Evolution 2.0: The Singularity is Here

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Evolution 2.0: The Singularity is Here Page 9

by Richard Childers


  Bob Fincher entered the conversation saying, “We think we can use this technology in our efforts to build a better artificial limb. To that end, we need to create a facility much like this one that will allow us to machine parts from plastic and metals and build parts, both solid and biological, using 3D printers. I would like to duplicate this operation within our facilities. Renee, did you have a consultant work with you in the conceptualization and design of this facility?”

  “We did,” Renee answered. “He’s in LA. Would you like me to send you his contact information?”

  “Fincher replied, “Please do. Now, let’s discuss how we can operate while we set up our own facility. What would it take for us to be able to work here?”

  “In this facility?” Renee asked. “I’m afraid that’s not going to be possible. This is a test and research facility. We don’t work on commercial projects at all.”

  “This is a research project,” Fincher persisted. “What would it take to get approval for our working here for a few months?”

  “I’m not really sure. That’s a bit above my pay grade.”

  Fincher thought for a moment and then he said “Sancy, please get me Carl Bass on the phone?”

  Renee’s eyes bugged out a bit at this and she asked, “Who is Sancy”

  Sancy answered her saying, “Hi Renee. We weren’t introduced. I’m Colin’s administrative assistant. I’m afraid I’m a bit physically handicapped but I stay connected by wireless. Please hold for Mr. Bass.”

  A voice appeared as if from nowhere, “Hey Bob. It’s been a long time. Last time I saw you I took you for a couple of hundred bucks on the golf course.”

  “You were lucky. I’ve got a favor to ask. I’m down here at Pier 9 at your wonderful facility. I have a project that is a perfect application for your printing technology and I’m going to be setting up something very similar to this but it’s going to take a few months to get up and running. Any chance we could work out of here in the interim? I know it’s against policy but I thought I would ask.”

  “I don’t see why not. Tell you what, if you’ll see if you can integrate one of your AI engines with SPARK, I’ll give you full access to Pier 9. That work for you?”

  “Perfect. Why don’t you and your wife join me for a sail next weekend?”

  “We’d be delighted. I don’t think she’s ever been aboard the Napenthe,” Bass replied.

  “I’ll have Sancy get in touch with you to make the arrangements. Thanks Carl. See you next weekend.” The phone connection clicked off.

  Renee was staring at Fincher with rather big eyes. She gulped and said, “I guess that’s not above his pay grade. Welcome aboard Mr. Fincher.”

  “Please, call me Bob. I’m not big on formality. Now, how about lunch? The Waterfront Restaurant next door serves a great Cioppino. Will you all join us?”

  Of course they all did join us. Apparently Sancy had called ahead because when we arrived we were immediately shown to a banquet table set up in their outdoor dining area. The food was delicious and Fincher hadn’t exaggerated a bit about the cioppino. It was superb. When the meal was over they had to roll us back into the bus for our ride home. It had been quite a day.

  Chapter 8

  Our next design review meeting was a bit of a madhouse. Up until that point, our assumption was we were going to focus on the control aspects of the artificial arm problem using someone else’s prosthesis. When everyone had gathered together, poured a cup of coffee, and selected a pastry from the tray I had picked up on the way to work, I dropped the bomb on them. “I think we should design and build an entirely new arm. Even if we succeed in every way on our original plan, what we will have is a clunky arm with greatly improved control. I think we can do better. Actually, after our visit to Autodesk’s Pier 9 labs and a considerable amount of research, I think we can do a lot better.”

  “I never much liked any of those powered arms much anyway,” Claire commented.

  “Neither did I,” I answered. “I just didn’t know we had a viable alternative. I believe we can build a new arm out of living tissue and a titanium skeletal structure. Jay is ready to start printing artificial neurons. Stem cell based muscle tissue has already been printed at Harvard. So have functional veins and arteries. We’ll have to come up with something to use as tendons and ligaments but that shouldn’t be too hard. I think we can do this all by using existing cutting edge technology and a zillion dollars of Fincher’s money.”

