Barely Human

by Dhtreichler

  “Why didn’t you tell me this?” I am completely stunned by his admission, but it explains so much.

  “I counted on you being here, being you. I never thought you’d become what you are.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Barely human.”

  I’m stunned.

  NEWS

  I have to admit Rocky’s characterization of me as barely human has triggered introspection in the Googlecar on the way back to work. I didn’t know the reason he maintained his absentee parentism was because he thought Anna Laura was still there for both of us. As I think about it, she was. Only as time passed I no longer looked for her to comfort me, guide me and keep me on the straight and narrow path of life that would lead me to happiness.

  There it is. That one word. Happiness. When it was the four of us we lived in a state of happiness because Anna Laura ensured we were happy at least once every day. Rocky was happy with her and that was all he needed. When she disappeared from my life, the everyday happiness also disappeared. Is that what I’ve been searching for ever since? Someone who would ensure my happiness at least once a day? And is that why I’ve been so disappointed? Because I’ve not met that person? Anna Laura was… well, how do I describe her? I remember her hugs more than anything. The soapy smells and flowers and fruit of her shampoo. The touch of her as she would put ribbons in my hair. Her hand on my shoulder and the kisses behind my right ear. Why was it always the right ear? I don’t know. But I do know no one else has ever kissed me there.

  The window of the Googlecar beckons me. But all I can see is Anna Laura’s smile. Why is it the details have disappeared? I’m not even sure I remember the shade of her hair color. It was dark brown but was it chestnut or more earth tones? I have lost that detail. Why is it important to me now? I don’t know, but I wish I’d had my new memory when I was that age, so I’d have a clear picture of her. I don’t, and the pictures Rocky had taken of her were always… how do I describe this? Amateurish? That probably sums it up. She would have always moved from the pose Rocky was hoping to capture. She had moved on and Rocky was back someplace else. I think that describes their relationship as I perceived it at the time. She was way ahead of him, but it didn’t matter then. Rocky was the bread winner. He paid the bills and Anna Laura contributed to the vacations, the clothes for school and the lessons to learn how to be more skilled in athletics and coordinated through dance than we would have been absent the lessons and games we played.

  Barely human. Rocky perceived the exact concern Dr. Woodall voiced when I decided not to transition back. Why does everyone else see what I don’t? Maybe I’m too close to it all. And I’d just decided I was trying to read the future from the past. That doesn’t apply in the world we are about to enter with immortals changing the very nature of humanity. I don’t have much time to figure this all out. The first of the AppleCore immortals will be coming out of the surgical suites this week. And then the numbers will grow quickly. I need to get to Dr. Woodall early. Build in the humanization from the beginning. Those who are transitioning are expecting it. And I know from experience, the new you isn’t ready for them. That makes me think I need to have an orientation for the new immortals as they report into work afterwards. Talk with them about what I’ve already learned about the possibilities as well as the limitations. And the limitations are what concerns me most. Will they think the company has mislead them about what they are getting into? Will we find that some want to go back because of some limitation they had not expected? I did. I better figure out how we address these concerns right at the beginning rather than find we have immortals who aren’t happy with their life choices and becoming immortal is very much a life choice.

  I look out the window. I see a damask rose derived from rosa gallica and rosa moschata. The flowers are known for their fragrance, and harvested for rose oil and perfumes as well as rose water and herbal teas. Why do I care? Because I decided I wanted to know more about the roses I pass on my walks to and from work every day. But I’m not limited to just those walks. Any time I see a rose my mind is instantly filled with the information about that particular rose. Okay. Just go with it.

  Then it occurs to me that the people, and they are people, who are transitioning are like my roses. They will know more about certain subjects than they ever really wanted to know. But that’s part of the process of becoming immortal. Will I know more about roses than I want to know a thousand or million years from now? What else will I have learned in those time frames? Depending on your age we always have thought about the next ten to thirty years as the time frame after which we will have retired and need to not only support ourselves, but find interesting things to do. That time frame has now stretched into millions of years. How much will roses change over the next million years? Probably a lot. That means what I know today will become history and not inform me of what I’m looking at a million years from now.

  Come back to the present. I have immortals coming off the assembly line this week. What do I do with them? Are they doing this because they want to? Or are they transitioning because management expects them to if they are going to be promoted to the next level, or keep the job they have now? How much of their willingness is coerced rather than because they see this as something they want individually? As I think about Oriana, I don’t think she would transition if she felt free from coercion. She’d be Mom and Senior VP at the same time. That used to be an option, but it really isn’t in the new and emerging order. How is sexual coercion any different from coercion to transition? I will have to sleep with A’zam at some point. Is that sexual coercion or coercion to achieve a level of responsibility in the management of a major firm? Is what I’m going to experience any different than what I’m expecting of those who are making the ultimate sacrifice in becoming immortal? That sounds strange to me. Sacrificing to become immortal. How many would give anything to live forever? And yet I’m making it an expectation if my team leaders want to keep their jobs. Only because those who don’t transition will lose their jobs at AppleCore. They might find work at Symbol Ventures. But it will be short lived as we put them out of business.

