by PJ Manney
His idea was simple, yet supposedly impossible: reverse-engineer Tom’s brain by mapping the neurons’ signal locations, stimulating and recording all the data they contained, and storing those thoughts in the newly mapped virtual brain, located on hundreds of computer servers. If it worked, it was way cooler than some role-playing avatar. Tom had little hope of success. The structure he conceived was too simple, too limited to contain him. But if he didn’t try, he was crazier than he thought.
And then came the greatest moment of simultaneous awareness he had ever known.
If he thought he was connected to the far corners of his brain before, now it was a waterfall, a never-ending rush where each drop of water was a memory, emotion, point of view, action, perception, surging past with all the others. Life passing before your eyes had nothing on the unearthly exhilaration of tsunami-surfing your very essence. Especially when it was pieces of six other mental landscapes! And it contained more than that. It included everyone he ever knew. He located the three women who made up his lovescape. Each seemed to emerge from a distinct part of his brain: Amanda from his hypothalamus, where hormonal regulation governed sex, the body’s rhythms, hungers, and the need to parent; Talia from his amygdala, where fear, emotions, and rewards were processed; and Ruth from his frontal lobe, where the higher cognitive functions of intelligence, language, and problem-solving took place.
He tried to focus on one moment, one feeling, but reeled, dizzy with effort. What he sensed couldn’t be labeled sensation at all, but rather a reinterpretation of all perception ever experienced, the white noise of a lifetime in synchronous playback.
And the music! A fraction of a second of sound identified tens of thousands of songs flying by too quickly to enjoy. Somehow the rush did not create discord, but made its own beautiful music.
For a moment, he wondered if this was a taste of what a creator might feel perceiving the entire universe at once. The vastness of his mind and life astonished and humbled him. But a leitmotif of love of family and friends could be heard above the noise. And what was more humbling than that?
If all went well, he would enjoy the show one last time, hoping all their work would take him from this endless pain to a better place. But what would that place be like?
Ruth rocked back and forth on her stool. “I think your output is . . . all right. B-b-but what is all right supposed to look like?”
“Time to spacewalk,” said Tom’s voice. “Turn the camera to the room.” Ruth did and Tom’s inner vision saw Steve at the foot of the bed, shuffling his feet with a tired, nervous expression, and Talia, legs crossed over and under, arms crossed, back curled into a question mark, as though she could pretzel-twist herself away. “Steve? Thanks, man. I owe you.”
“Just make some history today, will you? My job’s riding on this.” He smiled halfheartedly. “Now, as your doctor, I need to know how you’re feeling.”
“There’s pain, but I can handle it. I’ve dampened what nerves are left, and the last dose of morphine wore off an hour ago. But no more drugs. They’ll affect the upload.”
“Got it.”
“Tal? What’s wrong?”
Her head turned away. She mumbled, “What’s wrong? Leave it to you to reduce your . . .” she paused, unable to say the word. “. . . to some glam-rock ballad.” She buried her head against the back of her chair.
“Tal, I’m sorry, but there’s not much time. I’ve left you Prometheus Industries. Carter’s death transferred his part-ownership to me in an automatic cash buyout to Amanda. It was his posthumous gift to us. You are the full owner, with Ruth and Steve as trustees. I believe the three of you together can best guide such a world-changing technology in the future.”
“We . . . ?”
“Let me finish. Talia, I loved you, even though I knew there was never any hope for us. Hate made me a monster, not the technology. I was less than human the moment you saved me . . . and you deserve better. And I think you know where to find him.”
Steve concentrated on Tom’s monitors, checking vital signs. Talia caught his eyes, and the doctor stared back in pained hope. He walked over and whispered in her ear. Luckily, Ruth turned up the input volume. “Regardless of how you feel about me, he’s hanging on by a thread for you. It’s taking enormous effort. Make it worth it.”
For once, Talia saw the man Tom saw. She stared at her fretting hands, ashamed.
“Ruth,” said Tom, “I’ve left you the Swiss bank accounts with Thomas Paine’s money. That should take care of us . . .”
