Tom started to hang around in the Institute a lot more than he was supposed to as a volunteer assistant mentor. He wanted to move up and he could not summon the courage to study at home. He often felt like he was getting nowhere but he had had that feeling before and he knew others in his situation probably felt just as bad about their limited progress. To work with M, you had to understand how formal grammars work, and understand it really well because… Well… If you wanted to ask a question to the Lab, and if there were no Prolog or FuzzyCLIPS commands or functions in it, they would not even look at it. Rick had dangled out the perspective of potential involvement in these ‘active learning’ sessions with M, and that’s where he wanted to get.

He understood a lot more about M now. She had actually not read GEB either: she could not handle such level of ambiguity. But she had been fed with summaries which fit into her ‘world view’, so to speak. Well… Not even ‘so to speak’ really: M had a world view, in every sense of the word really: a set of assumptions about the world which she used to order all facts she accepted as ‘facts’, as well as all of her conjectures about them. It did not diminish his awe. On the contrary, it made her even more human-like, or more like him: he didn’t like GEB. He compared it to ZAMM: a book which generated a lot of talk but which somehow doesn’t manage to get to the point. Through his work and thinking, he realized he – and the veterans he was working with – had a tendency to couch his fears of death and old age in philosophical language and that, while M accommodated such questions, her focus was different. When everything was said and done, she was, quite simply, a radical behaviorist: while she could work with concepts such as emotions and motives, she focused on observable and quantifiable behavioral change, and never doubted the central behaviorist assumption: changes in behavior are to be achieved through rewarding good habits and discouraging bad ones. She also understood changing habits takes a lot of repetition, and even more so as people age – and so her target group was not an easy batch in that regard, which made it even more remarkable that she achieved the results she did.

He made a lot friends in the Institute. In fact, he would probably not have continued without them, which confirmed the importance of a good learning environment, or the social aspect of organizations in general: one needs the tools, but the cheers are at least as essential. His friends included some geeks from the Lab. Obviously: he reached out to them as he knew that’s where he was weak. Terribly weak.

The Lab programmed M, and tested it continuously. Its activities were classified ‘secret’, a significant notch above the level for which Tom had been cleared, which was ‘confidential’ only. He got close with one guy in particular, Paul, if only because Paul was able to talk about something else than computers too and, just like Tom, he liked sports. Paul was different. Not the typical whizkid. No small wonder he was pretty high up in the pecking order. They often ended up jogging the full five or six mile loop in Central Park. On one of these evenings, Paul seemed to suffer from his back.

‘I need to stop, Tom. Sorry.’

They halted.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘I am sorry, Tom. I think I have been over-training a bit lately. I feel like I’ve overstretched my back muscles while racing Sunday.’

Paul was a runner, but a mountainbike fanatic as well. Tom knew that was not an easy combination as you get older: it involves a very different use of the muscles. Paul had registered himself to join in the New York State’s cross-country competition. Sunday’s Williams’ Lake Classic had been the first in this year’s NYS MTB cross-country series. There were four more to go. The next one was in two weeks already.

‘That’s no surprise to me. I mean, running and biking. You know it’s very different. You can’t compete in both.’

‘Yeah. Not enough warm-up I guess. It was damn fast. It was not my legs. I just seemed to have pulled my back muscles a bit. You should join, man! It’s… Well… An experience let’s say. You think you’re in shape but then you have no idea until you join a real race. It’s tough. I lost two pounds at least. I mean permanently. Not water. That’s like four or six pounds. It’s just tough to re-hydrate yourself. But then you’re so happy when you make the cut. I was really worried they would pull me out of the race. I knew I wasn’t all that bad, but then you do get lapped a lot. It’s grueling.’

He had been proud to finish the race indeed. It was a UCI-sanctioned race and so they had applied the 80% rule: guys whose time on a lap was obviously below 80% of the race leader’s first lap – which is equivalent to guys who get lapped too easily – were pulled out of the race. He had managed the race in about three hours – one hour more than the winner. He had finished. He had a ranking. He had been happy about that. After all, he was in his mid-forties. This had been his first real race.

Tom actually did have an idea of what it was: Matt was doing the same type of thing and, judging from his level of fitness, it had to be tough indeed.

‘I think I do know what it means. Or a bit at least. I’ve got a friend whom I think is doing such races as well. He is – or was – like me: lots of muscles, no speed. I think it’s great you try to beat those young kids. Let’s stop and stretch for a while.’

‘I feel like wiped out. Let’s go and have a drink.’

They sat down and – unavoidably – they started talking shop. Tom harped on his usual obsession: faster roll-out.

