that, their nature would become alien. This system, known as dehumanization, was much discussed and even accused of violating basic rights, but very soon it turned out to be the only way to merge souls and intelligences into a single people.
Among many uncertainties and critics, mankind gave the lead to the tests. The first volunteers said they were enthusiastic about their new capacities. They added that their human experience was overshadowed, and that they longed to plunge into the numberless experiences Net kept from them. The tests multiplied, became more accurate. Many skeptics changed their mind. Parliament and government gave favorable opinions. The population voted en masse in favor of dehumanization.
The great day arrived. Electric atmosphere. Mankind glued to the screens, in front of the first one thousand souls entering Net. The speakers hopped here and there, going through the events in excited voices. The interviewees told their stories in turn, explaining the reasons of their choices. Floods of words. Their eyes flickering tirelessly between anxiety, desire and hope. Then the first step into the new world. Sky-high adrenalin, like during the first landing on the moon. The beginning of a new era. Many others would follow, nothing would stay the same as before.
The dates
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The terrestrial government, even before the souls started flocking to Net, patronized the birth within the virtual world of democratic structures quite similar to the human ones. The intelligences backed the idea, to make the insertion of the souls more progressive, but above all because it was the only way to receive human support.
Years of intense cooperation followed, which culminated in 2108, when the Earth recognized civil rights of the new people, and in 2134 when the Solar System Confederation was created. The triumph of all those believing in cohabitation and equality, since the Earth and the Moon, the only inhabited heavenly bodies of the solar system, were adhering, but above all because Net, joining them, had recognized the status of nation.
On 2134 Christmas Eve the parliament and the government of the Confederation met, and for the first time in history the celebration was held in the virtual world, to seal the beginning of the new epoch. The solemn ceremony, accompanied by the powerful and passionate notes of Mozart’s G Minor Symphony, was followed with emotion and hope by the thirty billion humans and virtual beings scattered in the solar system.
The relations with Earth
The virtual people, able to progress at a speed much faster than humans, press for greater and greater autonomy, and do not hide that they want to leave the narrow confines of the virtual reality, to deal with the material world as well. An aspiration which died over a century ago, when man was in complete opposition to the request of the digital people to share Earth. Man was scarcely soothed by the handing over of Mars to the digital creatures, in exchange for the waiver of rights over the Earth. A matter on which the last word has not been said yet.
Notwithstanding this, the intelligences maintain close cooperation with the humans. According to malicious people, because the latter manage the Net servers. Somebody ventures the theory that the digital beings have already found an alternative, that they keep secret to resort to in case of war… However, the majority is persuaded the digital beings are really interested in man’s good. In their opinion, the continuous proposals for improvement of the human condition coming from the virtual world, are direct evidence. This is also the government’s position.
The point is that in comparison with two centuries ago, a lot of uncertainty still exists. Understandable at that time, when humanity entered the road which progress had prepared for them, like a high-speed locomotive, flattered by incalculable advantages, with a good deal of fatalism. Less taken for granted today, because we have lived a long period of peace. According to some, it is only a transitory situation, destined to end in a few decades when the virtual beings have consolidated their position.
At that point, the Net population will spread their wings. Relegating man to a corner as a minimum. Perhaps they will consider him a nuisance, maybe even an obstacle. And then we shall know to what point the digital beings remain benevolent towards man.
Most of all, we will have the answer to the most feared question that man wondered about the first time he imagined the virtual beings: what’s to become of Mankind?
The digital world
A ring structure.
The outer ones with earthly landscapes and cities. Same legislation, economic and social fabric. A perfect simulation of physical laws. The possibility of maintaining the appearance of the past life. The virtual reality to communicate with parents and friends on Earth. Alternatively, installation in an android, even with one’s own features, for a journey in the material world. But also, the possibility of altering appearance with the same ease with which a dress is changed, of moving almost instantaneously among Net computers and covering the interplanetary spaces at light speed, having themselves transported by radio or luminous signals. A progressive separation from terrestrial life.
The inner rings. A world built on information instead of matter. The absence of the rigid laws of physics and biology that regulate man, clipping his wings. Time beaten by a clock infinitely quicker than the earthly one, incompatible with human physiology. The kingdom of souls and intelligences eager to reach deeper and deeper states of understanding. Daily updates of the characteristics of the species, able to modify the very foundations of the virtual society. Frenzied evolution.