“Us?”
“We have a deal. I promised you my work, then my mind, then my life. Forever. Do you still want me? Even if I’m not quite ‘me’ anymore?”
Ruth simply rocked and hummed in reply.
A window popped up on the monitor and his internal screen: “Upload Complete.”
“T-T-Tom . . .”
“I know, Ruthie. I know . . .” Even though he was still connected and transmitting thoughts, his rushing essence no longer flowed, and the energy surge’s delicious flavor tapered off. As the loneliness crept back, a wave of fear gripped him. What if the upload failed? Would it be the ultimate isolation? If his memories were gone forever, would that be the end? Or would the dead remain a part of the memories of the living, as long as they had memories, and then disappear for good once they were dead and gone? Or was there an afterlife, as the priests always promised? Was his father there?
It was time to find out.
“Steve, turn off the life support,” Tom said.
The doctor looked stricken. “Tom, I can’t . . .”
“You’re not betraying your oath. You’re expanding it.”
Steve shook his head.
If Tom could have made the computer speaker sigh, he would have. “Ruth?”
She rocked more strenuously. “Nein . . . nein . . .”
“Talia?” he asked.
She rose from her chair and perched on the side of the bed, reaching down to hold the bandaged remains of his right hand. She leaned toward his face, mostly obscured by gauze, searching for the man she knew. “I’m here.”
“Turn it off. Please.”
Without a word, Talia leaned over and shut off the respirator. The room was quiet.
“Wish I could see you,” he said. “With my eyes.”
“Your memory of me is better than the reality,” said Talia. “It always was. And it doesn’t matter, baby. It’s over. It’s all over. And I’m here. With you. Now all you have to do is just let go. Let go of everything.”
“I’ll be alone . . .” said Tom.
“Oh, baby, you won’t be. You know what I was thinking, coming to get you? Remember how you wanted to take the Pequod up the Hudson? To show me where you grew up? And how you swam in the river? You said it always made you feel like a new man. Remember?”
“Yes . . .”
“Let’s go there.”
“Can . . . ?”
“You know we can. It’s a beautiful night. There’s moonlight playing on the water. It looks so cool, so inviting. Doesn’t it? You know you want to go in. Just jump in the water, Tom. It’s right there, waiting for you. Jump in and swim. And keep on swimming, baby.”
“You . . . swim . . . ?”
“Soon, baby. Soon.”
Talia stroked his wrapped hand as the mechanical voice fell silent and Tom’s rattling breath stopped. The heart monitor, having maintained its steady rhythm until now, beeped erratically. She squeezed his hand. “Tom?”
He was swimming. And the water felt wonderful.
A snippet of music played on the computer’s speakers. Bowie’s Cool-Britannia voice cooed the journey had begun and he loved his wife very much.
“I know,” replied Talia. “I love you, Thomas Paine.”
She knows, thought Tom. Just as he saw Pop standing on the river’s shore, he took one last, agonizing breath . . . and his chest collapsed with a sigh and stopped.
All eyes turned to the heart monitor and the drone
of the flatline. Tom’s body shook for a moment, then was still.
Talia rose, shaking with repressed tears. She held her hand out to Ruth. The scientist tried to reciprocate, but could not. Instead, she passed Talia and removed something from her breast pocket to place on Tom’s body: two clipped glass slides containing two blood drops. Then she gently pulled the bottom of her pink button-down shirt out of her chinos and tore the hem a little, murmuring, “Baruch Dayan Emet.” Her eyes met Talia’s. “B-b-blessed is the one true judge.”
“Can you bring him back to you, Ruth?” whispered Talia.
“I d-don’t know,” Ruth bleated.
“Where is he?”
“Not in there.” Ruth pointed at the computers she had brought with her. “Too small, too little processing power. He’s out there. In a server farm.”
“Where is it?” asked Steve.
“He n-n-n-never told me,” said Ruth, frowning as she logged back into Project Major Tom. “Miss Gray Hat knows.”
“But you still don’t know who Miss Gray Hat is?” asked Talia.
