Two signs, ‘Harvard & Yale complicit’ and ‘Our future demands action now,’ hung from the balcony of the historic Hill House Mansion at 10 Sachem Street, which sat directly across the street from the Peabody Museum of Natural History. The black-painted letters on the banners trailed out and dripped on the floor, obscuring the text and smudging the marble entry to the building.
Originally, the building had been a private mansion built in 1835, but it had been converted and had been used for academic purposes for decades. The original entrance at 158 Whitney Avenue, with its almost neo-classical architecture, reminded of its colonial past, with its yellow stones, large windows and four columns baring the traditional balcony. The newly added expansion was straight and more Bauhaus style, giving the building its current ambivalent look. Next to the Sachem Street entrance, the lights dimmed behind the large steel-framed windows. In the room behind it a focused beam on a projection screen read:
Linguistic Anthropology and
Artificial Intelligence
~~~
One Step Beyond
~~~
Dr. Jennifer Porter
The conference room looked old with its open fireplace in the back and antique oak floor. On two rows of seats, some thirty young men and women talked loudly and exchanged papers.
“Good afternoon.” A woman’s voice sounded from the front of the room behind a wooden lectern. The woman, in her mid-thirties, wearing a yellow dress, looked younger. Her narrow eyes, long blonde hair, and the constant slight lift of the corners of her mouth gave her an open and friendly look. She had been a little under the weather the past few days but felt too proud not to show up for a presentation of what felt like her life’s work. “I hope you can all hear me because we don’t have a sound system available. I’ll try to speak up. My name is Jennifer Porter, recently Dr. Porter, but Jennifer will do just fine. I know you all had a long day here on campus, but I hope you’re a little wiser than when you left your homes this morning. I’m here for your final twenty minutes of introduction at Yale University. It’s good to see you here in the Anthropology department. Anyone have any idea of what we do here?”
A young man in the back raised his hand.
“No need to raise your hand. Just speak up.”
“You study human behavior,” the young man shouted.
“Okay. Anyone else?”
This time, a young woman spoke up from the back. “You study patterns in behavior.”
“Cultures,” another young woman cried out from the same row.
“All correct,” Jennifer confirmed. And with a press on the remote on the lectern, she changed the slide on the screen.
Anthropology
‘The scientific study of humans, human behavior
and societies, in the past and present.’
“And there you have it. So, if you don’t like people, I guess you’re in the wrong place.” The room laughed, and Jennifer felt her shoulders lower a bit. She’d never felt comfortable presenting for large crowds. Even when she knew she had all the knowledge needed to give a sparkling presentation. It always took a first joke and the appropriate reaction from the crowd to break the ice, to make her feel comfortable. From here on, she knew and sensed it would be easy. Again, she changed the slide on the screen.
Fields in Anthropology:
Sociocultural
Biological
Archaeological
Linguistic
“Now, these are the main fields of anthropology I like to recognize. There are many more to be named, such as economic, political, applied, art, media, music, film, medical, nutritional, psychological, kinship, feminism, gender and even sexuality and many, many more. You can all regard them as subsets of the four main fields. And my specialism is Linguistic Anthropology.” Another slide appeared on the screen:
Linguistic Anthropology
The understanding of human communications,
verbal and non-verbal, across space and time.
The social uses of language,
and the relationship between language and culture.
“Now. Let me ask you a seemingly off-topic question. Can a computer be intelligent?”
For a few seconds, the potential students looked left and right at each other, but the room stayed silent.
“Let me add something. Can we agree that one of the primary manifestations of human intelligence is language?”
Many of the youngsters now nodded and mumbled confirmation.
“Some would even say that the acquisition of language is the most significant intellectual accomplishment of humankind. So, now I ask you again: Can a computer be intelligent?”
“They have a language, so yes,” a young woman in the front row replied.
Jennifer smiled. “If what I stated before was true, you must be right.”
The young woman smiled back.
“And yet”—Jennifer glanced at the young woman again, who now frowned back—“computers only understand what we tell them to, and generally they don’t understand us, and we don’t understand them without translation, and here the problems begin. There are many more problems that we need to address before we can call a computer intelligent. Problems such as communication, perception, knowledge, planning, learning, reasoning and thinking. Regarding thinking.” An image appeared on the screen.
“You all heard of the Turing test?” About half the students raised their hands. “For the other half,” Jennifer continued. “In 1950, Alan Turing developed a test to determine a computer’s ability to show intelligent behavior impossible to differentiate from a human. In this example, human C is the interrogator. He’s given the task of trying to determine, between A and B, which is the computer and which is the human. Officially, the interrogator is limited to using pre-defined written questions. Though much debated, if we take the test for truth, computers have already won and proven their intelligence in the past decade. And that brings me to my special interest.”
Human and Computer Awareness
vs.
