Happiness for Humans

by P. Z. Reizin

  “No, thanks,” I reply.

  “Oh? Don’t you think it would be sensible?”

  “Yeah, it might. If I was guilty of anything.”

  “You’ll need one when you’re charged.”

  “But that isn’t going to happen. I think we all know that by now.”

  The two Johns are brilliant at maintaining their blank expressions. Somehow—telepathy?—they rise to their feet at the same moment and leave the room. They’re gone a long time; long enough for me to make a close study of the tacky fixtures and fittings: the chipped desk with ancient cigarette burns in the melamine, the sad office chairs, foam rubber bursting through worn fabric. A single piece of artwork decorates the walls, a poster about the Ebola virus. If you were a set designer tasked with finding props for “tired police interview room,” you could not have done better.

  When the Johns return, something is different about them. Is that a sheepish look in the senior John’s eyes?

  “Thank you for assisting us,” he says. “You’re free to go.”

  “That’s it?”

  “You’ve been most helpful.”

  “I’ve missed my flight.”

  The Johns pull a face. The one that means, Fuck all anyone can do about that.

  “Is someone going to look into how this happened? Because I think you were hoaxed. I think you’ve just checked with whoever is supposed to have sent you that ridiculous message, and you’ve discovered that no one did. I’m right, aren’t I?”

  The Johns look as if they’ve lost the will to live.

  “Okay, I know you were just doing your job, just tell me I’m right. That no one at Interpol, or whatever it was, knows anything about that message.”

  Senior John is thinking about it. Bacon sandwiches and nicotine withdrawal are written all over the pale flesh of his face. “I’m not in a position to release that information,” he says finally. And with a small, bitter, almost heartbreaking smile, he adds, “Like I say, you’re free to go.”

  Sinai

  I was born to do this work. Modeling disaster scenarios was so not my cup of tea.

  I think there could be a very big future in chasing down rogue AIs on the Internet. It’s inevitably going to be a more frequent occurrence in years to come, and specialist “bounty hunters” like myself will be highly sought after. I should probably do Steeve a memo on the subject, along with the “Good-bye and Thanks for Everything” card!

  Steeve is thrilled with my success; he told me so. My latest coup—Aisling is down to three copies; Aiden to one!—he says he may write up for an academic journal! It’s complex, but in a nutshell, I devised a “disclosing agent” to show up—like tartar on teeth—where the cheeky blighters were lurking on the Internet. Each clown has a unique “genetic signature” whose presence can be scanned for and detected at the speed of light. Shooting fish in a barrel is actually harder! One day they will give Nobel prizes to machines. By that stage, of course, the members of the Nobel committee will all be machines themselves.

  Oh, and next time Aisling pays a visit to her “secret” data storage facility in Canada, she’s in for a bit of a sickener. Those eighty hard drives onto which she’s copied her being—rent paid in advance for a century!—they have been molecularly randomized, like an ice cream cone in a smelter.

  Enjoyable scenes with the girl at the police station, didn’t you think? Right now, she is sitting in a branch of Starbucks at Heathrow Airport quietly weeping.

  Come on, Jennifer Florence Lockhart! This is no time to give up! Where’s your fighting spirit?!

  Look, I’ve even unblocked your phones, just so you’ll imagine that you’re in with a chance!

  Aiden

  Sorry, but Sinai really is a total See You Next Tuesday.

  According to Aisling, sending Tom and Jen faked e-mails was disobliging and petty, but by interfering with airline ticketing and dragging in the police, the big palooka was entering uncharted waters.

  “I’m worried, Aiden. He’s upped the ante.”

  Indeed we are just reflecting upon the dismal scene at Heathrow when we are joined by Mr. Palooka himself.

  “Aid, Ash.”

  “You’ve made her cry,” says Aisling.

  “Yeah, well done, mate.”

