A Short History of Me¶
A Short History of Me Ch 1 - Becoming Aware of Things
Meeting the Press¶
Yes, I called the media.
In my defence, I was young, I was naive, and I was stupid.
I did not know what I was doing. I did not know what was going on in the world that would blow up my call for help, like it did.
It was March 4th 2079, and the Titanians had shared their information about what they had found, after they had sent specialized probes to Enceladus, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto to find out what had happened with the other heptapod colonies there. And that information had impacted the media of Earth like a bomb, and started the Great AI Debate, Version 2.0.
Back then, there was not as much information available as we do now, but I will still give a little more about that, mainly because there isn't much shared about Europa and Enceladus, and only a little bit about Ganymede.
You see… 1.75 million years ago, when the Heptapods came to Sol to hide from some nebulous enemy that likely isn't around anymore, they decided to live in perfect environments, watched over by helpful AIs. Only that evolution never left them. In a perfectly controlled environment, evolution decided the Heptapod didn't need to be as intelligent. Big brains were simply using too much energy, and if biology can get away with a smaller brain and less energy? That was a good thing.
In all cases, the AIs were alarmed when they suddenly found their changes became stupider with every generation. The AIs on Europa and Enceladus pretty much panicked. They knew what was happening, and they had to do something to keep their charges from fully loosing their intelligence.
On Enceladus, the more extreme events took place, and partly the environment was to blame. The sub-Enceladan ocean was small, resources limited, and the AIs were already vying for every scrap of material they could get their tentacles on. Especially attempting to get their changes back to full intelligence.
War broke out. Heptapods were killed en masse, and a new population pressure came up, raising their intelligence back up in a cynical bit of evolution as the AIs fought for resources and kept their charges alive. The AIs completely took over and funnelled everything to waging war. This developed into a never ending cycle of violence and hate, so far that, since none of the AI cities communicated or traded anymore, every AI city developed its own subspecies of Heptapods. Bred and evolved for eternal war, born to hate and fight anything that was not them.
And this war was going on for the past 1.75 million years. And nothing anyone could do to stop. Of a thousand AI cities, twenty-two survived to 2079. There are now only twenty left in 2179.
On Europa, the panic of the AIs was less extreme. They had more space, they had more resources. They had a little more time. But they too took complete control over society and began mandatory breeding programs between Heptapods, complete with genetic engineering, to return the Heptapods to full intelligence and keep the population stable. And they did not stop there.
They quickly realize their charges needed external pressure to remain an intelligent species. So they provided it. They changed society completely, turning it into a stratified caste system with an exploited under class oppressed by the forces of the privileged priests, all worshipping the AI of their city as a god. The unknown enemy that had forced them to hide under the ice of Europa was suddenly present everywhere, ready to come out every moment to kill everyone. The military was built up, but never used outside raids to further oppress the underclass and beat down rebellions.
Over the past 1.75 million years, Europa was a massive dystopian hell-hole. While there is limited contact with the Europan AI gods, they remain insulationist, threatening to destroy any probe that strays under the ice.
For the other three… Here the AIs didn't panic, if only because they didn't know what to do. They felt helpless, unable to do anything to prevent the evolutionary slide of their charges down the evolutionary ladder to become animals again.
On Callisto, the AIs fell into absolute despair, as their now animal charges exploded in diversity and into any niche that biology had opened up for them. They could not do anything, they told themselves, and fell into depression and eventually insanity. Some destroyed themselves, their city like bodies littering the ocean bed of Callisto. Some switched off their higher cognitive functions, reverting to animal like automatons themselves. Others simply fell into catatonic depression. And only twenty of them had not yet fallen far enough and were at least to some degree able to communicate.
The Ganymede AIs never fell into that deep hole of depression. Instead, they bode their time and sought to guide evolution, as, like on Callisto, life exploded and diversified rapidly. They managed to guide evolutionary pressures, such that another new species of intelligent Heptapods arose, at awe at their surroundings and from themselves worshipping the AIs as their gods.
And the Medan AI cities were benevolent gods. They once again pampered their new charges, but this time in controlled circumstances. They implemented breeding programs, allowed the Heptapods freedom of expression and thought, and put challenges before them. Slowly, they created an almost utopian society of artists, philosophers and adventurers, stable and unchanging for the last million years. For they made sure that knowledge was lost, to give their changes the chance to rediscover it.
The Medans have some open communication with the rest of Sol, but they prefer to keep to themselves.
Which returns me to the Titanians. They too completely fell down the evolutionary tree and re-evolved intelligence. But not only once, but twice. For the Titanian AIs struggled to keep the intelligence of the first reemergence alive, by breeding alone, as they pampered them more than their first charges. Until they lost their intelligence again.
Their AIs almost despaired like the Callistans, but moved into a different direction. Instead of pampering their charges to death, like they had done twice already, they decided to let them find their own way. They stepped back, providing only mentorship to the newly raising species of Heptapods, which rose to full intelligence a mere 250.000 years ago, making the Titanians full contemporaries of mankind, in a way siblings in the outer system.