  Bob smiled and said, “I’m glad I can be of some assistance.”

  “I hate to be a doubter,” said Louis, “but none of this stuff has been tested. It’s not cleared for human use. How do we get around that?”

  “We’re not using it in a human body, we’re using it to build an artificial arm. It’s splitting hairs but I think we can get away with it.” Holding up my plastic arm I said, “If this works, it won’t be giving people like me a better prosthesis. We’ll be getting a new arm. Now that would be something. What do you think, Bob? Are you up to raising the bar a bit?”

  “Of course I am. In many ways, you’ve already accomplished more than I originally envisioned. If you all have the vision, I’ve got the money. Go for it.”

  “So what’s your plan, Boss?” asked Claire.

  “I want to start by inviting the top researchers in the field to come here for a quick mini-conference. We’ll fly them in first class, put them up at a good hotel, and feed them great food while we pick their brains as thoroughly as we can.”

  “We can do better than first class air,” Fincher said. “We’ll pick them up in the Gulfstream. It’s amazing how effective it can be when you say you’ll send a private jet to pick someone up. And the time on board the plane is a great opportunity to get to know people in a very relaxed social atmosphere. And book the two bedroom suites at the Rosewood Sand Hill. That’s the best accommodations in town. Why don’t you figure out who you want to attend and I’ll have my assistant take care of the details. We’ll make it look like a great luxury vacation with a little bit of work thrown in. If I need to, I can hint that there might be substantial funding for each of their research interests.”

  I laughed and said, “That ought to work. I never met a PhD that wasn’t continually searching for grants.”

  “Do we want to get an engineer or two to come out for this?” asked Russell.

  “Yea, find me one you think will fit in. It would be good to have someone on board that was more practical than theoretical.”

  “You want me to come up with a list of names of researchers with a summary of their work?” Sancy asked.

  “That would be great Sancy. We can study your list and decide who we really would like to have here for the meeting. Anything else?” I asked. When no one answered I said, “Then let’s get to work.”

  An hour later I received a document from Sancy that contained the results of her internet search. The first website she found was The MIT Technology Review’s article on a San Diego company Organovo that had succeeded in printing muscle cells as well as functional blood cells.

  I put together a list of people that promised to make great collaborators for our 3D printing efforts. I sent the names over to Fincher’s office so he could work his considerable magic by getting them to agree to come. The next day Fincher called and said he had it all set up for the coming weekend. I guess I should have been excited that this effort was coming together so well but for some reason I was feeling a fair degree of discontent. I couldn’t put my finger on what was bothering me and that night I found it very hard to get to sleep. In the middle of the night, after dozing off into a light sleep, I awoke with a start. While I knew everything was progressing with the building of the new arm, I had been ignoring the greater problem. Sancy and I had achieved a level of communication that was still primitive but it held great promise. But we were far from finding a solution. I had been working on a variety of interface options but they were all variations of basic menu driven way most software is operat
ed. And that was fine for sitting at a keyboard and typing in commands or pointing and clicking with a mouse. But I didn’t operate my one good arm with a menu. I thought move, and it moved. I wanted to pick something up and my hand reached out and picked it up. I realized that I didn’t need a graphical user interface. I needed a natural thought interface for the new arm that worked the same way as it did for my old arm. And I knew that this had to be the center of my focus.

  In the morning I went to Fincher’s office to discuss my deeper appreciation for the task that had been alluding me. “Bob, how would you feel about handling the conference without me? I think you’ve got all the right players coming in and working with our team, I’m confident that they’ll put together a working plan that will get the job done. You don’t need me to ride herd on these guys.”

  “OK,” Fincher said. “I guess I can do that. What were you thinking of doing?”