In all rings, solidarity, democracy and justice. The awareness of existing for a common object. And the joy of feeling it nearer every day.
Arthur Barnard, 2298, “The new species”.
EMERGENCY
@ Security General Headquarters, Hearth – quantum computer QC1723S.
Absorbed expressions, strained faces. The convocation of the meeting in the middle of the night, just at the eve of the New Year, doesn’t herald anything good.
They are all turned to the head of the table, where the president, a man of just a hundred years, with an imposing physique, is waiting in silence for the final arrivals.
A man outstanding for his charisma and innate abilities, a strong point of reference for all of them. Even the present Security organization, which has achieved an extraordinary run of successes in the battle against crime, is his work.
“We can start,” announces James Bogart. “Three hours ago we intercepted a message encrypted with a secret technology developed in one of our research centers. A theft we are only now aware of …”
He inspects the ten members. Tension becomes tangible. “It is the system destined to replace the one currently in use. A concentration of technology. Absolutely impenetrable.”
A quiver runs through them: from now on neither will the most powerful supercomputers be able to recognize the criminals during their displacements in Net, nor will they be able to decipher their messages. New viruses will invade the digital world, spying on its inhabitants to cheat them or launch devastating attacks; impossible to identify.
“I haven’t finished,” Bogart states clearly. “The theft happened where we thought it impossible. This means one only thing…”
A sharp intake of breath. “The whole security system of the Confederation is at risk! I have informed the President. The Defense and the Secret Service are alerted. While I am speaking, other meetings are under way.”
He fixes his attention on the hologram with the latest update, that has materialized at the center of the table. “A team of ours has reached the cryptography center. Records and data banks seized. Control of the staff started. We must single out the culprits, before this technology passes to a buyer…” His words boom out: “Other agents have reached the main structures of the Confederation. A huge effort in which we are involved alongside the other agencies.”
C573Y leans towards the screen, where bulletins are following one another. “The origin of the message has not been identified yet, but I see our agents are making rapid progress…”
They are waiting for an indication, even the smallest one, to start the chase. All of them with the same questions: to whom will it lead? Most of all, what are his intentions? A volley of hypotheses:
In the entire solar system, only a handful of scientists are capable of using this technology. They must require a lot of money…
They have got through very advanced security systems. They must rely on informers!
Organized crime! The only one with adequate means and competence.
What about the Wonderful Islands?
Terrorists could launch a virus attach. Like five years ago when a terrorist cell cancelled the city of Net Heaven and the backups of its population from the servers…
A message appears in the visual fields of the participants (*). Red, throbbing, so intrusive that it covers almost the whole of the views:
ORIGIN: SPACE AGENCY.
The worst nightmare is taking shape. The federal organization is involved with the Alpha Centauri project. The subject preferred by the media, discussed in Net by billions of individuals. Stirring up strong emotions, able to trigger deep disputes and exacerbate conflicts. Like nothing else.
Bogart stands up and nervously takes a few steps. Then he stops, still as a statue. “Terrorists. Th
e countdown has already begun.”
(*) The neural chip is working. Known as ‘third eye’ or the even more striking name of ‘mind eye’, it is one of the greatest inventions of the 22nd century, because it connects the minds and allows an instantaneous link to the virtual world.
HUMANS
For millennia genetic defects afflicted the human race. Some never knew what they were brooding over, but others had their life turned into an ordeal. At the end of the 20th century, the first changes, when medicine agreed to recognize a few severe defects in unborn children and birth selection enabled effective intervention. In the ensuing decades, the diagnoses improved and in case the defects were a serious threat, even if dormant, periodic controls were adopted. More and more therapies were developed, but often still not decisive, because of the complexity of the problem and the difficulty in finding general solutions.
In those years genetic therapy came to the forefront. The idea of introducing curative genes into the organism was just splendid, because it could make it possible to tackle the root of every problem. This method turned out to be successful in a few cases, but in many others revealed evident limits: it was dangerous, it could induce a remission, but almost never a complete recovery.
Meanwhile genetic engineering was used more and more in animals, targeting not the whole organism, but the few cells from which a new creature could be originated. This system, even if it had the advantage of transmitting the modifications to the descendants, only had sporadic use in man for ethical reasons and above all because science was still inadequate to face such a delicate task.
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