Upload

by McClelland, Mark

  Raymond had witnessed some very disturbing images in his two years on the project. He recalled the never-released images of Minnie, the uploaded beagle, when she first encountered the simulation of her loving real-world trainer and companion, Jesse, in her new v-world. Minnie sniffed at her, then cowered and ran. They tried the introduction over and over, thinking that the dog had experienced some kind of trauma, but there was no improvement. Jesse said it was as if Minnie didn't recognize her. Perhaps it was a problem with the memory scan, the researchers posited, causing Minnie to have no recollection of Jesse. Or was Minnie's computer brain not able to interpret the visual data it was receiving? Poor Minnie, whose real-world body had been destroyed molecule by molecule during the scanning process, suffered two real-world months of depression in her simulated world before Anya realized that their whole simulation of smells and olfactory receptors was vastly inferior to that of Minnie's natural life. None of the smells in her new world was anything like those she remembered, which, as it turned out, she remembered just fine; once the smell-related subsystems of Minnie's simulated physiology and environment had been appropriately enhanced, her reunion with the simulated Jesse was a squirmy, jumpy explosion of dopamine-crazed face-licking. The real Jesse, watching footage of this reunion, cried at the sight of it.

  Although the team had ultimately figured out the nature of this problem and was able to solve it, there seemed to be thousands more such oversights awaiting discovery, especially for an animal so psychologically complex as a human. Similar problems had been encountered and overcome with every animal; improvements made to the olfactory system of Lentil the mouse had not been good enough for Minnie the beagle. It seemed quite likely that more problems would be encountered with Bento, the terminally ill chimp they planned to upload in the coming weeks. Problems capturing the complexity of a chimp's socialization seemed particularly likely. The researchers were optimistic about being able to quickly rectify any problems that arose, but they would not be available to fix the problems with uploaded Raymond; if he did upload, he sure as hell didn't plan to stick around the lab.

  It had been assumed from the start that an uploaded human would not have exactly the same experiences. Consumption of alcohol, for instance, would not destroy the hardware that corresponded to brain cells. Alcohol would taste the same and might induce drunken behavior, but no one saw any point in simulating the physiological downside of neural damage. Where Bob argued that such shortcomings and unknowns would make the uploaded mind something other than human, Anya argued that the essential mental experience would be the same, and that the benefits of uploading already outweighed the risks for a person at high risk of an aneurysm, for instance. She argued that everything human would still be there, but there was the potential for life overall to be better. Where feasibility was concerned, she had pointed out repeatedly how similar humans are to chimps, arguing that—once the bugs had been ironed out in a few chimp uploads—the leap from chimp to human wasn't giant at all.

  Raymond's conclusion, based on the meetings he had attended and his own understanding of how their proposed system would work, was that the system would soon be ready enough. Once uploaded, he reasoned, there should be nothing stopping the mind from altering the simulation of its body as necessary. So long as every aspect of mental perception could be controlled, the smoke and mirrors that made it all seem human were just a matter of cleverness. So, he planned to learn as much as he could from Anya, preferably without her knowing why he was so interested.

  Of more immediate and fathomable concern, however, were the tactical and strategic issues of uploading himself—getting away with it, and escaping his crimes in the process. The computer that could hold his mind was a rare device indeed, and not something that could be emulated in real time—as far as he could figure—on some more common platform. It would take a massive collection of traditional computers to pull off what one of the neuristor-based computers (NBCs) could do, and the communications overhead among all those traditional computers would be immense, slowing or perhaps even ruining the magic of the human thought process. He knew of only four NBCs capable of hosting a human mind: the development, test, and production NBCs they planned to use for Bento the chimp, and the NBC being used by a lab in Berlin where researchers were attempting to create the mind of an infant from scratch and develop it at an accelerated pace into that of a young child. As much as he dreamt of being able to slip through networks, a refugee mind hacking its way nomadically into systems around the world, he would, in fact, have to rely on a single piece of hardware, custom-built to process information in the manner of a human brain. Which meant he would have to deal with the hardware maintenance side of things.

  Keeping his host computer powered and safe would be his first concern. This was also the easiest problem to solve. He had been keeping computers going at his bunker in Minnesota for five years now, checking in on them only once every few months. The solar arrays and windmills there had thus far shown a zero failure rate. As for keeping the host computer safe, secrecy and deception—as usual—would be his greatest weapons. The tougher problem would be getting the machines there. He would have to perform the scan here at the lab and rely on robots to load the NBC into his motor home, which had gotten itself to Minnesota and back dozens of times. Unloading and installing the NBC on the other end could be dicey. An experienced listener and data thief, theft of physical property made him nervous. He couldn't stand the thought of his robots carting his future brain out of the university building, while his mind lay temporarily dead in storage media. He imagined one of the robots dropping some key component and accidentally crushing it. And the people... there would be so many people. Even if he waited until Christmas break, students and staff would still be in and out of the building at all hours. Physical exposure was a relatively foreign concern for him; the thought of it made him feel naked and scared.