  I am reminded that I’m making assumptions again. I assume with immortals in our leadership positions we will put Symbol Ventures out of business since their top people will simply not be able to keep up with our immortals. But from what I’m seeing, it will take a while for our immortals to be able to really make a difference. Until their teams are also transitioned, they may be well ahead of those who actually do the work. Great to have leadership ready to go. But if the teams aren’t, the result will be significant frustration on the part of those who have transitioned until their entire teams are ready to go. Some will pick up the pace. Others won’t until the whole team is in place. I have to adjust my expectations that we will have some teams accelerating their product introductions and others won’t for a while. But in the end, they will eventually catch up. We just have to be ready for the uneven implementation of our strategy.

  This makes me think our strategy of transitioning leaders first may not be a good idea. Maybe it would be better to transition a whole team at a time and get them up to speed quickly. Bring the next team up next. We would be getting maximum productivity out of a team rather than waiting for everyone to have a core capability that pushes the whole team over the tipping point. But that raises the issue of some coders being transitioned earlier than supervisors. It’s a class issue. Not a problem for those who are coding because they are going to another coding slot. But the supervisors won’t be happy that someone else’s team comes over before they do. How do I deal with perceptions?

  I need to think more about this whole issue of coercion. Are we really coercing our team leads? What do we tell them? We have the ability to be much more than we are today. Got that. Immortals will have all the domain knowledge and be able to apply it forever. Who can compete with that? Okay. Next selling point is we are going to make them immortal. No more doctors, no more air, no more sl
eep. When they aren’t at work they can party to their hearts content and not have to worry about getting someone pregnant in the process. Is that a male view? Maybe, but for all the women who become immortal the same applies. They won’t get pregnant and that is always a concern for a professional woman who is trying to establish a career. A child or two divides their attention. Some employers are okay with that while others aren’t. How does anyone move beyond that concern? Become an immortal because it goes away.

  But is that a good reason for someone to transition? You won’t get pregnant. No. Not a great or even good reason to transition. Transitioning should be all about leading the emerging new world order. But then I realize I got a seat at that table because I was the first. Then A’zam decided to make me important. Without both of those changes there was no chance I was going to keep a seat at this table. I was just another brick in the establishment wall. Deliver new products as fast as I can. If I succeed I can keep on doing it. If it doesn’t work out? Well, then I can always clean toilets at the railroad station. Just about fitting for someone who has ignored the common person most of my life in hopes of being aware of what forces are really driving society.

  I try to put myself into the shoes of those who will be coming back to Cupertino from Dallas, wide-eyed and trying to figure out how the changes are enabling and also limiting them. I’ve just walked those same roads. I’ve learned those lessons for me, but they won’t be coming back at anywhere near the same level I did. They will have management studying their every decision. I didn’t. Most didn’t even know what I’d done, let alone what to look for in evaluating my new level of performance. I wonder if we should do the same for these folks. Let them get back in the saddle. Interpret what the world expects versus what they can deliver. How far and how fast can they push their teams? I’m expecting that as many will be successful, we will find leaders who overstep, expecting their teams have to be at least as advanced as they are. Only the reality will be they are not. The expectation will impede the team’s performance until all members have been upgraded and adjusted to their new reality. A matter of weeks if history is any guide. So what do we do during this transition period? Let Symbol Ventures take over the market while we figure out how to get back in the game? No. We would never do that. What we will do is accelerate product releases as much as prudent, so Symbol Ventures will be distracted at the very time in which they need to be aware to change the world.

  What do I need to say to them? Those who are transitioning. This will be a great opportunity for you? Has it been for me? Yes, but I’m the first. Things will never be the same for anyone else. What I experienced is not what they will. The special considerations I’ve been given? They won’t benefit the same way I have. A matter of fate? Probably. I can’t help that I was the first. But they will all live and work as long as I will. Change? Yes, they will lead the change in what we contribute to the world as I will. The difference is they will all play subservient roles to what I will play. I get the benefit of the doubt. I was courageous. I went across when no one knew if I’d die on the operating table or end up the beneficiary of a whole new body and a reset on the mortality clock.

  There has to be something I can do for them that will make it all easier. Rocky said I’m barely human. I have to make sure they never feel that way. Do I? It changes from time-to-time. When I don’t feel anything in a situation I know I should, well, that is difficult. So far, I’ve relied on memories to get me through those situations. Acting in a manner that is consistent with my memories of how I or others I observed acted in similar situations. Did I blend in? I have no idea. Did I act appropriately? Apparently appropriately enough that others I heard did not remark upon how strange I’m acting.

