by Steven James
“Who would hack into your files?”
“The government is everywhere.”
“You’re paranoid.”
“Prudent is the term I prefer.”
He’s running his finger along the contents of his filing drawer, obviously looking for something in particular. “So, The Singularity . . .” He finds a folder, tosses it onto the table, and flips it open. “Here.” He points to a printout of a 2004 article from Christianity Today titled “The Techno Sapiens Are Coming,” and a 2012 article from the Smithsonian: “How to Become the Engineers of Our Own Evolution.”
“Let’s see,” he begins, “how to explain this . . . The word singularity relates to one thing in mathematics and in astrophysics—I’m not even exactly sure, something to do with event horizons, I think—but anyway, in relationship to transhumanism, it means something completely different, or, well, maybe the same, if you’re talking about an event after which you cannot predict what is going to happen.”
“Xav, you haven’t even started yet and you’re already losing me.”
“Okay. I’m not even sure there’s an agreed-upon definition, but basically it’s the moment in the future, by maybe the midpoint in the century—some people say it’s hypothetical, others inevitable—but the moment in history when several things converge: advancements in reverse engineering the human brain, nanotechnology, genetic research, information technology, and robotics . . . um . . .” He’s really struggling here and that surprises me. It’s just not like Xavier. Honestly, I find it somewhat unsettling.
“Focus, Xav.”
“Right.” He takes a breath. “The Singularity is really the moment when these converging technologies create a tipping point after which our understanding of what it means to be human will be irrevocably changed. It’s when machines reach strong AI—that is, they’re able to have emotional intelligence, language acquisition, and pattern recognition on the same level as human beings.”
“So, when machines become self-aware? What? Skynet? A Terminator scenario?”
“Well, no one really knows what it would look like if machines were to become self-aware, or what might happen if they do. They could very well feel threatened by humans, and if they were allowed to make decisions, then an artilect war is not out of the question.”
“An artilect war?”
“Artificial intellect. There’s always the possibility that an artilect just wipes us out.”
Now, that sounded more like the Xavier I know and love. “Okay, gotcha.”
“No, it’s not as far-fetched as you might think. When machines are able to do everything that we can do, but trillions of times faster and better than we can, we might become irrelevant.”
“They won’t make love better than we do.”
A beat. “Okay, I’ll give you that, but if machines decide we’re getting in the way, they might just decide to eliminate us.”
“When they become self-aware.”
“Yes, or when they’re given autonomy, the opportunity to make decisions without human involvement, especially when they have access to weapons systems.”
My friend is able to angle almost any conversation back to his theories about the research going on at Groom Lake. “Like the Air Force tests out at Area 51?”
He taps a finger against the air to accentuate his agreement. “Precisely. Think about it. Today, if a drone identifies a target, a human operator needs to make the decision to fire. Well, what if we fed even more algorithms into the machine and gave it more parameters and data and so on, and then allowed it to fire when a certain level of certainty or verification was reached.”
“You mean it makes the decision to fire.”
He tilts his head back and forth as if he’s having an internal debate about how to answer me. “That’s probably looking at things more anthropocentrically than necessary. The point at which a machine can make a decision the way we understand making a decision is still a ways out, but for all practical purposes, yes. It makes the decision to fire.”
“That could never happen. You’ll always need humans to make the final decisions. Autonomous machines?” I shake my head. “It seems far-fetched.”
“What about airplanes that can land on autopilot? Or the self-driving cars Google invented? They got the first driverless license in the country right here in Nevada a couple years ago. Or Israel’s Iron Dome? Or other missile defense systems that identify missiles without humans in the loop? The only link in the chain that’s missing is a weapons system that fires at a human target without human authorization. Besides, we already depend on autonomous decisions by machines for our livelihood.”
“How’s that?”
“On the stock market. We let them do our trading for us. It’s all done through algorithms humans plug into computers. The firm with the best algorithms and the fastest computer wins. It’s not even free trade, it’s hardly capitalism since people aren’t using capital to trade but are entrusting their money to computers. And it’s impossible to regulate because you can tell everyone to only trade at a certain speed, but you can’t regulate that. You can only encourage it. It’s too late. You can’t undo what we’ve done. The only hope would be to set up limits not at the source but at the destination.”
“The actual stock exchange itself.”
“Yes. Somehow find a way to regulate the speed at which transactions of any one computer or computer system can trade. But no one’s even suggesting that. It’s not a matter of if machines will have a meltdown sell-off like they did in 2008, it’s when it’ll happen again.”
I’m not excited about the fact that he’s making some pretty valid points. “I think we’re getting a little off track here. Get back to transhumanism.”
He digs through a file cabinet, and I’m not sure how he could possibly know what he’s looking for, but he comes up with a file of papers and spreads it out on the table.
“How do you keep this stuff organized anyhow?”