“Nein . . . Tom believed he’d know by now . . .” When the connection was complete, she asked the microphone, “Ground control to Major T-T-Tom? You there?”
“This is Major Tom to Ground Control.”
Ruth bowed her head and under her breath said a prayer her father had often repeated: “Baruch Atah Adonai Eloheinu Melech ha’olam oseh ma’aseh vereshit”—We praise You, Eternal God, sovereign of the universe, source of creation and its wonders.
“The computer looks bigger . . .” murmured Talia.
Ruth and Steve glanced at each other and then at the body in the bed. They left unsaid that the body looked proportionally smaller. Rationalists didn’t dabble in such anecdotal, subjective observations.
Tom stepped through the door. One moment, he had been in his dying body, feeling nothing but love for Talia, Ruth, and Steve, grateful these people were with him, the only ones left who knew him for what he had been and would be. He wasn’t alone and felt their love completely, no barriers between them. They were one. That was all that was left of him at the end. Nothing else mattered.
And then, for a period of time both infinitesimal and endless, he seemed to be everywhere and nowhere. For that moment, he finally grasped what Buddhists meant by universal consciousness. But just as bodhi, the awakening of total awareness, was dawning . . .
He was back. But where?
It was the ocean-sized computerscape he had sensed when first connected to the Internet. Reaching out to the topography’s edges, his home felt finite and yet potentially infinite. Time, space, and matter had no meaning here. Only energy. It was certainly a unique sensation, if he could use that word. But how do you describe sensation without senses? And what could he perceive with such limited means? There was a video camera and microphone in one world and nothing but information in the other. He knew that by asking these questions, he qualified as a form of consciousness. That was good news. But what kind? At least the music that flowed was really playing Bowie, not his brain processing a digital version or a memory, but an actual, digital recording. And what’s more, he wasn’t hearing it, he was the music, riding every note and percussive vibration. The tin can of his cybership gave him a radically different view of the universe.
“Ruthie? Cogito ergo sum,” said the computer.
Talia and Steve looked confused, and Talia unconsciously grabbed Steve’s hand.
“René Descartes,” Ruth explained. “ ‘I think, therefore I am.’ The ghost in the machine.”
“My revolution,” said the ghost.
“But what happens to you now?” asked Talia.
“I’m sending my story to every website, e-mail, blog, and chatroom in the world. And Ruth will take care of me. Tsum glik, tsum shlimazel?”
Ruth’s smile twitched at the corners. “ ‘For better, for worse?’ Ach, you’re the perfect mate. Toilet seat stays down. Toothpaste stays capped. Never needs a hug.”
But was he Thomas Paine or Peter Bernhardt or a group-mind of Bernhardt-Paine-Dulles-Eng-Lobo-Brant-Potsdam—or something else? He wasn’t human. And he contained multitudes.
He was Major Tom, the friendliest ghost he knew, the first human-born artificial intelligence.
Talia hadn’t let go her iron grip on Steve’s hand while she scooted close to the computer, dragging him with her. “What’s it feel like in there?”
Thus began the revolution.
ABOUT THE MUSIC
(R)evolution was born listening to a song, “The Boy in the Bubble,” which Peter recalls during the first Phoenix Camp. Paul Simon’s classic sums up the eternal dichotomy of society’s grappling with technology. It’s a miracle in the right hands. And a curse in the wrong ones. All those lasers and signals and millionaires and billionaires. Simon got that so right.
Many more songs influenced (R)evolution than the approximately forty that remain. I have a personal playlist of seventy songs that are in this novel one way or another, and there are dozens more on tap propelling the sequel. My MP3s get a workout.
The music and writing formed a feedback loop. A song inspired the story, which inspired another song, which inspired more story . . . and so on. It was a symbiotic, organic relationship much like Peter/Tom experiences, even within a strict story structure. Some songs felt deeply serendipitous, like listening to Todd Rundgren’s “Initiation” and “Born to Synthesize.” I had the bones of the club initiation scene before I found Rundgren’s album. And those thorny issues of how Peter would survive? Todd helped. A lot. But finding “Born to Synthesize” was a revelation. In 1975, Rundgren wrote about the intersection of consciousness, thought, and sound. He intuited brain processes long before philosophers or neuroscientists were anywhere near the truth, and I could see a brain-computer interface in his lyrics. Todd, you rock.
