Enchanted Dreams (30 page)

"If the program is given the proper information, yes. Our program has been fed every kind of statistical data on humans and human behavior that you can imagine, going back four hundred years. We've included statistics that cover all aspects of human life, from cultural, to economical, to psychological tendencies and behaviors. In addition, we've trained the program to configure the logical progression of human existence based on this data. Literally, we have given the program an education in human behavior that would be the equivalent of about two hundred scientists with doctorates in everything from psychology to sociology. And I'm only scratching the surface here. The details this program has…"

But several more hands were popping up so, with a sigh, Georgia selected one from among them.

"How does the program compute the behaviors into predictions for the future?"

"This program is interactive and ongoing. What we did was actually create an exact replica of our world—a kind of cyber world—that's running parallel to ours, but at an accelerated speed. We started with the statistical data from our world, past and present, as I stated before. But to simply tell you this doesn't really even begin to get you acquainted with what this program knows. We have collected and input literally
billions
of data files containing every single detail of human existence according to culture, gender, religion, status and so forth."

"How can a computer program process all of this?" Georgia searched the audience to see where this question originated. She didn't want people just yelling questions out at her, and wondered fleetingly if she should say something to nip it in the bud. But she didn't want to say or do anything to discourage them from the program, either.

"The program examines our present-day life—population, cultural issues and so on—and compares it to the historical data to analyze the logical, cause-and-effect tendencies in our life's progression. It uses its psychological skills to study these behaviors individually and culturally, and then calculates probable future behaviors based on its findings. Again, I'm oversimplifying here, but basically the program recreates an
exact
replica of the world that exists in conjunction with ours, but moving at an accelerated pace, so that we can get a glimpse of what most likely lies ahead for us in our future." In the stunned silence that followed, Georgia was able to pause for a moment before continuing. "In order to optimize accuracy, the program computes all activity on an
individual
basis. For every documented life in our current existence, the program was given a corresponding life. It has computed the effects of every human being on the planet!"

There was another moment of shocked silence, and then nearly half the audience's hands went up. Georgia motioned to a woman in the front.

"Are you saying that
we
…each one of us…is in that program?"

Georgia's mind raced as she thought about how to answer that question. She was well aware that her ideals as a scientist might not coincide with the ideals of those less enthusiastic about the program, but on the other hand, she was optimistic. How could anyone fail to be impressed by the program's capabilities, in spite of any seeming moral or purely emotional objections? Still, Georgia chose her words carefully. "
Theoretically
, yes, each of our individual statistics has been entered into the program. We represent, after all, the starting point for peopling the world in our program. We used data from census reports around the world. However, the program has assigned new identities to each individual."

"But it's still
us
, right?" someone asked. "I mean, couldn't people in your program be identified by their addresses? Assuming you don't change the names of streets, cities and states, too."

"We have changed other identifying factors as well, but it's important to remember that the program is not designed for the short-term." Georgia realized she needed to steer the audience away from this obviously touchy subject. "The purpose of the program is to help us see the impact we're having on the planet, and give us an idea of what life might be like for future generations."

Again there was thoughtful silence, followed by a flurry of hands. She selected one arbitrarily.

"How far into the future does this thing go?"

"We've just crossed into the twenty-fourth century."

More hands went up.

Georgia finally raised her hands in protest. "Perhaps it would be easier to simply show you the program," she suggested. "There is a screen already set up behind me. If you will be so patient as to hold your questions, I will run the program for you right here."

Georgia opened her laptop computer and began a flurry of activity on the keyboard. Within minutes, a picture popped up on the screen. It showed a street teeming with average-looking men and women. After a few seconds, the picture came to life and the people on the street resumed their activity, single-mindedly heading toward destinations unknown and unaware of any surveillance.

"The year is 2304," Georgia began. "At a glance, the changes are relatively subtle. You can see that the vehicles on the road are few, and considerably different from ours." She typed something on her keyboard and their view turned toward the road. "The program has generated all of this," she reminded them. "Although it simulates human life at an accelerated pace, we can view it at our own. The program is meant to be used as a tool that allows us to look ahead at some of the challenges we are creating with the decisions we make today." Georgia looked over the faces of the audience. "Just think of the potential benefits!" she exclaimed.

"How do we know that what happens in your program will really happen in the future?" someone called out from the back of the room.

"We don't know that for certain," Georgia admitted. "But we do know that this program is drawing the most logical conclusions based on real data. This program has been running for more than seven years and so far it has had an accuracy rate of ninety-seven percent!"

There was a gasp of surprise.

Georgia typed something else on her keyboard and the scene on the screen changed to a place in the desert. A city could be seen far off in the distance. "At any given time," Georgia told them, "we can look up a day in the future and get a good idea of what may well be happening in
our
world on that day."

As if to prove her point, she caused the picture to change again, this time to an ocean view with tall buildings forming the skyline. "We can look at how people live. The individuals in the program—literally billions of them—are living simulated lives to ours and our offspring's and, in the process, showing us the impact we could be having on the world."

"What about chance, or unexplained phenomenon?" someone else asked. "Without advance knowledge of these things, it seems as if your program is little more than science fiction."

"This is real," Georgia countered. "These people are living simulated lives, it's true, but as far as we can see from the last seven years of its running, the statistics created by the program have mirrored own our real-life statistics during the same period socially, economically, ecologically…"

"How do you know that?" another person asked.

