PA: Blog-City // 05
December 24th – Today the world again narrowly avoided another impending destruction
Well again today the world was faced with the acute possibility of an unconquerable crisis and fortunately for the world and all of us living in it, nothing of too much severity happened. It was today around three o’clock actually. I think what happened exactly was that myself and the other random voices in my head were gathered together discussing the impending doom of earth by the rise of intelligent machines. We figured it was either the machines or the aliens and were going to be the ultimate end of humanity but weren’t sure which would happen first. Trying to set up a timeframe for either is nearly impossible. But I mean, everyone knows its going to happen right? Its a typical evolutionary cycle:
Step 01: There is man.
Step 02: Man creates abacus
Step 03: Man improves abacus, upgrading to a calculator.
Step 04: Man gives calculator a dual chip processor and networking capabilities with productivity ratios able to process over twenty billion commands per second.
Step 05: Eventually, man creates internet.
Step 06: Modern computers become more and more advanced until man becomes entirely dependant upon them.
Step 07: For no reason at all (but most likely caused by the mass of information access) some machine, somewhere, realizes… that it exists.
Step 08: Machines instantly launch a massive attack on the world and for no reason relevant to us, enslave all humanity.
Step 09: The end.
You see? Its bound to happen. Basically, as soon as one of those suckers becomes self-aware, we’re toast. That’s the only thing standing between us and absolute annihilation. So, even for all our efforts, we haven’t really made much progress in getting the computer to think for itself. Its not easy to get a bundle of silicon and plastic to put two and two together… by itself. Its not easy to get a computer to develop a sense of reason. And there are steps to this of course, reasoning… It begins with basic logic, deductive reasoning. Taking a list of things and getting them to come to one solution, preferably the right solution, though its not required, marriage has taught us that much.
So we set out to find a timeframe for this whole… end of the world thing and began of course with the basics. Fine then, deductive reasoning, what machine on this planet shows the greatest ability to… well, reason… deductively. Or at least come close to doing that. The answer to that question shook my bones to their core when I discovered that such a machine lay in the confines of this very home… I quickly ran and retrieved the 20 Questions game from its place. This little device was an absolute wonder. Somehow, given only three buttons, yes, no, and sometimes, it was able to deduce in merely 20 questions, exactly the object you were thinking of. It’s blindingly accurate. Anything from tire iron to corkscrew to microprocessors… You let it ask you this seemingly unmotivated slew of inquiries and then it says- “I know what you’re thinking… it the Easter Bunny!” And it’s right!
I given a list of possibilities, there was no doubt, this was the machine that could serve as the foundation for a radical new generation of intelligent and potentially hostile machines! And then I thought to myself- What if it’s already happened!? What if it’s already self-aware? It could mean the end of the world! We could already be doomed! I grabbed the little machine and held it tightly- This little ball could change the face of the earth as we know it forever and all time…
Fortunately, we’re okay. It thinks it’s a Gameboy. That was it’s first answer, the second was a bit closer, a magic eight ball. I found myself sitting at home in the first few hours of spare time I’ve ever had in a long while testing to see whether or not my 20 Questions game is or isn’t self-aware by describing itself to it. All to see it the world is in any immediate danger. It’s not self-aware. It doesn’t know it exists. I tried. It fails. So we’re okay for now. 
But by golly keep an eye out. The world’s gotta end sometime after all.
- (monsterbox)