Evolution
“I’m sure you’ll agree when I say that there are many levels of intelligence. I only have to look around the room to see there are smart people and....” Jennifer paused for a second. “And let’s say there are smarter people. And no, I’m not going to tell you who is who.” She smiled, and the room grinned back.
“Humans are the only animals on Earth who are aware of their mortality or awareness,” she continued in a severe tone. “No other animal is aware of its existence and eventually at the end of it, at its inevitable death. Neither do computers. Now, what does that mean? To be honest, I’m not completely sure myself.” The room giggled again. “No, really, all I can say is that some think that intelligence equals awareness of his own mortality. That would mean if we can teach a computer—or better, if a machine can learn by itself—that its life is evanescent, it would create, by definition, consciousness and could be considered intelligent.
“On the other hand, if this is true, animals will probably never be regarded as intelligent, because I don’t see anyone soon explaining to my dog that he is mortal.” Jennifer took a deep breath. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that studying here, or wherever you wind up, I expect your study will create as much, or even more, questions than it will answer. And with that note, I have one thing I would like to give you before you leave here tonight. One thing to think about when you’re at home tonight, sitting on your couch watching Netflix or playing a game on your Xbox or swiping on your phones.” She swiped the screen of an invisible phone in her hand. “Think about this.” With a push of a button, large red letters appeared on the screen.
Evolution = Extinction
“Whatever definition of intelligence you’ll use, in our time, we will see computers become more and more intelligent. We will see them grow, learn how to communicate with us and with each other. We will see them take over more tasks from us. They’ll drive us, cook our food, grow our crops, heal us, build our hous
es, probably even write our books and create our music. Computers, Artificial Intelligence, combined with nanotechnology applied in robots, will evolve. A new form of evolution will rise. You ever think of that?”
The room stayed silent.
“I do think of that, and when I do, my biggest question is how we, humans, and AI are going to co-exist. Humans are the dominant species on Earth. We’re at the top of the food chain and, more importantly, we are the only ones. Ever wonder why? Take a quick look at human evolution. In the last million years, the Homo naledi, Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis, Homo neanderthalensis, and Homo sapiens at some point in time all co-existed next to each other. They all lived together, one big happy family. Or did they? One thing is for sure. Only one species survived: us, the Homo sapiens.” Jennifer paused to see if there was any connection in the room as to where she was going. She recognized mostly frowning, questioning faces, which she remembered from her early days studying. She looked at her watch and then pointed to the screen and read aloud. “Evolution equals extinction. Everything ends. Human evolution took place over millions of years. AI evolution is in its infancy, but is snowballing. I told you. In our time, we will see computers become more and more intelligent. We will place this intelligence into robots and then....” She paused for a long moment.
The room stayed silent, anticipating the climax.
“Then, we’ll need to learn to co-exist, as intelligent species. Something humanity hasn’t been able to do in millions of years.” She took a deep breath and gave a big smile in an attempt to alleviate some of the tension in the room. After a few seconds, she said, “Thank you for attending. I hope I made you curious and left you with enough questions to think about when you’re at home or maybe even come back someday and study anthropology. I have a few minutes left to answer some questions, so anyone?”
A young man rose from his chair. “You draw a glum ‘rise of the machines, Terminator-like’ future. Do you really believe robots will take over the Earth someday?” The boy sat down again.
“I don’t know what your Terminator-like future looks like, but what I’m sure of is that....” Jennifer fell silent. After a short moment, she shook her head.
“Are you okay?” a young woman in the front asked her.
Jennifer slowly bent her head down, her fair skin turning even paler.
After a moment, she spoke slowly. “Yes, thank you. Sorry. What I meant to say was that there’s one thing I know for sure. If we don’t find a way in which....”
From one moment to the next, she felt her head grow heavy, her eyesight blurred, sounds muffled and her knees grew weak, all immediately followed by a loud thump. In a fraction of a second, she realized it was the sound of her own body hitting the floor, which was followed by complete blackness.
“Dr. Porter. Hello?”
“Jennifer.”
“Can you hear me?”
“Someone call 911.”
Chapter 2 – Gone Fishing
Otter Creek, VT, The Present
Otter Creek, Vermont’s longest river, snaked its way from the Green Mountain National Forest to flow into Lake Champlain, 112 miles farther west, crossing Vermont’s state line with New York. As the sun rose over the tackle and bait store at the Hillcrest Campground and Cottage at the end of the river, a twenty-year-old blue Jeep Wrangler drove into the empty parking lot and parked close to the river.
“I love this car.” Matthew Bishop lovingly padded the doorknob.
“How did I let you talk me into this?” Walker James Monroe asked in his throaty British voice. The black curator of early books and manuscripts at Yale’s Beinecke Rare Book Library had been dragged out of his bed five hours ago by his friend, who had insisted on taking him on a fishing trip. “At four in the morning,” he whined. The usually well-clad conservative was forced out of his favorite suit and tie and forced into jeans, a sweater and sneakers, instead of his preferred Oxfords, Derbys or Bluchers.