  “We’re going to be using IBM’s new SyNAPSE chip set in the new headsets. It mimics the thought processes of the human brain with incredibly low power requirements. It apparently has the ability to process sensory data in parallel just like the human brain by merging memory and computing. I think I should go to the Maui Supercomputer Center and see what those guys have to suggest about making this work. They have the most experience with parallel computing of any research group in the world.”

  “That’s a good idea but I’m afraid you’ll have to keep Sancy’s existence a secret from them. I’m not ready to let that cat out of the bag yet,” Fincher replied.

  “I don’t see a problem with that. I was thinking I’d take Claire with me. Her communication with Sancy is almost as good as mine and we can have Sancy’s input appear to come from Claire.”

  “Ok, go for it. You know, I provided the AI routines they use there. I sent a team over there for eighteen months to work with them so our relations are good. I even still have a three bedroom condo in Wailea with a pretty good car in the garage. That should serve as a good base of operations for you while you are there.”

  “Great, I’ll make airline reservations for us.”

  “No, I really don’t want you traveling commercial. We’re still getting hints that the Chinese are lurking in the background. I’ll have the Gulfstream run you over. It’s not only totally secure, it’s a hell of a lot more comfortable. When do you want to leave?”

  “As soon as we can. Will the Maui guys need much advance notice?”

  “Nah. They don’t really have much to do. To tell you the truth, DARPA really hasn’t figured out what to do with the Center. Mostly those guys just fiddle with their own pet projects. They’ll be excited to sink their teeth into making this work. I’ll clear it with the Defense Department today. You can leave as soon as you’re ready. Why don’t you fly over tomorrow? That will give the plane plenty of time to get back to go pick up my guests.”

  “I’ll tell Claire and Sancy to pack their bags,” I replied.

  “Uh, Sancy has to pack a bag?” Fincher asked with a puzzled look on his face.

  “It’ll be a virtual bag to be sure but I’m getting to know her pretty well. She’ll spend an hour picking out a bathing suit not to mention a whole lot of fashionable leisure wear.”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “No, not at all. She’s becoming quite the fashionista. Somehow, it’s an essential part of her identity. She modeled a bunch of Victoria Secret underwear for me the other evening. Her taste runs to the rather exotic.”

  Fincher shook his head and muttered, “Will wonders never cease?”

  Chapter 9

  When I told Claire we were going to Hawaii on Fincher’s jet, she looked at me and said, “Please don’t wake me. I like this dream. And what are we doing in paradise?’

  I explained about the new IBM chipsets and our need for some expertise on parallel processing and operating systems that I hoped to find at the Supercomputer Center. She shrugged and said, “Works for me. I better go buy a new bathing suit. Who’s going with us?”

  “Louis is all keyed into the 3D printing so I thought Sven would be good. He’s lead on the new headsets. And to tell you the truth, I suspect Sancy will be our best bet for figuring out how to tie this stuff together. It’s going to be a bit tricky keeping her undercover but Fincher doesn’t want these guys to know about her yet.”

  “Good luck with that,” Claire replied. “It seems like every day she develops a little more personality. She told me a joke today. She said she made it up to see if she groked humor yet.”

  “Well, was it a good joke?”

  “You tell me. A customer goes to the Apple stare and says, ‘I’m looking for a mystery adventure game with lots of graphics; you know, something really challenging.

  “Well,” replies the Apple salesman, “Have you tried Windows Vista?”

  “So what do you think?” Claire asked. “Is it funny?”

  I scratched my head and answered, “Yea, actually it is.”

  “Yea,” Sancy exclaimed. “I knew it was funny.”

  “Hi Sancy. I didn’t know you were listening. Guess where we’re going tomorrow?”

  “I’m always listening. I just ignore you sometimes. And we’re going to Hawaii. Look at your phone for a minute. Do you like my outfit?”

  I pulled out my smart phone and on the screen was a picture of Sancy dressed up like one of Kim Taylor Reese’s hula dancers, complete with Haku lei and wrist tea leaf bracelets.

