by Erik Hamre
“We don’t know. But that is what the data is telling us right now. The methods Cronus is currently utilising to hack our systems is significantly less sophisticated than the methods it used only four hours ago.”
The general laughed. “It’s playing dumb.”
“It could be. It could also be caused by other things.”
“What things?”
“When I authored Protocol Cronus, the theory of an intelligence explosion was just that, a theory. We didn’t know if it was going to happen or not. Maybe there exist physical restrictions on how smart a machine can get? Like any other theory we will have to wait to see if the theory matches up with reality. We now have preliminary data. And they point to the idea that Cronus has already peaked. That it has stopped improving. That it is in fact going backwards.”
“How is that even possible?”
“Cronus appears to have been designed to evolve like a human brain; through learning and adaptation. It might get smarter over time, but it might also go backwards. If it is focusing too much on irrelevant data, that learning might not directly result in an improvement in the way it approaches hacking problems.”
“So you are saying it is not focusing enough? It is getting dumber because it is not paying attention?”
“I’m saying it is not focusing on improving its hacking skills. It must be allocating most of its resources to improving other aspects of what it is doing.”
“And what could that be?”
“We don’t know yet. But it would indicate that it doesn’t have any bad intentions towards humans. It might not have wanted to access our nuclear weapons systems to launch an attack. It might just have wanted to access them to learn about us.”
“Well, it will learn not to fuck with us. In five hours those nukes will detonate. Dumb or smart, it will be gone. So pack up your stuff, Kraut. You’re all being evacuated to a safe place. Once all the power goes out, this won’t be a place you would want to be.”
“We’ll stay. We’ll take our chances,” Kraut responded.
The general put his hands on his hips, and raised an eyebrow. “Are you speaking for everyone?”
The members of Team Cronus nodded in unison. That was the moment they all felt the same. They all felt they were history’s last line of defence.
Even though they knew they wouldn’t be able to stop the nukes from destroying Cronus, and killing billions of people in the process, they knew they had a responsibility to history to find out why Kevorkian had created Cronus.
It wasn’t a rescue mission anymore. It was a recovery mission. Recovery of information.
How could one expect future generations to act differently if they didn’t understand why Kevorkian had built the first Artificial Super Intelligence in the first place?
“It’s your call. We leave in five minutes. There won’t be any other evacuation teams coming for you. This is your last chance.”
“We’ll stay,” Vladimir said, and then simply turned around to continue working on the computer.
“Very well,” the general nodded, before turning to leave. He then seemed to hesitate for a second before turning to face Kraut and the team again. “You’ve heard the latest news about Kevorkian, haven’t you?”
“What news? We haven’t received any updates since yesterday.”
“He’s still alive. But he’s had several more strokes. It doesn’t look good, that’s for sure.”
“Why have they stopped sending me updates?”
The general shrugged his shoulders. “Everything is breaking down at the moment. People deserting to be with their families. It’s a bit of chaos to be honest.”
“Do they know which areas of Kevorkian’s brain have been damaged?” Vladimir asked.
“I’ve got no idea,” the general responded.
“Do you know what time the strokes occurred?”
The general shook his head. “I only know the outlook is not good. The message I got was that even if he wakes up, he won’t be able to speak. He’ll be a vegetable.”
“Did the strokes damage his Broca Area?” Vladimir asked.
“Broka what?”
“The left frontal lobe. It’s the area that controls speech.”
“I don’t know,” the general answered.
Kraut looked over at Vladimir. “What are you thinking, Vladimir?”
“I might be wrong, but maybe there is a perfectly good reason Cronus won’t communicate with us. Maybe there is a perfectly good reason it doesn’t seem to get any smarter.”
48
3rd of June 2015
Kevorkiana HFT’s HQ
Silicon Valley, California
DAY 3:
0600 Hours
The day after Neuralgo Inc had successfully mapped the last percent of Kevorkian’s brain, Vladimir had been sitting in the office by himself. It was a Saturday morning, and the rest of the team had been told to take the weekend off - the first weekend off in months for most people. Vladimir hadn’t felt like taking the day off though. He hadn’t been sure what he had felt like.
Many top athletes claimed they felt empty when they finally achieved their goals. Perhaps they had sacrificed the best part of their life to get to a point in their career where they could hold a medal above their head for four minutes as the national anthem was being played? Perhaps they hadn’t been able to party with friends or study what they wanted at university? Life was always about sacrifices, and the ones willing to sacrifice the most were often the most successful. It was one of the reasons there were so many with Asperger’s Syndrome on Neuralgo’s payroll. It wasn’t just intelligence that was needed to be a good employee at Neuralgo; you needed to be single minded, to maintain a single minded focus for years, to not let temporary defeats bring you down or set you back.
Vladimir’s social life had practically been non-existent since he started working for Neuralgo. He didn’t have a single friend outside work, and he wasn’t even sure if he had that many friends inside Neuralgo either.
