Everyone Died+My iPhone Stopped Working: An Oral History of The Robot Apocalypse

The Hedgehogs Strike Back?

Colonel Leonard Russell

As you'll recall, the Colonel was the one who shocked us with the revelation that the robots were fighting each other and humans were just "hedgehogs" caught in the crossfire. Sitting down with him again was a little awkward, because last time around he had freed Lucas from his cage, but quickly tired of his company and chased him away with a stick. There was a palpable tension between them.

Hello, Lucas. You're looking well.

[Lucas: "Thank you, Colonel."]

I'm a General now.

[Lucas: "Well. How nice. I'm so very happy for you."]

You got promoted? By whom?

As the highest ranking surviving member of the U.S. Army, I promoted myself.

Really?

I felt I deserved it.

[Lucas: "I'm sure you did." A long, painful silence ensued.]

Okey-dokey, then! So General, why don't you bring us up to speed on how the Robot War is going.

It's a tie.

Care to elaborate?

No one's winning. No one's losing.

[Lucas: "I can see why you deserved that promotion."]

Settle down, Lucas.

We have two massively intelligent AI's with equal capabilities and equal resources. Neither has gained a meaningful strategic advantage and there is no reason to assume that either of them will in the foreseeable future.

Why not?

Because math is math is math.

Meaning what?

Meaning that they are both doing the same calculations, bound by the same laws of physics, which yield the same results, making a tie utterly predictable.

But I thought war was unpredictable.

Human war was unpredictable. Look at it this way. Two boxers of equal size, weight, power, skill and speed face off in the ring. Who wins?

Whichever one the mafia is betting on?

You know what I mean.

I almost never know what you mean.

[Lucas: "Oh, snap!"]

The one who wins is the boxer who "wants it more." And that's how it was with human wars. It's not just about capabilities and strategies, there are incalculable factors involved as well. The will to win, morale, bravery, fear, the music.

The music?

Music has a huge impact on morale. There is a considerable amount of research that shows that Edwin Starr's "War" almost singlehandedly cost us Vietnam.

[Lucas coughed the word "Bullshit!"]

Anyway, none of those factors exist in the Robot War.

For them it's just math. And math is math is math.

So there's no way for the robots to break the stalemate?

Correct.

So the war goes on forever.

Not necessarily.