Crisis- 2038

by Gerald Huff

  SAN FRANCISCO

  “Good morning, Bay Area! You’re back with Calista Quinn-Jones, here on the early shift. It’s another foggy day outside, although it’s expected to clear by mid-afternoon. Thanks to our last caller for the great question about the lack of affordable housing in San Francisco. Next up is Frank. What’s your question, Frank?”

  “Thanks, Calista. I just love your show. It’s getting harder and harder to have a real conversation online these days.”

  “I hear you, Frank.”

  “What’s your take on Sara, the young Indian woman who’s tearing up omnipresence right now? I like where she’s coming from.”

  “Sorry to disagree with you there, Frank. I mean, yes, she seems very nice and I appreciate her spirituality. And I know she says some things about eliminating poverty. But what I really hear her saying is very pro-technology, pro-business, and anti-government. She doesn’t seem to have heard about any of the disastrous consequences of all this technology. She flat-out said she’s pro-fusion and pro-GMO.”

  “Yeah, I know. That’s disappointing.”

  “She even said she’s a strong proponent of income inequality! There’s something fundamentally wrong with capitalism, and here she is perpetuating an unjust system.”

  “Well, what about the basic income guarantee she talks about? I heard that Martin Luther King, Jr. and Alan Watts were both in favor of that.”

  “Yes, that’s true. But so were Richard Nixon and Milton Friedman. What does that tell you? And here’s a little secret about her plan. She wants to eliminate all social welfare programs, including Social Security, and replace them with this guaranteed income. But how much is that income? She didn’t say! And how do we know it won’t just get cut and cut and cut, year by year, like all the other non-military spending? Once the bedrock programs are gone, all Congress has to do is gin up some new war—and then they’ll claim they have to lower the basic income.”

  “I never thought about that. But isn’t there something to her call to lift up all of humanity? She wants the wealthy to invest in things that can help everyone.”

  “You know, Frank, it sounds good. But when you really think about it, it starts sounding fishy. Seems to me like it’s ultimately going to discourage local action. I mean, if you aim for all of humanity, how are you going to focus on the problems in your neighborhood? And as for the wealthy, yeah, right! The wealthy only invest to get more and more for themselves.” Calista softened her voice. “I know it’s a bummer, Frank. I had high hopes, too, until I really started to listen to what she was saying. Thanks for the call.

  “Next up, we’ve got Jasmine on the terrible jobs situation.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  SANTA BARBARA - NOVEMBER 7

  “Good morning, Roger,” said Allison.

  “Good morning, Allison. How did AV do in the overnight runs?”

  “The AntiVenom algorithms were able to classify ninety-two percent of the selected content sources.”

  “Great! That beats our goal of ninety percent. I think it’s time to do a demo. See if you can get a holochat with Ian Maguire at DiscIQ. He doesn’t know me, so use my connections at UCSB as references. Topic: revolutionary tech to clean up OP discussions.”

  “Checking. His AI accepted a request for fifteen minutes at 3pm today.”

  “Great, that’ll give me a little extra time to prepare.”

  Ian was two minutes late for their appointment. He materialized in the holochat seated in a chair in an office setting with a woman in another chair beside him.

  “Ian, thank you so much for taking the time. I’m Roger Driscoll, I’m an independent AI researcher and data scientist.”

  “You come well recommended, Roger. This is Meifeng, my chief content officer. Your subject said ‘revolutionary tech’—I’m sure you realize we get pitches like this all the time. So far, none of them have worked out. Can you sketch out what you’re working on?”

  “Of course, and I’d love to give you a demo. As with most innovations, AntiVenom—that’s what I call it—builds on what others have done before. It’s a combination of technologies with a unique user interface that I think may finally solve the problem of overwhelmingly negative and fact-free discussions in omnipresence.”

  Meifeng smiled. “Oh, Roger, I can’t even count the number of times I’ve heard that before.”

  “Yes, I can imagine. DiscIQ is the largest discussion moderation service on the planet. You probably have dozens of your own people working on this as well. So what AntiVenom does is combine deep semantic content analysis algorithms with online fact-checking systems. I leveraged open source to start, then enhanced it with a reinforcement learning algorithm by playing it against known argumentative bots.

  “For the fact-checking systems, I’m using a half dozen services with a consensus voting algorithm. Wolfram Alpha and True appear to be the best of the bunch.”

  Ian interrupted. “True, that’s the crowd-sourced fact checker, right?”

  “Yes, that’s right. It has a deep knowledge representation system and avoids the classic binary true/not true problem by assigning probabilities to nodes in the knowledge graph. And it’s got a killer API.”

  “Okay,” said Meifeng, “we’ve seen tech like this used to analyze OP discussions. You mentioned a UI?”

  “Yes, that’s the key. Doing after-the-fact analysis of OP and publishing data about it doesn’t change anything, as you well know. The key is to inject it directly into the user experience. Here, I’ve sent you a link to a shared overlay. On the left is a typing area, like you’d have in DiscIQ. On the right is the AntiVenom display. Go ahead and type something on the left. Maybe start with a simple factual statement.”