‘Tom… Let me be frank. You should be more patient. Tone it down. Everybody likes you but you need to make friends. You’re good. You combine many skills. That’s what I like you. You talk many ‘languages’ – if you know what I mean. You’ve got the perfect background for this program. You can make a real difference. But this program will grow at its own pace, and you’re not going to change that pace.’

‘What is it really? I mean, I understand this is a US$100+ million dollar program. So it’s big – and then it’s not. I mean, the Army spent billions in Iraq – or in Afghanistan. And it’s gearing up for Syria and Egypt now. But so we’re using the system to counsel a few thousand veterans only. If we would cover millions of people, the unit cost would make a lot more sense, wouldn’t it? I am sorry to ask but what is it about really? What’s behind?’

‘Nothing much, Tom. What do you want me to say? What do you expect? You’re smart. You impress everyone. You’ve been around long enough now to know what’s going on. The whole artificial intelligence community – me in the first place – had been waiting for a mega-project like this for a very long time, and so the application to veterans with psychological problems is just an application which seemed right. We needed critical mass. None of the stuff till now had critical mass. We needed a hundred million dollars – as ridiculous as it seems. You are working for peanuts – which I don’t understand – but I am not. Money burns quickly. Add it up. That’s what it took. But look at it. It’s great, isn’t it? I mean – you’re one of the guys we need: you rave about it. The investment has incredible significance so one should not measure its value in terms of unit costs. We have got it right, Tom. We finally have got it right. You know, the field of artificial intelligence has gone through many… well… what we experts call ‘AI winters’: periods during which funding dried up, during which pessimism reigned, during which we were told to do something more realistic and practical. We have proved them wrong with this. OK, I have never earned as much as I do now. Should I feel guilty about that? I don’t. I am not a Wall Street banker. I feel vindicated. And, yes, you’re right in every way. M is fine. There’s no risk of it spinning out of control or so. But scaling it up more rapidly than we do would require some tough political decisions and, so, yes, it all gets stalled for a while. I don’t worry. The scale-up went great, and so that helps. People need time to build confidence.’

‘Confidence in what?’

‘People want to be sure that making M available for everyone, M as a commodity really, is OK. I mean, you’re right in imagining the potential applications: M could be everywhere, and it could be used to bad ends. It would cost more for sure. And more than you think probably: building up a knowledge base and tuning the objective function and all of the feedback loops and all that is a lot of work. I mean re-programming M so she can cover another area is not an easy thing. It’s not the kind of multipurpose thing you seem to think it is. And then… Well, at the same time, I agree with you – on a fundamental level that is: M actually is multipurpose. In essence, it can be done. But let’s suppose it is everywhere indeed. What are the political implications? Perhaps people will want the system to run the justice system as well? Or they’ll wonder why Capitol Hill needs all that technical staff and consultants if we’ve got a system like this – a system which seems to know everything and which does not seem to have a stake in discussions. Impartial. God-like really. I mean, think all the way through: introducing M everywhere is bound to provoke a discussion on policy and how our society functions really. Just think about how you would structure M’s management. If M, or something like M, would be everywhere, in every household really – imagine anyone who has an issue can talk to her – the system would also know everything about everyone, wouldn’t it? It would alter the concept of privacy as we know it, isn’t it? The fundamentals of democracy. I mean… We’re talking the separation of powers here…’

Paul halted: ‘Sorry. I am talking too much I guess. But am I exaggerating, Tom? What do you think? I mean… I may be in the loop here and there but, in essence, I am also clueless about it all really.’

‘You mean there are issues related to control – political control – and how the system would be governed? But that’s like regulating the Internet, isn’t it? I mean that’s like the ongoing discussions on digital surveillance or WikiLeaks and all that, isn’t it? Whenever there is a new technology, like when the telephone became ubiquitous as a tool for communication, there’s a corresponding regulatory effort to define what the state can and cannot do with it. That regulatory effort usually comes with a lag – a very substantial lag, but it comes eventually. And stuff doesn’t get halted by it. The private sector finds a way to move ahead and the public sector follows – largely reactive. So why restrict M?’