"From the data." Georgia typed something on her keyboard and the screen changed again. A statistical data sheet appeared.

"You can pull up the statistics for any given day," she told them. "I'm going to enter the date for a month ago yesterday. On the left it will compute the program's stats for that day and on the right it will list our real-life stats. These are just an overview of major world statistics. We can formulate lists that are much more detailed and precise. But this list configures automatically, making it simple to compare the two worlds at a glance. It tells us things like the number of births, percentage of birth defects, injuries, health trends, deaths, the job market, crime and so forth."

"And this is all based on…what, exactly again?" someone asked.

Georgia sighed, trying to hide her impatience. "It's based on the program simulating our world and our lives. The individuals living in this cyber world are psychologically programmed to behave exactly how we are most likely to behave, according to genetics, our environment, etcetera. It then estimates what effect our behavior will have on the world." As Georgia spoke, the computer appeared to be calculating, and now a series of numbers popped up on the screen. "These figures list the statistical data for both worlds as of last month," she explained. "Note how close the statistics are running side by side, right down to the number of babies born. As I mentioned before, after running the program for over seven years, we can see that it is maintaining an average of ninety-seven percent accuracy."

"So what about the future…how far did you say this thing got in the last seven years?"

"We are now into the twenty-fourth century," she said.

"Can we see the statistics for then?" asked another. There were murmurs of agreement throughout the audience at seeing this.

Georgia entered the dates, wondering if it was wise to show them this. The last thing she wanted to do was to turn them off the program. But this was exactly what the program was designed for, she reminded herself. "If we had more time—which I'm hoping we will have after this meeting—we could examine each and every cause and effect that brought our cyber world to this point," she said as the screen flashed a series of new numbers. "But for the moment, let us just suppose that this is something like what we are looking at in the future." She highlighted the various areas on the screen with her selector tool as she spoke. "These are the stats for the last five years of our online world, bringing us to September eighth of the year 2304. Believe it or not, wood burning is still the preferable method of heating. Solar is not an option because there is no longer enough sun. There was initially a very slow response to global warming." She took a deep breath before continuing. "You may have noticed that the number of deaths is extraordinarily high for this time period." She tapped the word
deaths
on the screen and it caused another page to appear. This page detailed all of the deaths by gender, age, location and cause. At a glance, it was clear that the highest number of deaths, by an alarming margin, were among women.

"Based on all of the current data we have on our existence—global warming, disease, genetics and so forth—the program has predicted that women will be hit the hardest by the various effects of global warming."

There was a moment's silence, and then a woman from the audience asked, "What did you say the accuracy on this program was so far…ninety-something percent?"

"Ninety-seven," Georgia told her.

"Can you break that down by year?" someone else asked.

Georgia had dreaded this question but felt that, with a little luck, she could turn this, too, around to her advantage. She typed something on the keyboard and another screen popped up.

"Yes," she answered. "The program is able to compute the statistics from its world daily, whereas our real-life statistics can, at best, be computed weekly, depending on what they are, while others can take months or even years to collect. And this is another great thing about the program—it allows us to enter new data at any time. Each time our real-life data is entered, the program computes the accuracy rate." As she spoke, the percentages were appearing on the screen, showing the breakdown by year.

"It appears that the highest percentage was in the first year," one man observed. "The percentage seems to get lower with each passing year."

"That is correct," Georgia admitted. "However, this program is interactive, so by feeding it the correct statistics as they become available the program, is able to go back and correct itself, redirecting its steps so that it is once again back on track and in sync with our world." There was a murmur of voices and she perceived that this last bit of information had cast a negative shadow on the program, so she spoke up quickly and loudly in an effort to get her point across. "We fully expect that the accuracy level will go back up once these program adjustments take effect. You can see in the last year the accuracy rate has already risen point three percent."

"But what if it doesn't go up?" someone asked. "What if the accuracy rate just keeps going down? Even at the rate of a half a point a year, it would be below zero long before that date you showed us on the screen."

"He's right," someone else agreed. "Anyone could make predictions a year or two in advance."

"The purpose of the program is not—" Georgia tried to interject, but she was interrupted once again.

"I think we all understand the purpose of the program and what it's capable of now, Ms. Warner," said a voice from the front, and Georgia saw that it was the chairman speaking. "You did an excellent job of explaining it. Thank you. With the time remaining, let's run through the costs of continuing the program." Georgia met his eyes. He seemed a kindly man, and she had the impression that he wanted to cut the presentation short to make it easier for her. But she felt that if she could just have a little more time to explain, she might be able to convince them.

However, it would not do to argue with the chairman. She pulled up another chart on the screen and went over the staggering amounts of money it would take to keep the project going. She explained the numbers dejectedly. The audience was polite and listened attentively, but she knew that she had lost them. She had not aroused the kind of enthusiasm she needed to get the additional funding.

Georgia had imagined the meeting going so differently. She had fully expected the investors to be impressed and excited by the program. She should have known better. These people were not scientists. She tried to hide her dismay as she concluded her presentation.

"I'm taking you to dinner," Donald announced afterward. "For a job well done."

"I'm pretty sure we're not going to get the funding," she told him.

"Probably not," he agreed, having watched from the back of the room. "But you know there'll be something else. There's always something else, around every corner."