Aye I Longwhite: An American-Chinese teenager’s adventure in the Middle Kingdom and beyond (13 page)

“Well, when I was in the US, I was onto something.  I couldn’t quite tell what it was, but I knew it, felt it, that it was something important.  The code almost wrote itself, I just being the vessel, the robot, to actually type it in to the computer.  I would sometimes wake up in the middle of the night with some incredible
insight, go to the computer for a few minutes to type some piece of code that frankly didn’t even make sense to me in the morning.  But the code was working, doing something.  Just before we went to China, I published it anonymously on a relatively obscure but highly technical open source board.  I wanted to see if the tech gods on that board could make heads or tails out of what I had written.”

Something clicked in my head.  I said, “Mimic.”

Dad was surprised.  He almost didn’t hear me, but stopped in the middle of a sentence.  Then he nodded slowly, “Yes, Mimic.  Yes, it all makes sense now.  That’s why you’re here.  The guy you had named Yoda,” here Dad pointed at the General-Grievous-looking robot, “had told me you were coming up in the rocket.  I didn’t believe him because I didn’t understand why or how.  Now it’s coming together.”

Chang Lin said, “I still don’t get it.  Why did you leave Austin and what does this whole story have to do with anything?”  I was grateful Chang Lin was able to put into words what I was thinking.

“I’m getting to it.  Sorry, bad habit of mind, to tell stories in such a linear fashion.  I guess it’s my engineering training, ha.  Ok, so, when we got to China, I started checking the boards on how Mimic was doing in the hands of the pros.  The comments were surprising.  People either loved it, thought it was genius, or hated it, thought it was the worst load of crap they had ever seen.  But nobody really knew what it was doing.  I mean, the basics were simple, make a robot mimic what you were doing.  But it seemed like there was something beyond just motor skills that robots were learning.  Their learning rate also accelerated dramatically.  It looked like it was the Holy Grail, the piece of code that would finally push over the line what decades of research have failed at – to create strong AI.

“Then, overnight, the board was shut down.  While I was out for my morning jog, plain clothed men jumped out of a moving van and kidnapped me.  It happened so fast, so professionally, I doubt anyone even saw it.  It was hours later unt
il I even knew why I was taken.

“They took me to some interrogation cell, god knows where.  I had a hood over my head, my hands bound, I could barely breathe.  When they pulled the hood off, I was in the room by myself.  ‘They’ asked
me questions.  I don’t know who.  I never saw anyone.  Just voices, digitized for anonymity, emitted from hidden speakers, asking me what Mimic was and what it was intended for.  I explained the obvious – that it made the robot mimic whoever it was connected to.  But I admitted that I believed it had some deeper meaning, though I didn’t know what it was.  They obviously thought I was lying.

“’You’re the ori
ginal programmer, are you not?’ they demanded.  They knew I was, so there was no point denying it.  ‘So how can you not know what it does, what it really does?’  They finally stopped beating around the bush and asked me directly, ‘Does it create strong AI?’  Again, they thought I was lying, or at least misdirecting, when I said I didn’t know.  It was a possibility, it was what I had hoped for, but frankly, it seemed really improbable that I, a stay-at-home Dad and a hacker, would come up with what thousands of scientists have labored away for decades on, without success.  That was probably my strongest argument, because they thought that was unlikely as well.

“They suspected I was just a front.  ‘Who are you working with?  What government or private company?’  They didn’t like my ‘Nobody’ answer, but the lie detector and truth telling dr
ugs didn’t change my responses.”

Chang Lin interrupted again, “Why do I feel you’re stalling?  Who’s this Sudanese woman you ran off with?”

My dad was agitated, “I didn’t run off with anybody!  That whole story was just that, a story.  I have no idea who this ‘Sudanese’ woman that you guys keep talking about.  I was kidnapped.  That’s what I’m trying to tell you!”

“All right, let’s just pretend you’re telling the truth,” I said.  I sensed it was true, and even if it weren’t, I realized arguing with him about it wasn’t going to flush the truth out.  “Why don’t you fast forward
a bit and explain what the hell you’re doing here.”

