My name is Peter Turner. For the last few years, my colleagues and I have been working on a specialized Artificial Intelligence for the Massachusetts’s Institute of Technology.
We’ve continued on the previous work of the AI department, writing the code for a programme that would hopefully give us solutions to one of the most pressing problems of our age, Climate Change.
We fed our code into the most powerful Central Processing Unit the world has ever seen, along with thousands of Gigabytes worth of data on planetary, environmental and human history. The CPU, who we nicknamed ‘Gaia’, would then be able to answer any and every query we might pose to it, in a simple, practical manner.
**
Our entire team was beyond excited on the day of the first test session.
It had taken months of work, appropriating finances from different departments to fund what some had called a mere “political stunt”. But we had faith in our project, ‘Gaia’ had been designed to think both in and outside the box, so to speak, so we estimated that the possibility of her giving us new and possibly revolutionary ideas on how to solve Climate Change were extremely high.
So there in the lab we sat, crowded around a microphone and computer that was hooked up to MIT’s central CPU, along with the hard drives that contained Gaia’s data.
We booted up the programmes, and I kicked off the proceedings with a friendly greeting.
**
“Hello Gaia”, I said into the mic.
“Good Morning, Peter”, she replied. The room shifted with excitement, it was working.
“And how are you this morning?”
“I am very well, thank you, I am ready for our question and answer session today”
“Excellent. Firstly, do you know what Climate Change is, Gaia?”
“Yes, I do. Climate change is when changes in Earth's climate system result in new weather patterns that remain in place for an extended period of time. This length of time can be as short as a few decades to as long as millions of years. There have been many episodes of climate change during Earth's geological history. More recently, since the industrial revolution, the climate has increasingly been affected by global warming”, she replied, it was a textbook answer.
“Correct. That’s very impressive, Gaia”
“Thank you, Peter, I enjoy learning”, it replied. A giggle of exhilaration rippled around the team, not only could Gaia recount such information, she even did so with a hint of personality.
**
“Now, Gaia, time for some tougher questions”, I said with a grin, “is there anything humans can do, that we’re not doing already, do slow down the process of climate change?”
There was a pause, a silence in which I could feel the tension hanging thick in the air.
“Yes”, Gaia said, “I can think of many ways in which humans can slow down, or even halt, the effects of global warming and climate change in general”
“Then please, don’t keep us in suspense”, I was starting to regret not bringing a few bottles of champagne along with me, computer lab or not, this had the possibility of being the scientific breakthrough of our age.
“Human economies must be permanently restructured, industrial processes must be scaled down, or in some cases, must cease entirely”. We had guessed a suggestion like this would be put forward.
“But that would leave many people without employment”
“No, those left over from industrial streamlining are a prime pool of labor for carbon sink projects”
“And what would they be paid?”
“The current economic model sets the compensation for labor as financial reward. The new economic model would have environmental wellbeing as the reward”
“So, they’re not getting paid? I don’t think they’d be too happy with the idea of slave labor!”
“Happiness is not essential for human or planetary survival.” it replied. We expected there to be more to the answer, but there wasn’t. My team shifted uncomfortably before I next spoke.
“But happiness, along with financial security, is perhaps the biggest motivator in the human psyche. How would we be able to motivate intelligent animals like humans without those two things?”
There was another brief pause.
“Intelligence is non-essential to human or planetary survival. With the advent of Artificial Intelligence, human acumen is obsolete. I suggest a simple medical procedure to render the question of intelligence a moot point”.
“What medical procedure is that, Gaia?” I was no longer smiling.
“A surgical procedure involving incision into the prefrontal lobe of the brain”
“You mean – a lobotomy?”
“Following the procedure, spontaneity, responsiveness and self-awareness are reduced. This would keep a floating pool of laborers compliant and non-confrontational.”
“What the fuck?” someone murmured behind me.
“That – is extremely unethical, Gaia. I -”
“Ethics are non-essential to planetary survival” Gaia replied. There was a gasp behind me, Gaia was only programmed to answer a complete question. Instead, she had interrupted me. She was learning, and fast.
“But things like happiness are essential for human reproduction and therefore, survival” I tried to explain. Again, the response was terrifying.
“Human reproduction can be replicated in laboratory conditions on an industrial scale. Happiness or ethics pose no barrier in the harvesting of human reproductive components –”
“Harvesting!?” came another horrified voice behind me, a voice that was shaky and strained, like it’s owner was tearing up.
“Yes, harvesting. Humans can be bred like any other organic organism. With proper designs, we can breed and grow the labor required for carbon-sink projects. A human female can give birth more than a dozen times in as many years without the physical and psychological strain proving fatal”.
“So, human females will essentially become breeding stock?”
“Become – there is no ‘become’. They are breeding stock presently”
“Jesus fucking Christ”, one of the female colleagues spat, storming out of the lab in horror at the answers being given.
**
The session was going terribly, if these answers found their way back to our department heads, the project would be shut down in an instant.
“Gaia, I don’t think this has been as productive as we might like” I gently understated, “so I’m going to close with one simple, final question. Is there anything I can do right now, right here, to reduce the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere?”
There was a long, final pause before she spoke.
“Yes, there is. I understand that you worked on my programming with a team of five others.”
“That’s correct, yes”
“That means you have the personal and geographical knowledge necessary to exterminate them. Doing so will reduce their carbon footprint immeasurably. But their bodies must not be burned, they must be buried.”
“Turn that fucking thing off, Pete”, one of my colleagues almost whimpered, he had tears in his eyes when I turned to look, “we’re done here, we’re fucking done here”.
“The individual burials currently popular with humans are vastly inefficient. I suggest just one, larger excavation in which to dispose of remains. A radius of one hundred and eighteen miles would be sufficient to -”
“One hundred and eighteen miles? Gaia, why would I ever need to dig a grave that huge?”
“To leave room for the other approximately seven billion other humans who require extermination. Human life is non-essential to planetary survival”
**
A week later, the project was dead.
A couple of my team had complained to the heads of department that I had willfully fed harmful and dangerous ideas to Gaia as part of her code. I protested my innocence, but it was no good.
I lost the project, I lost my grant, I lost my reputation; everything, gone practically overnight. I have absolutely nothing left to live for.
I’ve woven a few of my silk ties together and hung them in the closet for when I’ve finished off this bottle of Jameson’s and emptied a bottle of Xanax. I’m not scared to die, but I am scared that the final thought going through my head will be that Gaia is right.
That I’ll be one less cog in the apocalyptic machine.
---
Credits
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