He was after all the boss.
And that role would always define him.
His only true friend had been Andrew Kevorkian - his own boss.
The guy who had brought Vladimir to America and practically invented his entire life.
Knowing that the engineering team had finally achieved the goal of mapping Kevorkian’s brain should have filled Vladimir with pride and joy. It was the culmination of all his hard work. He had finally done something important, something most people hadn’t even thought possible.
It should have been the happiest day of Vladimir’s life.
Instead it had been the saddest.
Much like Kevorkian had felt empty when he finally took TrakTek public, Vladimir had felt empty when he realised his work at Neuralgo was coming to an end.
Neuralgo would still exist. Vladimir estimated it would take years, maybe decades, to discover all the secrets and intricacies of the brain. Their real work had just begun.
But for Vladimir it was already over. He felt burnt out.
Depressed.
He had studied an image of one of the billions of individual neurons inside Kevorkian’s brain. They had now mapped every neuron, but they still didn’t know exactly what any of them did, or why they did what they did. Or why the same neuron would do a different thing in a different brain.
What they had was a blueprint of a brain, but a blueprint only gave you so much information. What did they really have? Would they ever be able to wake up the copy of Kevorkian’s brain? And if so, what would happen to Kevorkian’s real brain? Would it be possible to have two identical brains operating in the same universe?
Vladimir had often spent hours upon hours pondering those sorts of questions. If he were to gradually replace every single neuron inside Kevorkian’s brain with a microchip, when would Kevorkian cease being Kevorkian, and the artificial Kevorkian take over? Would there ever even be such a moment?
When the general had informed the team that K
evorkian had suffered several more strokes an idea had formed in Vladimir’s head. What if Kevorkian’s brain was still somewhat connected to the artificial copy? It didn’t make any sense, because they should be totally separate things. But this was the first time in history somebody had actually made a copy of a human brain. He had to be open to the possibility that he knew nothing. He couldn’t afford to dismiss any ideas. Not even the crazy ones.
He had to be open for everything.
“We need to get the exact times of Kevorkian’s various strokes,” Vladimir said to the general.
“I don’t have that. You will need to contact the hospital.”
“We don’t have access to the hospital,” Vladimir replied.
“Then I can’t help you.”
“I know who we can ask,” Kraut said.
“Would anybody care to let me know what is going on?” Amanda asked.
“I think there may still be a connection between Kevorkian’s real brain and the artificial one.”
“You mean that’s the reason Cronus seems to have gone backwards over the last few hours?”
“It could be. It could also explain why Cronus is not able to communicate with us in traditional ways. If one of the strokes has caused damage to his Broca area, then it could also have damaged Cronus’ ability to communicate properly.”
“That doesn’t make any sense, Vladimir. Cronus doesn’t need to communicate verbally. It could communicate through a million other ways if it wanted to.”
“We don’t know how the brains would be connected, or if they are at all. At this stage we have to be open to the possibility that there is a connection though. And that the strokes could have had an effect on Cronus.”
“And the times of the strokes would confirm this?”
“Not confirm it. But they might give us an indication that there is a link. If the times of the various strokes coincide with the times of Cronus hacking through our firewalls, then we should be able to conclude there is some connection. We know from the video footage at the casino that Kevorkian raises his hand to his head shortly after sending the text message that triggered Cronus. We also know that Kevorkian most likely had another stroke several hours before he collapsed mid-air, thus it could coincide with the second attack. If the exact time of each attack matches up with a stroke it is highly unlikely it is just a coincidence.”
“I agree. And we would then have three reference points connected to Cronus.”
“What’s the third one?”
“Kevorkian’s GPS receiver. The timing of the last ping corresponds with Cronus’ attacks on our systems.”
“Only when it attempted to access the nuclear weapons though.”
“That’s correct. So there has to be a connection between the nuclear weapons control systems, Cronus, the keyring, and Kevorkian’s brain.”
“The times correspond,” Kraut hollered from across the room. He had just called a friend in the CIA, and received a copy of Kevorkian’s updated medical file. The general had been correct. Kevorkian had suffered several strokes in the last forty-eight hours, and the timing of each one could be traced back to one of Cronus’ attacks.
“So what does all this mean?” the general asked.
“It means we may have found a new way to kill Cronus,” Kraut responded.