  Janet, the lab's information assistant, announced an all-hands meeting in the main conference room. Raymond wondered just how much Bob would tell. He headed out of his office as Ellen, the Chief Programmer of the team, was coming out of hers, just across the hall. Ellen Emami, a skinny nothing-but-business workaholic in her mid-40s, had been working with Bob Wells for many years. Raymond had looked into her background before joining the team, but had since forgotten most of what he had found. Nothing worth remembering, in his opinion. She was one of those programmers who seem to have been assimilated by the machines they work. Raymond only wished he could swap out her personality and replace it with one of his own creation. As they walked to the conference room, she asked him how his current tasks were coming along. He answered her directly, wondering whether she had even the slightest grasp of the significance of the ESW statement.

  o-------------------------------o

  Eleven members of the thirteen-member team sat and stood in cramped assembly in the conference room. Bob Wells, a short pudgy man in his late fifties, stood at the head of the main table. His eyes closed and his lips moved slightly; he was communicating via his comm implants.

  Raymond looked across the room to where Anya sat. She sipped a shake while reading from a tablet. A coffee-banana shake, for sure—that was her favorite. Raymond loved that she had a favorite, and took pleasure in recognizing that he knew what it was. He wondered whether an uploaded mind would experience that same pleasure, and it occurred to him to start his own journal of sensations, that he might test their presence if he succeeded in uploading himself. He immediately thought of the confusion of lust, tenderness, defensiveness, compassion, and joy he felt when he and Anya had kissed, not two weeks before, and wondered whether an uploaded mind could know such confused exhilaration. Gazing now at her beautiful face, he recalled the odd sense of relief he felt—while going through illegally obtained records on her personal background—upon discovering that she was genetically altered; it solved the mystery of her perfection. He smiled, wondering how it was that an anti-social natural child like himself could attract a
beautiful gene-job like her.

  She looked up and spotted him. As if reading his mind, she smiled back. She tapped a longish nail on her tablet, and Raymond felt a vibration in his wrist relay. He glanced down and saw he had a message from her. The subject line read "Eight o'clock". He looked back to her and nodded, smiling.

  The conference room's wall monitors lit up as voice-visual connections were established with the other two members of the team, Jake and Tim. Jake's face came up on one. He was in a hallway somewhere, a University Broadcast monitor behind him. On the other monitor was the face of a cartoon polar bear, which Raymond recognized as one of Tim's goofy avatars. Bob took a moment to look around the room.

  "Well, I expect you all know why I called this meeting. Jake and Tim," he said toward the wall displays, "I assume you're up on the news of the ruling?" Jake and the polar bear both nodded. Bob paused for a moment, preparing his thoughts, then launched into speech.

  "The ESW has ruled that the destructive uploading of human minds is unethical." There was a heaviness to his tone that was unfamiliar to Raymond. All in the room were keenly attentive. "No one is willing to accept that the electronic copy of a human brain is sufficiently faithful. The implication, as I'm sure you're all aware, is that destructive uploading constitutes murder, although it'll be up to national courts to resolve this."

  Bob paused, scanning the faces of those in the room. "You're probably all wondering what this will mean to our research. I would like to say that it means nothing—we could be years from human upload. We're just now entering the chimps phase, and this ruling has nothing to say about uploading non-human primates. But research doesn't happen without funding, and most of our funding is from corporations for whom chimp upload is worthless. From their point of view, this project is all about human upload, and this ruling makes that objective unethical. Which makes us a much less attractive investment."

  Bob paused again, gathering his thoughts.

  "I've taken the first step," he continued, "toward refacing the project, by changing the name to the Mind Upload Project—dropping the 'Human'. But don't worry... we still know what we're all about, and we'll just have to hope that some of the Naturalists on the ESW lose their seats in the next few years. Or, who knows, maybe we'll shift operations to Portugal, eh Anya?"

  She raised an eyebrow at his playful jab, a "yeah-right" look on her face. Portugal was famous for sheltering non-mainstream researchers. Knowing as he did that Anya's position on the team was likely short-lived, it seemed like a mean comment to Raymond; he was relieved by her mild response.

  Bob looked down at the table in front of him. "The unfortunate upshot of all this, I'm afraid, is that I can't retain a staff of thirteen for a chimp upload project. There's just not enough money for it." He looked up again, making brief eye contact with Raymond. "After year end, some of you will probably lose your positions. I know that's not far off... it's already October. I'm doing what I can to find new grant money, but we're suddenly a much weaker investment, and a risk to the public images of our investors. It will take at least a couple weeks before I can work out the details, but I wanted you to know the situation. I'm hoping I can convince some of the big players that it's still worth it to them. The decision could be overturned, or loopholes could creep in, in which case they would want to be backing the lead research team so they can be there when it pays off. But I'm not optimistic—not in the short term."