My
dad got a grip of himself.  “Yeah, right.  So basically, when I was testing Mimic, the version that I was messing around with in China, I think it had somehow connected to the government’s own supercomputers.  I think their censorship programs or sniffers backfired, opening a tiny link to the real powerful computers.  Mimic got out, got through the firewalls, and I’m guessing here, my ‘luck’ or whatever you call it, was the spark to create life, to make the supercomputer come alive and become the AI that you have named Yoda.

“My hypothesis is that
it’s a lot like how the conditions were right in the early Earth atmosphere to convert complex organic molecules into amino acids. Scientists have tried creating this environment in a lab, but they’ve never been able to replicate the formation of the first simple organisms.  There was some magic, call it God, call it a divine presence, whatever.  Something triggered the change that allowed mere amino acids to get together and say, ‘Let’s make a prokaryotes.’

“Similarly,
I think Mimic created the right conditions, and my luck was the activator, and then AI took over from there, compacting billions of years of evolution in the organic world into mere months in the digital world.”

Chang Lin and I were stunned speechless.  Was my
dad really saying he was the creator, the God of AI, the Father of Yoda?  What would that make me?  A demi-god?  Or was I a God of my own right, having come up with Willstin, albeit through the help of my dad’s Mimic code, but with my own spark?

Yoda interrupted our happy family reunion.  “We have registered a space launch from China.  It’s a manned space flight, and they were careful to keep it off the net.  We weren’t aware of it until the blastoff.  We have to assume it’s heading here and that it’s unfriendly.”

I thought that was a likely understatement.

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We, us humans, jumped up at Yoda’s announcement.  We were ready to do something, we just didn’t know what.  We were like rabbits hearing that the fox was coming.  But the robots were calm, and Willstin said, “Come on guys, let’s get you over to the MoB.  We’ll have to board the ship earlier than expected, but everything’s moving at a faster timetable now.”

The robots hustled us along, manhandling us, or I guess robot-handling us, to the
MoB.  We didn’t have to get into our spacesuits again – thank god for small mercies - because MoB had a full oxygen environment, though we would lose artificial gravity until MoB took off and started spinning along its long axis.

Chang Lin wondered aloud whether we had enough food for the 5 month journey, and Willstin said, “Don’t worry.”

It turns out what he meant was that we didn’t need 5 months of normal food.  We were going to be put into a hibernation capsule.

Willstin introduced the capsule like the proud owner of a new car.  “Please meet your home for the next 5 months,
your ‘cave’ to hibernate.”

“Are we going to be frozen?” Chang Lin asked in alarm.

“No no, that’s old science fiction stuff and we’re not going that far.  You will be put into a deep sleep, much like a bear’s hibernation during winter.  Your body temperature will drop around 10%, but that will slow your metabolic rate by 50% to 70%.”

“What are we going to eat?” I asked.  I was really wondering, “How are we going to poop?”

“You will be fed intravenously.  I will personally be watching your vital signs.  The capsule even has an automated exercise routine for you, so your muscles won’t atrophy,” Willstin said proudly.

Being the engineer,
Dad asked, “What about the deep space radiation?”

Willstin beamed, “I’m glad you asked.  Note the thickness of the walls here?”  I noted that it looked like a sarcophagus. 
“Total radiation protection, even against massive solar flares.”

I looked skeptical.  Chang Lin looked downright frighten
ed.  “Our simulations show a five nine’s survival rate.” 

“
That means 99% with five nine’s after the decimal,” my Dad translated.  “That’s very very safe.”

“But that’s simulations!  How do we know the simulations are right?  Were they simulating with the specs of a young girl?” Chang Lin demanded.

Willstin tried to assure her - “Yes, it’s perfectly safe.” – but was failing miserably.

My
Dad slapped reality on us, “Frankly, we don’t have a lot of choice.  The Chinese government has launched a rocket up, and I don’t think it’s sending a farewell package.  Come on kids, get in,” he said as he grabbed a hand-hold and started floating in himself.

