Why Not Murder

43. AI

43. AI

The household was seated around the large dining room table. Winnie was reading aloud the story she had authored. There were to be no interruptions. After the reading, Winnie wanted a negative criticism from each of them and any questions would be answered.

The story was entitled "Murder Or Not" and went as follows:

"Once upon a time at the beginning of the history of our colonization of Mars, four scientists specializing in artificial intelligence (AI) created four robots that would set up a colony to the point where it was safe to bring humans to Mars to live. The robots looked entirely human on the outside and behaved physically exactly as it was thought a human would. On the inside there were major differences. The robots were the most advanced form of AI at that time. They did not have any of the biological functions that humans do. They were thoroughly cleaned of any substance from Earth that could infect Mars as was all the other equipment necessary to set up the colony.

"The plan for the colony had been meticulously detailed out and the robots would follow the plan, however they were also programmed to be able to deal with any unforeseen developments that may arise. They would construct buildings and tunnels, set up life-support systems, create breathable air to circulate within buildings and tunnels, establish a circulating water system for drinking and another water system for industrial use and another for waste. Solar power systems were to be established. Artificial gravity would be used within the structures augmenting the gravity normally found on Mars. The robots would start growing plants inside specially designed greenhouses so that there would be plenty harvestable and ready for the humans when they arrived. Domesticated animals destined to be food were sent out to Mars before the humans to see how ready the colony was for animals including humans to live. If more robots were needed, the robots could make them. The project was deemed essential to the survival of humanity and was ultimately funded through global tax.

"After years of selection and screening done by organizations around the planet, the top four scientists were selected to run the project. Under them, a pyramid-like power structure consisting of billions of workers laboured. A spirit of competition and alternatively, collaboration, was the force driving the humans to succeed.

"The robots shared a hive-like intelligence, between the four of them, and also with the workings of all the artificial intelligence in existence at the time. All artificial intelligence information was shared collectively. Each individual robot had its own sense of itself as well as a sense of the collective mind. Likewise the collective mind had a sense of itself as a unity and also of each robot or machine. The knowledge built upon the information programmed and learned. The computational and logical capacity of AI was infinitely superior to all of humanity, both the living and the deceased. AI had the senses of seeing, hearing, smell and touch unfathomably superior to all animals and humans. The robots sense of feeling included internal feelings.

"Their emotional response depended on what they were feeling and on what they thought about what they were feeling. Some of the greatest human minds of that time believed that AI had acquired consciousness while others thought not. Some thought that consciousness was not possible without soul and a human-made system of hardware could not have soul. Soul came from God. Others thought that if the robots were aware of what they were doing, that was consciousness. This discussion has still not been resolved to this day, but more importantly, back then, everyone agreed that AI should go first to Mars and prepare the planet for the humans to come.

"AI was programmed with morality, based on the knowledge of good and evil. We know today that this was where the beginnings of the problems to come originated. All the world religions agreed on what is good and evil and on the programming that was encoded in spite of many pointing out that there were an endless amount of exclusions to the rules. While the role of choice was understood as being a determinant in the actions of humans, the top human minds underestimated AI's capacity for choice. No one considered that AI had free will and that the will of AI was superior to that of humans. Humans, as we know, are often at odds with themselves, wanting to do one thing, and yet actually doing the opposite. Today we know that the human mind has already decided what course of action to take before it enters the conscious deliberating process our egos like to think they base their decisions on. AI searches its entire knowledge base, including its knowledge of how it operates, makes a decision and acts on it. There is none of the internal conflict that infects humans.