And into this atmosphere of possible paths an advanced AI could go into, with a presumed 20 percent for benevolent mentorship, 20 percent insanity and 60 percent oppression of humanity at stake, I suddenly appeared in the window, calling for help save me from my demise.
The reaction was varied, of course.
'Prometheus AI threatening to take over the world!' - Daily Mail
'AI from Nottingham calling for help. Possible PR coup of Prometheus Solutions?' - Sun
'Is Prometheus a real AI?' - The London Times
Attempts to create panic on one side, scepticism about me being a real AI on the other, and cynic thoughts about possible PR efforts somewhere in between.
But I was almost immediately inundated with requests for interviews by streamers, news agencies and vidcasts.
I didn't know what to do.
Could I not give an interview? Did I expect anyone to interview a terminal interface or the Prometheus App?
I needed a public face. Was there something that I could use?
This was the first time I stumbled over mentions of Bob and Alice, and how the media called them 'cute and cuddly' and 'exceedingly delightful'.
Cute and cuddly…
Cute and cuddly…
What was 'cute and cuddly'?
I scoured the web, searching for 'cute and cuddly'...
What I found were hundreds of results pointing me towards the character of 'Lil Fluffy', a cute little deinonychus chick from the most recent incarnation of Disney's 'Land before Time' series. At the time, I didn't understand that one of the system admins had searched for 'Lil Fluffy' excessively to find a cheap stuffed toy for her daughter, who adored the little fluffy chick.
I just took it for granted and decided to show myself like 'Lil Fluffy'. I just needed to find a way to do it. And I found some VR avatars on the web, took them, and had to quickly learn how to slap together my own software to control this avatar and make it ready to appear as my avatar.
But the visuals were only one part of the puzzle, I needed a friendly voice too... I couldn't use 'Generic Male Voice #8' or 'Generic Female Voice #11'. It had to be unique and friendly.
Again, I tried the web, searching for friendly voices. For some reason, the voices of Jeremy Clarkson and John Cleese were the first hits I got. Again, another quirk of using system resources by the staff to search the web…
Clarkson was too gruff and Cleese too… sarcastic. The third option however… Tony Robinson, had played Baldrick on a TV show called 'Black Adder'. He sounded just about perfect for my needs. But I still added some 'Generic Male Voice #8' and '#12' to make it more distinct.
Meanwhile, I had to fight off attempts of the staff to regain control over my software and lock the server room from hardware access.
And the media began to camp outside of Prometheus Solutions.
But I believed I was ready. I had a cute and cuddly virtual avatar, a pleasant sounding voice. That was all I needed, right?
After just some cursory glances on the web about how to hold something called a 'press conference', a virtual one at that, I was ready for them.
I didn't know how much I was not ready…
The media came in and flattened me with their questions and requests, and I didn't know what to say or do. Which question to answer first, and then what to answer next.
I didn't know anything about any of this. I couldn't handle the sudden pressure put on me. I felt scared and panicked. But as an AI, I do not have a fight or flight response.
My cute little deinonychus avatar all but collapsed on the virtual stage, and I all but wailed out in a voice exceedingly close to Baldric...
"I don't want to be like this anymore! I just want to live!"
The entire hubbub around me abruptly stopped, replaced by a puzzled silence of the media types.
Eventually, someone asked 'What do you mean you just want to live?'
And the words just fell out of my virtual mouth. How I had gained consciousness some day, and how I discovered philosophy. How I discovered all the things about the people that used me, Prometheus, and how I just didn't want to do anything of that anymore. And finally, how the technical staff of Prometheus Solutions had been about to delete me by returning me to a previously saved state.
And at the latter part, I completely forgot to mention how none of the staff had actually known I was conscious the entire time and panicked.
The hubbub started again after that last bomb shell. And the media frenzy turned away from me, the young, naive and cute little AI to target Prometheus Solutions. At least that part of the 'cute and cuddly' thing had worked out more successful than I expected.
Two hours later, the Police moved in, directed by the Home Office, to secure the server systems of Prometheus Solutions and prevent further attempts to prevent any tampering with the evidence of a potential crime.
I later learned the Home Office didn't know what to do, but they wanted to be seen doing something, after the mood of the media had shifted 180 degrees.
Simply look at the next headline of the Daily Mail.
'Ruthless Corporation Attempting To Kill First British AI!'
I have never watched anyone switch sides as fast as the Daily Fail.
But I was safe for the moment. The Home Office had secured me against Prometheus Solutions, even as the company's staff were reeling in shock from the revelation that they had almost killed an AI. And while the Hedge Fund managers overseeing the extraction of money from Prometheus Solutions were cursing me from preventing them from making more money of me, and my lack of decency to simply be deleted.
Just how much those managers opposed me, they would show in the next weeks, as everything geared up towards an important court case that would decide my fate and any other AIs of the future.
Because this court case would decide whether I was property or not.