He taps his head. “A steel trap.”
“With a little rust. I mean, that comes naturally with age.”
“A touch, perhaps.”
He walks directly to a stack of papers beside his bed and shuffles through them. “Right now we’re seeing exponential technological breakthroughs in bioengineering, gene therapy, synthetic biology, medicine, and nanotechnology. According to Moore’s Law, which is a way of understanding the exponential growth in technology, the performance will continue to go up even as the price plummets—which has held true for the last forty years . . .”
He’s flipping through the pages. “Even as some scientists are working at reverse engineering the human brain—which will happen within the next twenty years—other scientists are developing never-before-imagined nanotechnology applications and virtual reality interfaces. Within a few decades we’ll be able to upload information directly to the human brain.”
“Is that transhumanism?”
“Partly, yes. We’re already merging more and more with nonbiological intelligence through neural implants and brain-to-machine interfaces. Eventually there’ll be no going back.”
“So we’re going to become cyborgs?”
He’s quiet for a moment.
“That’s not seriously what you’re telling me here.”
“It’s already happening—cochlear implants, bionic eyes, artificial limbs, synthetic organs, deep-brain stimulation, the next generation of brain-imaging technology—”
“Okay, okay.” I hold up my hands. “I hear you. So, The Singularity is when humans are able to do what? Upload their consciousness onto a computer?”
“If desired.”
“I’m still not sure I get the transhumanism part.”
“The more we augment or enhance humans, at a certain point we may be more machine than biological entity, and even the biological part will be enhanced by gene therapy and genetic manipulation.”
He reflects on that for a moment. “The big question at this point is really where you draw
the line between augmentation and enhancement—or even if you should draw any line at all. For example, having glasses to augment your seeing, or wearing a hearing aid, or maybe having an artificial leg. That’s all acceptable.”
“And you’re saying transhumanists want to take things further?”
“Exactly. From augmentation to enhancement. We use binoculars to see infrared, why not just give people the ability to do so? We use cars to travel at higher speeds than we can on our own, why not just merge people with Segways that let them do so themselves while preserving the planet’s limited supply of fossil fuels? Through xenotransplantation we can—” He catches himself and explains before I have to ask him what that means: “The transfer of genetic or organic material between members of different species.”
“Splicing genes of other species into humans?”
“Yeah, it’s coming.”
Though I don’t doubt this aspect of what he’s saying, it still unnerves me. It brings up images of the grisly experiments on the fictional island of Dr. Moreau.
Maybe it isn’t so fictional after all.
He goes on, “There isn’t even consensus today among biologists about what specifically constitutes Homo sapiens. Some scientists think we should drop the whole concept and see ourselves not as different or unique within the biological world, but simply a fluid moment in the ongoing evolutionary process. Xenotransplantation is going to blur the lines about what it means to be human even further—how much augmentation is acceptable. I mean, right now you’ve already got a debate going about cyberorganisms, synthetic biology, cloning, animal and android rights—so when computers reach strong AI, what kinds of rights should they have? Are they living, even though they’re not biological? Do we have to redefine what it even means to be alive?”
“Android rights?”
“An android is a robot that looks human, a cyborg is a human that is part robot.”
“Okay. And they have rights?”
“Well, that’s what’s being debated—if self-aware machines deserve the right to life, the right to never be unplugged or destroyed.”
This is all a little more than I’m ready to process at the moment. I take out my Morgan Dollar and start flipping it through my fingers, something I tend to do when I’m deep in thought. “And you honestly think the government is doing this? Is developing these autonomous weapons, or is maybe wanting to enhance soldiers like this?”
“They’ve already admitted that they are.”
“Not publicly, though, right?”
He scratches his chin as if he’s trying to figure out where to start. “Okay,” he mumbles. “‘Technology Horizons.’”
He goes to the bottom drawer of his filing cabinet, yanks it open, and within seconds locates what he’s looking for. He reads the title: “‘Technology Horizons: A Vision for Air Force Science & Technology 2010–2030. Air Force document, AF/ST-TR-10-01-PR.’ It was released back in May of 2010.” He shoves the printout across the table toward me. It’s several hundred pages thick. “You take this one. See what you can figure out.”
I look at it unenthusiastically. “We need to be at the Arête by one.”
He pulls up a report of his own, a printout called “Losing Humanity: The Case against Killer Robots” from a 2012 Human Rights Watch proposal, evidently to ban robots that could fire without humans in the loop.
“Well then”—he picks up a highlighter from a pencil holder on the countertop—“we better get started.”
Lipstick
Roger Yarborough woke up in his hotel room, groggy and feeling a little heavy all over, as if he were on a planet where everything weighs twice what it does on earth. His sheets were a mess. He was dressed only in a pair of underwear.
He rubbed his hand against his forehead and took a long, deep, clear-your-head-in-the-morning breath.