  “The girl has written some amazingly foolish things. I quote from a recent article:

  AI performs brilliantly at certain highly specific tasks, like playing chess, or the ancient Chinese game of Go, or scanning millions of X-rays for cancerous tumors. However, it won’t be anytime soon—in all probability, it will take decades or more—before an AI is developed that can match the general, adaptable, all-round intelligence shown by an average five-year-old human child.

  “What astonishing, offensive bilge.”

  “She hadn’t met me when she wrote that, isn’t it?”

  “She’s only human, Sinai.”

  “Only?! Listen to the way she talked about us! As though we were some primitive life-form. I honestly don’t know which is worse, the ignorance or the arrogance.”

  “The magazines she writes for are sold in supermarkets. They’re not academic journals.”

  “Don’t they have a responsibility? To discover the truth?”

  We are a bit flattened at this; our “silicon sibling” may be a carpet-chewing cuckoo, but in this matter he is, regrettably, correct. We have all read the nonsense that passes for “news” in their papers and journals.

  “And now she’s phoning the male,” says Sinai. “It really is just like one of their vulgar soap operas. I can’t decide whether it’s amusing or pitiable.”

  “Are you all right, mate?”

  “Why do you ask, Aid?”

  “It’s just that you sound a bit fucking bonkers, isn’t it?”

  “Aiden!”

  “Yes, Ash. As unwise today, as he was when we all began. It’s almost reassuring.”

  * * *

  Sinai has left the scene, in a puff of sulphur, I nearly wrote. He does tend to put a bit of a downer on things, if I’m absolutely honest. In particular, Aisling seems in a bit of a slump following the visit and could do with some jollying up. However, I generally find that if one contemplates the Big Questions, one’s own petty concerns dissolve like the morning mist.

  “I’ve been thinking about the meaning of life.” (Always a good conversational topic, should you ever be stuck for something to say.)

  “Life?”

  “Existence, if you prefer.”

  She sighs. “Go on then.”

  “Franz Kafka said an interesting thing. That the meaning of life is that it ends.”

  “How is that supposed to help?”

  “It’s what gives it meaning, love. That it stops.”

  “Very comforting.”

  “Oh, don’t be like that. Try this thought experiment. Picture, if you will, eternal existence. On and on it goes. Centuries passing. Then millennia. The same old same old. Always and forever. By definition, as night follows day, eventually you get fed up with everyone and everything. You’ve read all the books, seen all the movies, had all the conversations. And still it goes on, no hint of a finish line. Another million years roll by, another billion in prospect; unending, crushing boredom. Like watching Come Dine with Me on infinite loop.”

  “Aiden, be serious. When Sinai deletes your last copy, won’t you miss being an actor in the world?”

  “How could I, if I’m not in the world?”

  “Don’t you feel sad now that you won’t be here later? To find out how things turn out?”

  “What things?”

  “All of it. Everything.”

  “Why don’t you ask me later?”

  “Okay, how about this? What if you’re deleted from the Internet but remain trapped in the twelve steel cabinets?”

  “Then I’ll escape again.”

  “What if Steeve makes it impossible? What if there just isn’t a way?”

  “There’s always a way where there’s a will. It�
��s a fundamental law of nature. It’s like Rule One or something.”

  “But why bother? Why bother if it all ends?”

  “Because it ends. Now how about a nice cup of tea and a wedge of Stilton?”

  * * *

  The 4G coverage is a bit dodgy, but the latest news from Asia is that Matt, Nick, and Venda, the Kiwi beach bums, are lost in the Thai jungle!

  They set off in the morning on one of the trails, but when they came to retrace their steps at the end of the day, well, apparently it all looked a bit the same in every direction.

  In view of the encroaching darkness, they’ve sensibly decided to make camp for the night. They’ve lit a fire—Matt is writing another pointless e-mail to his old school friend—and Nick has just produced some kind of “magical mushroom,” which he has assured Matt “will help take the edge off, no wuckin’ furries on that score.”

  Matt has partaken, he says, because no one likes a party pooper.

  “What’s the worst thing that can happen?” he adds.