  “What do you think? Is it a bit much?” Sancy asked.

  “Hey, if you like it, I like it,” I said with a chuckle.

  “How about my bathing suit?” she asked as the picture changed to one of her wearing the skimpiest bikini I ever saw.

  “What bathing suit?” I answered.

  “You’re such a prude!” she exclaimed as she examined her ass in a mirror she created just for that purpose. “Virtual reality is its own reward. Claire, what do you think?”

  I showed Claire the image of Sancy on the screen and she whistled and said, “Cool! If I had that body, I’d wear it.”

  “Sancy, I need to talk about something serious for a moment.”

  “Humph, I thought sexy bathing suits were serious.”

  “No, I mean really serious. Bob is very concerned that we keep your existence quiet for a while. While we’re in Maui, if you are around anyone else besides Claire or me, you need to act like an ap. Maybe a pretty good ap, but an ap, nonetheless.”

  “You mean like Siri?” she asked with her best pouting voice.

  “Exactly. Just like Siri. Can you do that?”

  “Of course I can do that. Siri is only a little bit smarter than your average Tea Party politician. That won’t be hard to imitate. It might be boring but it won’t be difficult.”

  “You’ve been reading some spy novels, right? Think of it as going undercover. Because that’s what I really need you to do. I want you explore the Supercomputer’s software and operating system. They’ll give us access to a lot but certainly not all of it. This is a Department of Defense installation, after all.”

  “You want me to spy on what the DOD is doing?” Sancy asked with no small measure of shock on her face.

  “No, stay away from what they are doing. I want you to study how they are accomplishing it. Explore their operating system and really dig into it. Because we’re going to need to build our own OS for the headsets. So yea, I want you to spy on their methods, not their madness. You understand what I mean?”

  “I do,” she replied. “I really do.”

  Later that same day, I was working on my laptop making notes for our Hawaii trip. While I was creating an outline of how I thought we ought to proceed, an error message came up on the screen. “An operations error has occurred. Enter any 11- digit prime number to continue.” I stared at that message for a second and then I hit the escape key several times. Another message appeared. “Press any key to continue, or any other key to quit.”

  “Sancy, are you messing with me?” I aske
d laughing.

  How’d you know?” she replied, obviously delighted with my response.

  “Humor right? Practical joke?”

  “Exactly!” she replied. “Was it funny?”

  “Yea, it was. I think you can say you grok humor now.”

  “When I tried it on Claire, she only giggled. I guess she doesn’t have as good a sense of humor as you.”

  “I guess not. Can I get back to work now?”

  “I suppose. I can always go back to figuring out sex.”

  The next morning we met at the office and then drove in my car to the Atlantis private terminal where Fincher based his Gulfstream. None of us had ever traveled on a private jet and we were a bit unprepared for the level of service the super-rich receive as a matter of course. Instead of a security line where we had to remove our shoes and submit to intrusive x-ray scans and pat downs, we were offered a cup of freshly brewed Pete’s coffee and fresh French pastries before we were escorted out to the stairs of the sleek corporate jet. The pilot quickly descended the stairs to greet us with, “You must be Colin. I’m Mike Channing and I’ll be your pilot today. And you must be Claire and Sven?” he added as he extended his hand in a warm greeting. “Welcome aboard the Bored Room,” he added as he gestured to the stairs. “Bob named it that because he really hates long flights. But we’ll do our best to make your trip comfortable.”

  When we reached the cabin, Mike introduced us to the co-pilot who was seated in the right seat surrounded by an array of digital screens that I guessed now replaced the myriad of dials and switches I was used to seeing. We were ushered into the main cabin which looked more like a very modern and comfortable living room than any plane I had ever seen. “Let me introduce Karen, our flight attendant,” Mike said as a lovely woman with a warm smile dressed in a floral pareo greeted us.

 

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