Definitely too many cocktails last night.
Hungover, okay, yes. But there was something else, something vague that came back to him, like a memory on the edge of memories, as if he were trying to make out a shape encircled in mist but not quite being able to.
A figure walking with him. Foggy, but that much was clear.
A woman.
Yes.
The memory had to do with a woman, that much he could tell. He couldn’t picture her face or even remember what she wore, but he did recall meeting her and coming back to the room with her and then . . .
Oh.
No.
Immediately, he went to his wallet to see if he might have been robbed after he passed out, but all his credit cards and even his cash were there. The cash surprised him since, had she been a hooker, he imagined he would have paid her before they got started, or at least she would have taken her payment with her when she left.
As all those thoughts rolled through his mind, he found himself staring blankly at his wedding ring.
He’d kept it on last night. He didn’t always do that, but he hadn’t been planning on picking anyone up when he left his hotel room.
Then again, it was Vegas.
Not quite subconsciously, he covered the ring with his other hand.
Roger traveled a lot, was gone on business nearly every week, so, sure, he’d had a few nights over the years that he hadn’t spent alone in his hotel room. Maybe more than a few. Nobody could begrudge him that. He was just a normal guy with needs that had to be met.
But last night, whether or not he’d brought the woman whom he vaguely remembered back to his room—well, he couldn’t be sure about that one way or the other.
Leaving the wallet on the dresser, he walked to the bathroom to splash some cold water on his face.
As soon as he flicked on the lights, he saw the sentence written in lipstick on the mirror: Go home to your wife, Roger.
For a long and unsteady moment he stood there staring at the words.
So he had brought a woman back here last night after all. And she hadn’t robbed him, but instead she’d left this message for him.
How much did you tell her about Janice?
He didn’t know, couldn’t remember, wasn’t sure he wanted to.
Roger had no idea what he might have done with the woman before she left, or how long she might have been here in the room with him, or who she was, and despite himself he felt a lump form in his throat.
He thought of his three children at home with Janice, his wife of nine years, what she would think if she saw these words, what his children would think if they knew what their daddy had done last night and done all too often on those other nights on his business trips. They didn’t know about sex yet, but they did know that a mommy and a daddy are supposed to be with each other. And only each other.
Wetting a washcloth, he worked at removing the lipstick. It came off easier than he thought it would, but even after it was gone, it wasn’t gone. He still saw the words as clearly as before, hovering in front of him, written, as it were, across his reflection like scarlet letters etched on his chest, and he wondered if he would see them every time he looked into a mirror.
Go home to your wife, Roger.
His eyes went back to his wedding ring.
Go home.
To your wife.
He had a decision to make.
And he did. He kept the ring on, and he vowed he was going to be able to stare into a mirror again and not be afraid to look himself in the eye.
“What do you mean it wasn’t there?” the voice on the phone said.
“It wasn’t there. I tore that place apart, and the information isn’t on the hard drive. I’ve been scouring through it since I got it from the house.”
“You know how small a USB drive is. You can hide one just about anywhere.”
Silence. “He might have had it with him.”
“I’m not ready to depend on what might have happened.”
“Someone else showed up before I could finish.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t
know.”
“No. They must have called 911. By the time I circled back to the house, the cops were there.”
“I know some people in the department. I should be able to find out the number they called in from. That’ll lead us to the person who made the call.”
“Yeah, they might have the drive, but—”
“You’re going to have to pay them a visit to find out.”
“This is out of my league. You just told me I needed to check the house.”
“I told you that you needed to retrieve the files.”
“I’m not the right guy to—”
“Remember the photos I sent you.”
A pause. “Yes.”
“Don’t make the mistake of assuming that I will be reticent to post them online, as I spoke with you about earlier. I’m a resolute man.”
This stretch of silence was the longest one so far. Finally the reply came: “How much latitude do I have in . . . obtaining the information?”
“Right now the only thing that matters is retrieving those files. I don’t care how you go about doing it.”
“Okay, I’ll take care of it.”
“Yes, I know you will.”
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Two formidable Hispanic men met Colonel Byrne at the curb outside baggage claim. One of them was a medium-height, wide-bodied brute, thick and muscular. The other was at least six foot six and had a flat and pockmarked face that made it look like he’d run face-first into a brick wall at some point in his life and never quite recovered.
The colonel carefully set the suitcase in the back of the SUV, then took a seat inside the vehicle.
Each of the men wore jackets, but Derek could see tattoos on both of their left wrists. From his work in the military he recognized the Hezbollah insignias.
It didn’t surprise him that the men were inked like they were. Over the last fifteen years Hezbollah, the Mujahideen, and Iran had developed a complex, mutual web of arms dealing, military tactics training, and intelligence sharing with the cartels of South and Central America.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend—it has been an operating principle of unlikely bedfellows for millennia. And the enemy of their enemy was America.