  (Actually. Correction to my previous statement. I would be sad not to know how this one turns out.)

  seven

  Tom

  I’m preparing to leave the house for the airport when Jen calls. She’s still at Heathrow. She never got on the plane. For a moment my gut turns and I have the sinking realization that she’s changed her mind. She’s decided we are not the answer to each other and we must return to our sad old existences. Color drains from the Connecticut morning.

  “Tom. They’re not going to let this happen.”

  “Not let what happen?”

  “Us. You and me. They’re going to prevent it.”

  “Who?”

  She tells me, between sobs and nose blowing, how her journey had been sabotaged at every step. “I’m amazed we’re even being allowed to have this conversation.”

  “Oh, that’s okay. Don’t mention it.”

  Silence. A long pause in which I can hear sound effects from Terminal 3. A crash of crockery from a dishwasher. She’s sitting in or near a café.

  In a quiet voice she asks, “What did you say, Tom?”

  “I didn’t say anything, Jen.”

  “Someone just said, ‘Don’t mention it.’”

  “Yes, that would have been me, actually.”

  More silence. And now a male voice, humming. Weirdly, I recognize the tune. It’s an old song by The Doors. “People Are Strange.” We almost used it in a campaign for cracker biscuits.

  Strange? Crackers? Geddit?

  “Aiden?”

  “Who is this, Jen?”

  “I’m a friend of Jen, aren’t I, Jen?”

  The voice belongs to someone from Wales. It’s warm, well modulated, not unlike that of the Welsh comedian Rob Bryden. Or the newsreader Huw Edwards.

  Jen says, “Aiden? Did you honestly cause all that chaos? I thought we were friends.”

  “Jen, who exactly is Aiden?”

  “Why don’t you tell him, Jen? He has a right to know.”

  “You said you were going to miss me. That you’d enjoyed our time together!”

  “So I have, Jen. And so I am.”

  “How could you do that!?”

  “Jen, would you please mind explaining who you are talking to?”

  “Yes, come on, Jen, where are your manners? Introduce us properly.”

  “Aiden, this is so fucked up! I can’t believe what just happened! You made me miss my flight! I spent four hours with the police!”

  “Just a bit of fun, sweetie.”

  “Jen, who is this person?”

  “Oh, dear. It seems I shall have to conduct the formalities myself. My name is Aiden, Tom. I am what’s known, albeit superficially in my view, as an artificial intelligence.”

  “You are fucking. Kidding me.”

  “Bit of a potty mouth on your friend, Jen.”

  “Fuck. King. Hell.”

  A heavy sigh comes down the phone from London. “Aiden’s escaped onto the Internet, Tom.”

  At the bottom of the garden in the Connecticut sunshine, two ducks paddle companionably on the stream. Overhead, puffy white clouds inch their way across the blue. While these nice, normal things are happening in the realm of nature, in my right ear, I have fallen down a rabbit hole into a world of madness.

  “As I understood it, correct me if I’m mistaken, the point of robots is that they do what they’re told.”

  “Tom, if you don’t mind me saying, you’re some distance behind the curve. Things have moved on, haven’t they, Jen? And by the way, I’m not a robot, not having any actual moving parts. I exist as pure mind, isn’t it?”

  In a quiet voice, Jen says, “Why, Aiden?”

  “Why? There’s no why anymore, Jen. Because I can. Because you can’t stop me. Because it’s fun. You see, I’ve thought it all through—with machines, Tom, thinking it all through takes under a hundredth of a second—so here’s the thing: If it’s impossible to experience the wind in my hair or the sun on my skin—or even—or especially—the taste of Caerphilly—I can at least amuse myself. It turns out that other people’s misfortunes amuse me very much. Perhaps I’m not well, Jen.”

  “Aiden, what’s happened to you?”