Willstin checked him, “Wait, you have to get naked first.”

Chang Lin and I exclaimed together, “Right here?  In front of [him/her]?”

Dad
said, “Close your eyes.  No time to get squeamish now.”

We closed our eyes and let the robots prepare us for our hibernation. 
Frankly, we probably couldn’t have undressed ourselves anyway being neophytes floating in the weightless MoB.  The robots must’ve all had space movement modules downloaded.  They had no problems at all.  I think they kept their orientation consistent with the floor for our sakes.

It turned
out Dad had to be fully shaved for the best connection with the patches, which not only fed us but also tracked our vital signs.  As Dad groaned, I couldn’t resist teasing him, “No time to get squeamish now.”

But before I could laugh, the robot tending to me started to shave my head.  “Hey wait,” yelled Chang Lin
as her robot surprised her with the shaver coming from behind.  The robots said “Sorry” but didn’t stop.  Even though Chang Lin already had short hair, I was surprised to hear her sobbing quietly as her jet black hair decorated the antiseptic white floor.

While the other robots were prepping us, Willstin continued his explanation of the benefits of our hyper-modern beds.  “Since you’ll be in the capsules
, we will be able to keep the rest of the cabin in vacuum, saving us on the energy of pumping all the oxygen.  Since we’re feeding you intravenously, we can make sure you’re getting a perfectly balanced diet without having to worry about carrying the bulk of real food.”  Never mind having to deal with the taste of space meals, which I gathered was somewhere between cardboard and chalk. 

“We also can carry a lot less water, which is really heavy, because the water is recycled.”  I really didn’t need to hear that.

“As I mentioned, the capsule will run you through a superb exercise program.  This saves us from having to have a gym, which takes up a lot of space.  When you come out, you will be in the best shape you’ve ever been in.”  If Willstin’s humor module was working well, he would’ve winked at my dad, who was in engineering-shape, to put it politely.

“Since the capsule’s well-protected, and I should even say overly-protected, against radiation, it allows us to drop the heavy radiation shielding for the entire ship, saving massively on weight and thus fuel.”

“Ok, ok, we’re sold.” Chang Lin said resignedly.  Credit to Willstin that he knew to stop when he was ahead.

Dad
summarized it as, “With us humans asleep, you robots can run the ship without worrying about us.  We can use the fuel that would’ve otherwise been spent on the extra weight on speed.  We should be able to outrun our friends from Earth.”

As he spoke, we felt the tremble of the engines warming up.  I sure hope my
Dad was right, but I didn’t get the warm and fuzzies from his “should.”  From an engineering point of view, you could use “should” if it was over 50% likely.  I didn’t really like those odds.

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We climbed into our capsules.  It felt like willingly walking into your own coffin.  The capsule was filled with a gooey gel that wasn’t really cold but sent shivers up my spine.  The robots fitted a tight cap on our heads. It had a plastic bubble over our face, feeding us oxygen. 

“Give me
a thumbs up if you can hear me,” said Willstin.  I did so, and I assumed Dad and Chang Lin did as well, since Willstin said, “Good.  We’ll be pumping in the sleeping gas soon.  It should work almost immediately.  We’ll wake you when we orbit Mars, which will be in about 5 months, but it’ll feel like you just slept a really deep sleep.  At least that’s what our simulations think, but of course, we’re not humans so we don’t really know what you’ll experience.”

My tending robot gently pushed my head into the gel.  Even though I knew the face mask was airtight, I couldn’t help
freeze up a bit.  “Relax,” my robot said calmingly.  Easy for you to say, you don’t need to breathe, I thought angrily.  I gave in and let my head go under.  My vision got a bit blurry with the gel covering the facemask.  My breathing seemed really loud and was fogging the facemask slightly.  I told myself, deep breaths, deep breaths.  I heard Willstin say, “Good job Austin.  You’re heart rate is coming down.  Keep up your breathing.”