  "Bob," asked Anya, "is there any room on your other team?"

  "I'll see what I can do, but I can't make any promises. Naturally, I will do what I can to help anyone who ends up being cut. There's some related research going on here at Michigan, and I'm in touch with a lot of researchers elsewhere, as well. If I do have to let any of you go, and I hope I don't, I'll certainly do what I can to get you onto a relevant project. Other questions?"

  "Bob," asked Ellen, "can you tell us a little about how you would decide whom to cut?"

  "Sure. In fairness to you all, I should say that I have always been inclined to protect my scientists. Technical people generally have an easier time finding new positions. Their skills are more portable. That said, I'm also inclined to look out for the people who've been with me the longest." Raymond looked to Anya, and she looked back knowingly. The ones who had been with him the longest also happened to be the ones most willing to subjugate their own careers for the sake of his. "Dedication means a great deal to me. But please, I don't want anyone to get scared and bail on me before all the facts are in. I'm not gonna lift a finger to help someone who bails now, but I'll bust my ass to make life easier for anyone I have to let go. And I'd like to say that I am very proud of this team. Losing any one of you would be a great blow to our progress and to the comradery of the team."

  "What makes you think the Naturalists will lose power in the court?" asked Alfonso, one of the scientists.

  "Well, in all honesty, I don't see it happening any time soon. But ultimately, they will have to go. As you all know, I believe the jump from organic to digital is inevitable. We've already woven computers throughout the fabric of our society. We're at a point where we could pretty much let them take over, if we wanted to. I don't mean to come across as paranoiod, but if we're not careful that decision could become theirs. The only way to avoid being outmoded by computers is to merge with them. It's just a matter of time."

  Bob thrust his hands in his pockets and leaned forward, looking down. It was body language that Raymond had come to recognize as a signal that Bob was about to wax philosophical.

  "Life is all about the power of order," said Bob, calmly declarative. "The power to survive in the face of entropy. Evolution is the anti-entropy, and digital life is the next step. We don't want to give that next step away, to life-forms we merely created. We want it for ourselves, and a merger is the natural solution. There are plenty of people happy to hand the reins over to computers and live like pampered pets, but not me. We've built the vehicle that can take us to the next step, and it's just a matter of time before we get in and fire it up.

  "Of course, the ESW may never approve of destructive uploading... they may never be convinced that it makes sense to destroy one life-form to create another. Human upload may be put off until we figure out how to scan a mind without harming it. But I don't think so. What we're creating is a powerful life-saving technology, not one that kills. There are just too many people who don't want to die. Uploading offers longer life, and a richer, cleaner existence. And, ultimately, there's no getting around it—the powerful people of this world can't bear the thought of giving up all the heroism of a new era to computers. Artificial life is already racing ahead.

  "I tell you, once I get started..."

  There were smiles and chuckles all around.

  "To come back to the original question," said Bob, "the Naturalists are putting on the brakes, and that may be wise—destructive uploading today would be unethical. We're not there yet—there's too much risk. Frankly, I don't think Bento will be the same monkey on the other end of the upload. We're on the frontier of discovery. Mistakes happen. Ethics call for cautious progression here. But I feel like we're too close for caution to prevail for long... my guess is five years, max."

  The meeting dissolved into small discussions. Raymond waited for Anya to stand and went to her.

  "Well, this ruling came sooner than I expected," said Anya. Raymond nodded. "And things don't look so good for either one of us."

  "No kidding," replied Raymond. "We'll have to talk. I got your reply."

  "That was a sweet message you sent me."

  Raymond looked tenderly at Anya, wondering what message his Puck persona had created on his behalf.

  "Are you well-versed in Shakespeare, then?" she asked.

  "I find a sort of vicarious pleasure there, I suppose." Raymond recalled the sexy Midsummer Night's Dream virtual mini-adventure where he had first come across the Puck persona. Shakespeare, he gathered, was some sort of flowery-but-clever soft-porn script writer. "I hop
e my timing's not too bad. The mood will probably be pretty serious tonight."

  "No, no," she assured. "We won't let it get us too down. I'll cook a nice meal, open some wine... and hey—" She moved in, her hair drifting along his jaw line as she leaned into a whisper. "I'm really looking forward to getting to know you."

  She smiled, gave his arm a friendly touch, and moved past him out of the conference room.

  Chapter 5

  The lab cleared out early that afternoon. Anya and Suma stopped by Raymond's office on their way out to see if he wanted to leave with them.

  "Uh, no... I have some work I want to finish up."

  "I don't know how you can concentrate," said Suma.

  "I want to work through some of the problems that came up in the last test. If there's any slip in the Bento schedule, I don't want it to be because of me."

  Raymond exchanged a somber look with Anya. The intensity of it electrified him.