‘I agree, in principle that is, but in practice it’s not so easy. As for the private sector, they’re involved anyway. They won’t go it alone. I mean… Google had some ideas and we talked them out of it and – surprisingly – it’s Google which is currently getting this public backlash at the moment, while the other guys were asking no questions whatsoever. All in all, we manage to manage the big players as for now but, yes, let’s see how long it lasts. When we talk about this in the Lab, we realize there are a zillion possibilities and we’re not sure in which direction to go. For example, should we have one M, or should we have a number of ‘operators’, each developing and maintaining their own M-like system? What would be the ‘core’ M-system and what would be optional? You know that M could be abused, or at least used for other purposes than we think it should. M influences behavior. That’s what M is designed for. But so can we hand over M to one or more commercial companies operating the system under some kind of supervisory board? And how would that Board look like? Public? Private?  Should the state control the system? Frankly, I think it should be government-owned but then, if it would be the US government controlling it, you can already hear the Big Brother critics. And they’re right: what you have in mind is introducing M – or M-like systems – literally everywhere. That’s the potential. And it’s not potential. It’s real. Damn real. I think we could get M in the living room in one or two years from now. But so we haven’t even started to think about the regulatory issues, and so we need to go through these. So it’s the usual thing: everything is possible, from a technical point of view that is, but so the politicians need to understand what’s going on and take some big decisions.’

‘When do you think that’s going to happen?’

‘Well… If there would be no pressure, nothing would happen obviously, but so there is pressure. The word is out. As you can imagine, there is an incredible buzz about this. Abroad as well, if you know what I mean. I mean… Just think about China: all the effort they’ve put into controlling the Internet. They use tools for that too of course but, when everything is said and done, the Chinese government controls the Internet through an army of dedicated human professionals. Communist Party officials analyzing stuff and making sure no one goes astray. But so now we’ve got M. No need for humans. We’ve found the Holy Grail, and we found it before they did. They’ll find it soon. M can be copied. We know that. The politicians who approved the funding for this program and control it know that too. So just be patient. The genie is out of the bottle. It’s just a matter of time, but so we are not in a position to force the pace.’

‘Wow! I am just a peon in this whole thing. But it is really intriguing.’

‘What exactly do you find intriguing about it?’

‘Strangely enough, I feel I am still struggling more with the philosophical questions – rather than the political questions you just raised. Perhaps they’re related…’

‘What philosophical questions?’

‘Well… I call it artificial consciousness. I mean we human beings are study objects for M. She must feel different than we do. I wonder how she looks at us. She improves us. She interacts with us. She must feel superior, doesn’t she?’

‘Come on, Tom. M has no feelings like you describe it. I know what you are hinting at. It’s very philosophical indeed: we human beings wondering why we are here on this blue planet, why we are what we are and why or how we are going to die. We’re scared of death. M isn’t it. So there’s this… Well… Let’s call it the existential dimension to us being here. M just reasons. M just thinks. It has no ‘feelings’. Of course, M reasons from its own perspective: in order to structure its thought, it needs a ‘me’. I guess you’ve asked M about this? You should have gotten the answers from her.’

‘I did. She says what you are saying.’

‘And that is?’

‘Well… That she’s not into mysticism or existentialism.’

‘Are you?’

Tom knew he risked making a bad impression on Paul but he decided to give him an honest reply: ‘Well… I guess I am, Paul. Frankly, I think all human beings are into it. Whether or not they want to admit is another thing. I admit I am into it. What about you?’

Paul smiled.

‘What do you think?’

Tom thought a split second about how he’d react to this but why would he care?

‘You join these races. You’re pushing yourself in a way only a few very rare individuals do. For me, that says enough. I guess we know each other. If you don’t want to talk about it, then don’t.’

Paul’s smile got even bigger.

‘I guess you’re right. Well… Let me say I talk to M too but I would never fall in love with it… I mean, you talk affectionately about ‘her’. Promise, that’s how you call her… I don’t. No offense. We are all flabbergasted by the fact it is so perfect. The perfect reasoning machine. But it lacks life. Sorry for saying but I often think the system is like a beautiful brainless blonde: you get infatuated easily, but M is not what we’d call relationship material, isn’t it?’

Now Tom smiled: ‘M is not brainless. And she’s a beautiful brunette. Blonde is not my type. What if she is my type?’

They both burst out in laughter. But then Paul got somewhat more serious again.

‘The interface. It’s quite remarkable what difference it makes, isn’t it? But you’ve been through it now, haven’t you? I’ll admit I like the interface too. That’s why we don’t work with it. It’s been ages since I used it. Not using it is like taking a step back in time. Worse. It’s like talking to your beloved ones on the phone without seeing them. Or, you know, that woman you get infatuated with but then you get separated for a while and you communicate by e-mail only and you suddenly find she’s just like you: human, very human. You know what I mean. It lacks the warmth. It’s worse than Skype. You’re suddenly aware of the limitations of words. We humans are addicted to body language and physical nearness in our day-to-day communications. We do need people to be near us. Family. So, yeah, to really work on M, you need to move beyond the interface and then it becomes rather tedious. Do you really want to work a bit on that, Tom? I mean, we have obviously explored all of that in the Lab. There’s tons of paper on that. This topic actually is one of the strands in the whole discussion, although it has little or no prominence for the moment. To be frank, I think that discussion is more or less closed. But so if you’re interested, we can give you access to the material and you can see if you’ve got something to add to it. But I’d advise you to stick to your counseling. I often think it’s much more satisfying to work with real-life people. And you must feel good about what you do: people can relate to you. You have been there. I mean… I never got to spend more than like one or two days in a camp. I can’t imagine how it changes you.’