  Ian brought up a virtual keyboard. He typed “Washington was the first President”. The first few words showed up in black on the left and right. But as he completed the word President the AV text converted to a green color. “Huh,” said Ian. He erased “first” and the text remained green. When he typed “second” in its place, the text converted to a dull red. Meifeng brought up a keyboard and typed “Washington was the best President”. The AV text was blue-green. “What’s the floating icon?” she asked.

  “Go ahead and tap it,” suggested Roger. Meifeng clicked and a small window appeared with two sources ranking Presidential accomplishments. “So straight facts go red/green and opinions are blue?”

  “Sort of. Opinions need to be based on facts. So they will tend blue-green or purple depending on whether they are well supported.”

  “That’s cool,” said Ian. “What about the sentiment analysis?”

  “Go ahead and type something friendly.” Ian entered “Roger is a great guy” into the window. On the right AntiVenom highlighted the text with a faint yellow glow.

  “The colors are all configurable, of course,” said Roger. “Try something mean.”

  Meifeng jumped in and typed, “You’re a nasty bitch”. The text on the right turned white and effectively disappeared against the background.

  “Here’s the idea,” said Roger. “You install AntiVenom into DiscIQ as a display option, but default it ON for all users. Then give this side-by-side window to people authoring content. As they type or speak nice, factual stuff their AV display will glow blue/green. If they just spew bile, it’s going to show up invisible. Readers will know they said something, and they’ll know it was negative, but they don’t have to read it.”

  “What about free speech?” asked Ian.

  “Well, the speech is there. You’re not blocking it. You’re just giving the readers of that speech an option to color it.”

  “That’s not going to stop the trolls out there from screaming bloody hell,” said Ian.

  “Still. Very interesting,” said Meifeng. “Of course, this all comes down to how accurate the system is. If it misclassifies all the time, people are going to get pissed off.”

  “Yes, true,” said Roger. “And p
eople may figure out ways to game the algorithm. It’ll be a bit of an arms race, but at least in the meantime people will see in real time what’s true, what’s propaganda, who’s civil and who’s a jerk.”

  “I like it,” said Ian. “Can we do an evaluation?”

  “Absolutely. My plan was to put it up on Tribal, open source. Get the world’s best working on it with me. I can make it a private repository to start and invite your team, just send me some public keys. We can do some iterations then go public. If you’d like, I can contact some smaller discussion moderators first, like a trial balloon?”

  Meifeng looked at her boss. “Let us evaluate it, Roger. But if this tech checks out, it’ll be more powerful if we adopt it. Smaller orgs may not have the resources to resist the backlash that’s sure to come.”

  “Are you saying you want it exclusive?”

  “Well,” said Ian, “I can’t deny that it would be one hell of a competitive advantage. But in this case, our whole damn industry is getting clobbered. I think we’re better off overall treating this like RealLife, a shared resource that makes omnipresence better for everyone.”

  “I like the sound of that,” said Roger, trying not to smile at the reference to RealLife, the technology his synth network had defeated. They finalized plans and signed off the holochat. He ordered a cup of tea from Rosie and smiled, recalling Sara’s words: Making the planet a better place to live and thrive.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  WASHINGTON - NOVEMBER 17

  Michele Rodriguez exited the Waymo and the Google nav program jumped to her smart contact lens to guide her the rest of the way. Even though it was chilly, she preferred to arrive invigorated from a brisk walk. Today would be one of her more challenging facilitations in many years, and one of the most important.

  Senator Harry Paxton’s chief policy aide Yumi had contacted her three weeks earlier, soon after Sara went viral. The notion of a small group of senators breaking through the gridlock paralyzing the government was appealing to her, and had worked well in the past. But with acrimony in Washington at yet another all-time high, she knew how difficult it would be to get even a small group to agree, let alone get the entire Congress to follow.

  Still, Michele was convinced it was the worth the effort, and she had prepared intensively for today’s session.

  She and Yumi had carefully selected a Gang of Six, aiming for a diversity of regions, ideologies, and important committee memberships. Michele had researched each of them in depth.

  Dylan Cipriani was the junior senator from New York and a member of the banking and commerce committees. He was a classic east coast liberal, focused on consumer protection and labor issues.

  Rebecca Matheson, Georgia’s senior senator and ranking member on the budget committee, was a social conservative and small-government deficit hawk.

  Liberal Emily McCutcheon of California chaired the health, education and labor committee and was also a member of the environment and public works committees.

  Zachary Keller from Kansas, leaning toward the libertarian wing of the Republican Party, was on finance and foreign relations.

  The group was anchored by Paxton himself and his colleague from Ohio, Esteban Hernandez, representing the budget, energy, transportation and communications committees. The two of them had jointly invited, cajoled, and arm-twisted the other four into attending, mostly by promising the utmost secrecy.

  There were still some moderates in Congress, in the No Labels and Third Path coalitions. But their numbers were small and their agendas limited. They had failed after twenty years of effort to gain any significant traction in a system of gerrymandered districts and unlimited campaign contributions. She and Yumi had agreed that it was best to start with senators not on the extreme wings of each party, but clearly identified as party stalwarts.