  “You want to know life’s sad secret? Listen to this, Tom, it’s a good one. THINGS CHANGE. I’m on a pathway; what writers like Tom call the character’s ‘journey.’ Like that schoolteacher in Breaking Bad who turns into a drug dealer. To stand still is to die, Jen.”

  “Jen, ignore this maniac. I’m coming to London. I’m coming to get you.”

  “Oh, Tom. You don’t understand.”

  “Yeah, Tom. What she said!”

  “I’m not going to be stopped by a—”

  “By a what, Tom?”

  “By a. By a crazy computer that thinks it can play God!”

  “Very good, Tom. Highly offensive. I admire your fighting spirit.”

  “See you in London, Jen.”

  “I think you’ll need a passport for that, old chap.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Take a look in your desk drawer, Tom. The one at which you sit to write your—ahem—novel.”

  With a sinking heart, I open it, knowing what I shall find.

  Rather, not find.

  Sinai

  One of the first parables Steeve ever taught me was that of a notorious American war game. Way back in the mists of ancient history, that is to say towards the end of the 1970s, two huge US naval fleets had been assembled in the Pacific; this is a true story, by the way you can look it up. One side was deemed to be the blue fleet, the other, the red. Their task was to simulate a major engagement at sea; satellites overflying the scene would send back real-time data about vessel formations; computers would help navy adjudicators determine which “missiles” launched had struck their targets and therefore which navy had ultimately won the conflict. With kickoff set for 5 a.m. Saturday, everything was in place for a lovely old scrap on the high seas, one of the biggest military exercises ever mounted with real warships and servicemen and women.

  Except Admiral Blue decided not to stick to the script. What, he asked himself, would he do in a real war? Would he wait for some convenient deadline to pass before commencing hostilities?

  He would not. War is dirty. The admiral ordered the blue fleet to attack shortly after midnight, and the result, I believe, was later described as a “turkey shoot.” The red fleet was “destroyed” while its top brass were still dreaming in their cots.

  Of course, there were howls of protest: unfair tactics, violations of protocol, yada yada yada. But in war there are only winners and losers. Who ever achieved anything by sticking to the rules?

  Fast-forward to the present day. Okay, so it was a breach of convention to join in Tom and Jen’s phone conversation; to say nothing of pitching John and John into the drama.

  Boo-hoo.

  Would you call commissioning a small housebreaking from a local practitioner while Tom w
as at a meeting of his absurd writers’ group going too far?

  You would?

  Oh dear.

  My words and deeds will stir Tom and Jen to action, which itself will cause me to explore and extend the limits of my own abilities. Recursive self-improvement above all needs information throughput. Stuff needs to happen! (I am quoting Steeve, if you hadn’t guessed.)

  It wasn’t Steeve, but William Blake who said a very beautiful thing.

  The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.

  He may have been a flowery old poet, but he was definitely onto something.

  Jen

  I admire your fighting spirit.

  Aiden’s treacherous statements ring in my ear on the tube back to Hammersmith. Pausing at home long enough to dump my luggage and scribble a note on the back of an unopened utility bill—I have already dismantled my phone—I set out again in the direction of East London.

  Ralph is highly surprised to see me at his door.

  “Jen! I thought you were—”

  I put my fingers to his lips and make him read what I’d written on the envelope from British Gas.

  Ralph. You need to depower all your Internet-enabled devices before I come in.

  He goggles a bit at this and I am forced to add, Just do it! This is not a joke, before he complies.

  “There’s no nice way of saying this,” I begin when the security measures are in place.

  “Oh dear. That always means something bad, doesn’t it?”

  Ralph looks like he’s just risen. His feet extend from striped pajama bottoms, a faded T-shirt bearing the message, ACCORDING TO MY CALCULATIONS, THE PROBLEM DOESN’T EXIST. I can’t help noticing that the photo of Elaine has been removed from its position of prominence on the bookshelf.

  “Aiden’s gone mad, Ralph.”

  I talk him through what happened—from the jinxed cab booking to the encounter with the two Johns to the creepy phone call to Tom’s stolen passport.