49
3rd of June 2015
The White House bunker
Washington DC
DAY 3:
0630 Hours
The US President studied the report from Team Cronus with interest. It wouldn’t change the outcome for the world. Its fate was already sealed. There was no way of stopping the nuclear bombs already orbiting in space. But if killing Andrew Kevorkian could ensure that Cronus would be gone forever then that was a very tempting proposition. Through the Extinction Event Directive the President had the authority to make the call - to order the execution of Andrew Kevorkian. But it didn’t seem appropriate to order the death of an American citizen without a fair trial. The President had only a few months earlier made the most important decision in the history of humankind. He had chosen to potentially sacrifice billions of people in order to ensure the certain survival of the human race. He would forever be remembered for this single decision. Everything else he had done in his life would become irrelevant, and his name would live on for eternity. He now had an opportunity to either ruin or cement the legacy he left behind. If he just ordered the execution of an American citizen without a fair trial he was certain that history would judge him harshly. Like it or not; history judged the taking of lives differently, depending on the context. In 1939 the biologist Jean Rostand wrote ‘Kill one man, and you are a murderer. Kill millions of men and you are a conqueror. Kill them all, and you are a god.’ The President had pondered that statement for a long time before signing off on Protocol Cronus. According to Rostand’s quote there was not even a definition for what he was about to become, it was somewhere in between being a conqueror and a god. Killing billions of humans in order to save humanity would never be accepted by those who lost their loved ones. But history would judge him differently over time. In a couple of generations people would be able to look beyond the immediate suffering. They would be able to look at the big picture.
If the President ordered the execution of Andrew Kevorkian without a fair trial though, his reputation would never recover. History would forever remember him as a simple murderer.
“I want to have Andrew Kevorkian tried for treason immediately. I want to have him tried and convicted before the nukes detonate,” the President said. It was his only option. If he could get the court to hand down a death sentence before the nukes went off, then he could ensure that Kevorkian was dead by the time the world lost electricity.
By the time everything turned dark.
“You shouldn’t have told him,” Vladimir said, struggling to conceal the fact that his eyes were watery.
“I had to. Anything else would have been treason. The President had the right to know.”
“So now they’re just going to kill him?”
“I don’t know what the President is going to do, Vladimir. But I do know we owe it to the man who is about to sentence billions of people to certain death to know what he has done, to know everything.”
“What if killing Andrew doesn’t help? What if his brain is not connected to Cronus after all? Or even worse; what if killing Kevorkian will set Cronus free? What if the only thing stopping Cronus from getting smarter is Kevorkian being still alive?”
“How could that be possible?”
“What if Kevorkian is still conscious? What if his mind is fighting Cronus as we speak, regretting ever letting it loose?”
“You’re grabbing at straws, Vladimir.”
“Perhaps. But it could explain the GPS coordinates and Kevorkian’s strange betting at the casino.”
“How?”
“Think about it. If Kevorkian wanted to build a failsafe, he would have had to do it in a way in which other people than him would be able to access it. We have been thinking about Kevorkian’s strokes as a side-effect of Cronus firing off all its neurons to hack the firewalls. What if Cronus is doing it on purpose? What if it is deliberately overloading the system to cause Kevorkian strokes?”
“You mean it is attempting to kill him?”
“That’s exactly what I mean. If the President orders Kevorkian’s death, he might actually be doing Cronus’ work for him.”
“So what would the GPS coordinates and the casino bets then mean? And how would Kevorkian have been able to know we would pick up the GPS receiver?”
“He didn’t have to. The GPS coordinates are the clue. Kevorkian said that Cronus would shut down the moment it had completed its mission. If we find out what those GPS coordinates really mean, then we might be able to turn it off. We might be able to finish Cronus’ mission, and thus shut it down.”
“Doesn’t really matter anymore though, does it? The nukes will still go off. Our world will sti
ll return to the 18th century.”
“Not necessarily. I think Kevorkian may have shown us his hand when he let Cronus access the GPS receiver.”
“How so?”
“The GPS transmitter lodged in Kevorkian’s son’s neck didn’t send any signal until three years ago, right?”
“Correct. That’s when Sarah said Kevorkian received the first ping.”
“And that transmission, and every one thereafter, originated from remote locations in the Atlantic and the Pacific Ocean.”
“Correct.”
“When we redirected the satellite to the location of the last transmission we only had a thirty-minute delay before we received live video feed. And still, there was nothing there.”
“I don’t understand where you are going with this,” Kraut said, impatiently.
“We didn’t see anything because there was nothing to see. And the fact that there was nothing to see means that the signal could never have been sent from that specific location. A GPS signal requires a clear line of sight to the satellite, right?” Vladimir asked, before grabbing a marker and starting to scribble on the whiteboard. It was the only thing he had insisted they bring along when deciding to make Kevorkiana HFT’s premises their new command control.
“What are you drawing?” Amanda asked.
“There is a theory that our brains might actually hold the secrets to quantum computing. When we mapped the last few million neurons in Kevorkian’s brain I have to admit I still had no idea how it all worked. The human brain was quite possibly an even bigger mystery for our team after we had seen how it worked than before we started our project. But one of the things we did notice was that even though the brain is quite slow - it is also quite fast. All the neurons are capable of firing simultaneously and instantly. If Kevorkian’s brain and Cronus were connected, then there would be no delay in the communication between them. Everything that happened to one part would happen to the other, and it would all happen instantaneously. There would be no need for a clear line of sight between them.”