  I can’t do anything about adding new sensors that will enable the new immortals to feel more than I do. What I do experience is memories. So how do I link memories with feelings? There has to be a way, but I have no idea and I’m supposed to be one of the smartest people on the planet at the moment. But that is about to change with the new immortals all being more current in their processors and memories than I am. I can always ask for an upgrade to become current, but that will only last just so long before I’m no longer current. Is that any different from everyone else? No. Everyone is current at a point in time when they have invested the time and energy to read everything and decide what is important and what is not. But that survey of the literature is time bounded. The currency is washed away in the tide of new information being delivered from the millions of sensors, computers and databases that are constantly looking for any entry opportunity.

  I know I’m not current. I’ve made a concerted effort to be. But there are so many issues I’m trying to address all at once. Staying current? Not likely. Too wide a domain of different sets of expertise. I try to process everything on any topic of interest. And even with my bandwidth so much wider than anything anyone else can deal with I’m still finding I can’t keep up. So how do all those folks who aren’t immortals keep up with the tidal wave of information that needs to be parsed and categorized so I can go find it when I need to? It’s never a question of have I absorbed all the information when it comes through. Instead the question is am I aware of the information and do I have any idea of where to go look to find the facts when I need them?

  And how do I help those who are transitioning stay or even become current? Not necessarily in all the information that anyone needs to know, but in the smaller set of information that is relevant to the decisions they have to make every day with their teams? With the teams that will accelerate the development of new capability to make humans the most advanced race in the history of mankind. We will do that in the short term. Of course, I’m looking at the short term as being the next ten or even twenty years. But after that? I don’t know. If in fact I’m looking at a million-year time frame, how do I have any idea how to approach that? How to be current with whatever my team leads know to be able to deliver the next capability that customers need even before they know it.

  How will the new immortals view all of those who are making the transition right behind them? Will they think they have seniority since they went through first? Or will they be open to the idea that the best and the brightest, no matter when they make the transition, shall rise to the top of the heap? History tells me those who go through first will want priority for the best jobs, regardless of their capabilities. I’m here first. I own this ground. You want to come aboard our ship? You need to get in line and work your way up, the same as we did. But no one really knows how the transition will affect different people and personality types. It may enhance some, but not necessarily others. I can see we will need to be able to adjust some folks in their assignments. Particularly if they aren’t getting results.

  History tells me that will be a problem. What do I do with someone who has been removed from a position and yet will live forever? Does that mean they will harbor a hatred of the company? One that demoted them a hundred centuries before? How long will such sentiments dictate the behavior of an increasing number of immortals? Does that mean we have to maintain law enforcement to keep disaffected immortals from disrupting the new society? Will it really be that much different from what we know today? I was all ready to make assumptions and suddenly realize I have no idea what to think about the future. It is unknown.

  Those who are making the transition have no idea what to expect. Will the immortal credential be like an MBA used to be for management? Those who had one got the job and those who did not remained in the core of also rans? No matter how good you were. The MBA can deliver results because they understand how the whole enterprise operates and all you know is your little sliver of the whole business. Those with broad perspectives can be expected to deliver superior results. But what most noticed is that domain expertise trumped broad understandings in most industries. Those who knew how to satisfy customers did better than those who understood how to downsize to the optimal revenue expense ratio.

  Is
that how immortals will play out in the coming world order? Doesn’t matter what they know. The fact they can process information so much faster is all that matters. The immortals can out think the mortals. At least they can get to a conclusion faster. Whether it’s the right conclusion is still up for debate. Social scientists used to give intelligence tests to prospective managers. Those who could correctly identify shape orientation patterns were valued as being able to arrive at the ‘right’ conclusion faster than those who did not. They were promoted to senior positions. But the history shows that they did not perform significantly better than those who were slower in their pattern recognition behavior. In fact, there was a growing debate about those who saw ‘alternative’ patterns quickly. What does it mean that you see the same pattern as the person who devised the test? If you see an alternative pattern does that mean you have better insight than those who take longer to see the ‘official’ pattern? That argument is still raging despite the fact I have to make a determination about who goes through the transition. Do I put through only the approved candidates or put through at least some of those who are quick to recognize different patterns? Since I never went through that testing I have no idea how to respond to the problem of who gets selected. My first thought had been to just put through the current supervisors. They were put into the role as a result of their ability to deliver results. Should that be enough? Or are the social scientists sufficiently far along that they have found something in the data that management has not seen over all these decades? The current process is to put supervisors through first. But now maybe a whole team should go through together. In that case I need to rethink that. Some of the team members who have tested have shown their capability to lead the team. Promoting them afterwards will be easy. I need to pull the data. Identify those who have the potential. Make sure they will have a chance to show their ability. But at the same time, don’t handicap those who have shown they are very traditional. That term almost seems prejudicial. Traditional. I’m not traditional by any stretch of the imagination.