“Oh, don’t be a baby,” Bishop replied. “It took me a lot of years and energy to convince you to come with me on a fishing trip, so I strongly advise you to enjoy it. You know, when I was a boy, my father used to wake me up at three in the morning every other Saturday to go fishing with him and my uncles.”
“Nuts,” Monroe complained. “My father was kind enough to take me to the Knightsbridge National Art Library in the Victoria and Albert Museum. At three in the afternoon.”
Bishop and Monroe had been colleagues at Yale University for almost ten years now. As a professor of Mathematics and Philosophy, heading the department of Comparative Literature and Religious Studies, Bishop worked closely with Monroe a couple of times over the years. In his early forties now, the curly red-headed Bishop, always with his three-day beard, steel blue eyes and tall, slender posture, was still considered by his students one of the most attractive, eligible bachelors on campus. Unlike the bald, dark-eyed Monroe, Bishop preferred a more casual clothing style. When giving lectures, he usually wore a sweatshirt or turtleneck with cargo pants or straight jeans—occasionally with tears in it—and loose-fitting sneakers, preferably no socks.
“Do you have any idea how much ‘Otter Creek’ we passed on our way up here?” Monroe complained again while Bishop unloaded all kinds of gear out of the back of the Jeep.
“Here.” Bishop threw a beige piece of clothing at Monroe, who caught it against his chest with a loud ‘oomph.’
“What’s this?” Monroe asked, unfolding it.
“It’s a chest wader. Put it on. It will keep you warm and dry when we get into the water.”
Monroe held what looked like a bib and brace in front of him. “Flattering, no doubt.” His British accent sounded snooty. Of the two friends, Monroe was always dressed to the teeth. His tailored suits, handmade shoes and even jewelry and watches always matched perfectly with his dark complexion.
“The reason we had to come all this way to the north end of the river and left a lot of Otter Creek behind us, is that this time of year the water in the south is relatively warm, but here in the north the water is cold, and that makes it an excellent breeding ground for the brown, brook, and rainbow trout. And if we are fortunate, maybe we can even catch ourselves a landlocked salmon.”
Monroe started to unbutton his trousers.
“What are you doing?” Bishop laughed and flapped his hands. “Over your clothes. Just take off your shoes and step into the wader. Put the suspenders over your shoulders, and you’re good to go.”
Both men got into their clothing. Bishop took a fly-fishing vest from the car, put in on Monroe, and handed him a rod. “You look ravishing.” Bishop gave his boyish smile, the enthusiasm showing in his eyes.
Monroe shook his head.
“Let’s go.” Bishop closed the car and walked up to the river. “Now, since you never fished like this before, I’ll teach you the ropes. There’s nothing to it. Listen to me and do as I do. The only important rule is that you always stay upright. Don’t fall. If you fall over into the river, your chest wader could fill up with water, and you’ll sink. Not recommendable, so to say.”
“This is getting better and better,” Monroe grumbled.
“No worries, I’ll get you back home safe again and tonight”—Bishop opened his stretched arms and anticipated an answer that didn’t come—“we eat fish. Follow me.” He waded from the bank into the shallow river.
When Monroe stepped into the water, Bishop started humming the Jaws theme.
“Shush.” Monroe put a finger to his lips.
“Scared?” Bishop replied.
Monroe shook his head and pointed to the sky behind Bishop. He instantly recognized the sound of helicopter rotor blades. As a young pilot, he had flown a Sea King helicopter from the carrier HMS Hermes during the Falklands War. It was the only time he saw combat as a volunteer pilot. The sight of one of his comrades being shot down, just over the island, traumatized him so he gave up his career as an army pilot, and returned to school to study comparative literature.
Bishop turned around. Accompanied by a low rumble of rotors, a helicopter neared from the east, soaring low over the marshes.
Monroe’s voice lowered an octave. “It looks like it’s coming this way, and fast.”
Bishop looked at the blackish dot in the sky that rapidly became bigger and bigger. Within thirty seconds, the blue and white Eurocopter had neared them and now hovered some fifty feet upstream over the river.
“It’s one of us, Yale-New Haven Health,” Monroe read from the side, shouting over the loud sound from the rotors.
Bishop walked a few steps back and put his mouth to Monroe’s ear. “I know. I got invited to an introduction flight in 2014. They use it for critical-care patients to transport and provide care during transport from one hospital to another.”
“But what is it doing here?”
“Good question,” Bishop replied as the helicopter hovered sideways to the parking lot, over Bishop’s car, and landed at the center of the terrain. Bishop and Monroe looked left and right, but there was no one in sight as far as they could see and then looked at each other in wonder.
“What now?” Monroe asked when the helicopter door opened, and a woman and a man with a briefcase jumped out.
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