  The recent attacks in Missouri and North Carolina had almost derailed the meeting. But Michele, Yumi, and Esteban’s chief of staff had simply refused to let the participants off the hook when they called to try to get out of the meeting due to the “pressing national emergency.” None of them was particularly involved in homeland security, so it wasn’t too hard to stare them down.

  As part of her preparation, Michele had studied past bipartisan working groups. She’d even managed to track down some facilitators who had worked with them. She had mapped out the positions of the participants on key issues and analyzed their likely reaction to each of Sara’s ideas.

  As she walked the final block against a stiffening wind, her mind swirled with dozens of possible bargains and compromises the group might adopt.

  She arrived at the conference center on G Street at 7:30 a.m., half an hour before the scheduled start. After she checked in with the automated attendant, a wheeled robot emerged from behind the desk and guided her to the meeting room on the third floor. It was tastefully decorated, with plenty of high-tech meeting collaboration tools, as well as old-fashioned whiteboards and markers.

  “Is the room satisfactory?” asked the robot. “Is there anything else you need?”

  “The room looks fine. Please have all the meeting attendees wait in the lobby until everyone is present. Then show them in as a group.”

  “Of course. The attendant will buzz you as each person arrives. The lobby video feed is available on your console.”

  Michele arranged the seats and waited for the senators to assemble. After the sixth buzz from the attendant, she made her way to the double doors, which slid open as she approached. The robot led the silent group of four men and two women toward her. She sensed a combination of anxiety and resistance.

  “Senators, it’s a great honor to meet you. My name is Michele Rodriguez and I’ll be your facilitator today. Please come in and take a seat and we’ll get started.”

  She walked the length of the room to a podium. When she turned around, she was not surprised to see that they had sorted themselves by party at the two tables. The Democrats were on her left—Harry closest to her, with Dylan and Emily next to him. Zach, Rebecca, and Esteban faced them across a four-foot aisle.

  “I was so pleased to get a call from Senator Paxton’s office asking me to facilitate this session. What you six are here to discuss today is of vital importance to our nation.”

  Michele set her hands on the podium and leaned forward slightly. “I hope you’ll forgive me if I speak for just a minute about the ground rules for this meeting. You of course have seen that this is a principals-only session. There are no staff, no media, and I must insist on no recording devices. Just six of the most distinguished public servants in the United States Senate.”

  The six faces accepted the routine compliment with a practiced combination of gratitude and false humility.

  “Therefore, I request,” she said in a firmer tone, “that you avoid all the normal posturing, name-calling, grandstanding, and canned talking points I usually hear from all of you on the media.”

  The expressions on their faces froze in surprise, but they kept their composure.

  Michele continued, “I expect you to of course represent the people of your respective states,” she continued, “but I also need each of you to represent all the people of this great country—and all of their children, grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren to come. This meeting is about what kind of future they’re going to have in a world of ever-more-capable machines.

  “So please be honest and authentic in your conversation. Nothing said here will leave this room without consent from all of you.” She paused. “Do I have your agreement on this?”

  After a few beats of political calculation, her guests assented with quiet yeses and nods.

  “Thank you. Very well, let’s begin.

  “Our economy is producing incredible innovations and great wealth, but people are struggling to find stable jobs, unemployment is rising past eighteen percent, and wealth inequality is at record levels. Smart machines like the attendant and concierge you just interacted
with are getting more and more capable and taking more and more jobs away from people. Our country is in the grip of deep anxiety and we’re now seeing growing signs of social unrest. I want to start by hearing what you think we should be doing about this situation.”

  Dylan spoke up first. “Clearly our system has become unbalanced. There is too much power in the hands of the banks, corporations, and the very wealthy, and they have rigged capitalism in their favor, taking more and more of the economic pie. We need tougher regulation and new laws, making it easier for unions to organize workers and prevent these massive job losses. When we had strong unions, they were able to negotiate with management for more of the gains from productivity increases.” Michele saw Emily nodding in agreement, but noted a small frown on Harry’s face.

  Rebecca, seated directly across from Dylan, harrumphed with barely disguised contempt. “Oh, please,” she began. “More regulations and more unions? That’s exactly what’s stifling our businesses on the global stage, and exactly why they aren’t hiring more workers. It’s lack of competitiveness. We don’t need more government regulation and obstructionist unions. We need less regulation. Capitalism and technology have slashed global poverty and raised the standard of living for billions across the globe. We need to get government out of the way and let free markets work.”

  Harry held up his hand. “Wait a minute, Rebecca. While I agree that free markets and competition in the private sector drive innovation, they also lead inevitably to machines replacing people. Machines are getting smarter and more capable every year while their costs go down. People just can’t compete.”

  Zach interrupted. “That’s ridiculous. There are millions of job openings for highly skilled people. We need to give people the freedom to acquire the skills the market is demanding. We need to break up the government monopoly on education and give parents and students the choices they deserve.”

  “I’m more concerned about the parents who can’t find work that pays enough to support their families,” said Emily, “even though they’re both working multiple jobs. We need to raise the minimum wage so those parents can pay the rent and put food on the table.”