‘Did you go out there at all?’

‘Sure. What do you think? That they would let me work on a program like this without sending me on a few fact-finding missions so I could see what it’s like to serve in Iraq or Afghanistan? I didn’t get out really but I talked to people.’

‘What did you think of it?’

‘It’s surreal. You want my frank opinion? It’s surreal. You guys were not in touch with society over there.’

‘I agree. We were not. If the objective is fucked up, implementation is usually not much better – save a few exceptions. Deviations from the mean. I’ve seen a few. Inspiring but not relevant. I agree.’

‘I respect you guys. You guys were out there. I wasn’t.’

‘So what? You have not been out but you were in. Can I ask you something else? It’s related and not.’

‘Sure.’

‘We talked about replication of M. Would M ever think of replicating herself?’

‘I know what you’re thinking of. The answer is no. That’s the stuff of bad movies: programs that are re-programming or copying themselves and invade and spread and expand like viruses. First, we’ve got the firewalls in place. If ever we would see something abnormal, we could shut everything down in an instant. We track what’s going on inside. We track its thoughts so to say. I mean, to put it somewhat simplistically, we would see if it would suddenly use a lot of memory space or other computer resources it was not using before. Everything that’s outside of the normal. You can imagine all the safeguards we had to built in. Way beyond what’s necessary really – in my view at least. We’ve done that. And so if we don’t program the program to copy itself, it won’t. We didn’t. You can ask her. Perhaps you’ve asked already. M should have given you the answer: M does not feel the need to copy itself. Why would it? It’s omnipresent anyway. It can and does handle hundreds or thousands of parallel conversations. If anything, M must feel like God, and, if God exists, we do not associate God with producing copies of him or herself, do we? We also ran lots of experiments. We’ve connected M to the Internet a couple of times and programmed it to pose as a therapist interested in human psychology and all that. You won’t believe it but it is actually following a few blogs and commenting on them. So it converses in the blogosphere now too. It’s an area of operational research. So it’s out there already.’

Tom looked pensive.

‘She passes the Turing test, doesn’t she? Perfectly. But how creative is she really? How does she select? I mean, like with a blog? She can comment on everything, but so she needs to pick some piece. Would she ever write a blog herself? She always need to react to something, doesn’t she? Could she start writing from scratch?’

While Paul liked Tom, he thought this discussion lacked sophistication.

‘Sure it can. Creativity has an element of randomness in it. We can program randomness. You know, Tom. Just hang out in the Lab a bit more. There are plenty of new people arriving there and you might enjoy talking to them on such topics. It is often their prime interest but then later they get back to basics. To be frank, I am a bit tired of it as you can imagine you’re not the first one to ask.’

‘Sure, Paul. I can imagine. But I have no access to the Lab as for now. I need to do the tests and get cleared.’

‘I can give you access to bits and pieces even before that – especially in these areas which we think we’ve exhausted a bit. The philosophical stuff indeed. Sorry to say.’

‘It would be great if you could do that.’

‘I’ll take care of it. OK. Time to go home now for me, I think. I’ve got a family waiting. How are you doing on that front?’

‘I know I am just not ready for a relationship at the moment. It will come. I just want to take my time for it. I am still re-discovering myself a bit here in the US.’

‘Yeah. I can imagine. Or perhaps I can’t. You’ve been out. I have not. Enjoy being back. I must assume it gets boring way too quickly.’

‘Not on this thing, Paul. I feel so privileged. It’s brilliant. This is really cutting-edge.’

‘Good. Glad to hear that. OK then. See you around.’

‘Bye, Paul. Thanks again. So nice of you to take time for me.’

‘No problem. It’s good to run and chat with you. You can’t do that with M.’

Tom smiled and nodded. There was a lot of stuff one couldn’t do with M. But then she did have a Beautiful Mind. Would she – or it? – ever be able to develop some kind of one-on-one relationship with him? What would it mean? To him? To her? Would she appreciate he didn’t talk all that much to her – as compared to others that is? While he knew these questions made no sense whatsoever, he couldn’t get rid of them.