My daughter was my muse for Peter/Tom. Her memories are laid down against her internal and external soundtrack of constant humming, singing, playing piano or guitar, and listening to her recordings. Everything relates to a song. Watching how she processes the world amazes me daily. My friend and artificial intelligence researcher, Dr. Benjamin Goertzel, was another inspiration, explaining how he solves problems musically both to encourage my daughter to realize her potential and to inform my hero.
Collecting and listening to this music in your own music library will provide a richer experience than my interpretations can convey. I encourage you to decipher Peter/Tom’s musical motivations. You’ll also have more insight into the inner life of his multimedia hacked ’n’ jacked brain. That might be your brain someday, so take notes. I’ll let you decide what songs you like best. Enjoy!
(R)EVOLUTION PLAYLIST
(in order of appearance)
“American Idiot,” Green Day
“Tiny Dancer,” Elton John
“Mother’s Little Helper,” the Rolling Stones
“Bad Brain,” the Ramones
“The Star-Spangled Banner,” Jimi Hendrix
“Once in a Lifetime,” Talking Heads
“Born to Synthesize,” Todd Rundgren
“With a Little Help from My Friends,” the Beatles
“Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown),” the Beatles
“Yesterday,” the Beatles
“Hail to the Chief,” United States Marine Corps Band
“American Pie,” Don McLean
“Initiation,” Todd Rundgren
“Suddenly Everything Has Changed,” the Flaming Lips
“No Surprises,” Radiohead
“School’s Out,” Alice Cooper
“What is the Light?” the Flaming Lips
“Welcome to the Occupation,” R.E.M.
“Boy in the Bubble,” Paul Simon
“Dead Man’s Party,” Oingo Boingo
“Put One Foot in Front of the Other,” Miami Relatives
“Race for the Prize (Sacrifice of the New Scientists),” the Flaming Lips
“Every Breath
You Take (I’ll be Watching You),” the Police
“Help,” the Beatles
“Message in a Bottle,” the Police
“Let Me In,” R.E.M.
“Good Vibrations,” the Beach Boys
“I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times,” the Beach Boys
“Every Breath You Take (I’ll be Watching You),” Karen Souza
“American Pie,” CDM Rock Project
“Galileo,” Indigo Girls
“Man in Black,” Johnny Cash
“1812 Festival Overture, Op.49,” Tchaikovsky
“Bad Moon Rising,” John Fogerty
“The King Must Die,” Elton John
“Initiation,” Todd Rundgren
“Frankenstein,” Aimee Mann
“Revenge,” Rob Zombie (a.k.a. “Make Them Die Slowly,” White Zombie)
“Der Golem,” Fantômas
“Golem II: The Bionic Vapour Boy,” Mr. Bungle
“Déjà Vu,” Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
“A Man Out of Time,” Elvis Costello
“String Quartet #2 in F# minor (final movement),” Arnold Schoenberg
“Requiem,” György Ligeti
“White Wedding,” Billy Idol
“Que Sera Sera,” Doris Day
“Psycho Killer,” Talking Heads
“The End,” the Doors
“Welcome to the Occupation,” R.E.M.
“While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” the Beatles (Cirque du Soleil LOVE soundtrack)
“Yesterday,” the Beatles
“Space Oddity,” David Bowie
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
As in all things, my mistakes are my own.
To the experts who generously gave their time to guide my research, allow me to express my gratitude: Jef Allbright, Jonathan Axelrad, Damien Broderick, James Clement, Michael Chorost, George Dvorsky, Benjamin Goertzel, Todd Huffman, James J. Hughes, Paul Karami, Eugen Leitl, Zack Lynch, Albert “Skip” Rizzo, Russell Rukin, Christine Petersen, Anders Sandberg, Lewis Seiden, John Smart.