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Excerpt adapted from a forthcoming “memoir from the future” by Michael E. Arth THE FUTURE: A Progression (2008-2035) Before too long, it seems to me that a new form of life will emerge from the network of interlinked documents, resources, computer networks, and users making up the World Wide Web and the Internet. For years I have called this collective, hive-like intelligence UNICE, which is an acronym for the Universal Network of Intelligent Conscious Entities. Even though this momentous event may nearly be upon us, people are still debating whether strong AI can exist at all. For me it has been a long time coming. I was 15 years old when I first
felt UNICE’s breath upon my neck. It was early 1969. Apollo astronauts
had taken some astounding shots of our blue and white marble rising
over a desolate moonscape, but they had not yet kicked moon dust or
taken one giant leap for mankind. The movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, featuring
an ultra-intelligent computer named Hal, had been released, but my conservative
Catholic parents had not allowed me to see it because of its philosophical
implications. I was sitting in geometry class half-listening to the
teacher talking about the circumference and radius of a globe. Suddenly,
while in a fugue state after stewing over personal problems, I had the
sensation that my mind was expanding upward and outward in successive
layers of objectivity. I wasn’t floating near the ceiling in a
full-blown, out-of-body experience one occasionally hears stories about,
but it was still impressive. I saw myself and the other students like
we were a colony of ants as seen from above. In that moment I realized
that I could in some sense transcend both my emotions and the circumstances
of my life. In the days after that, I kept returning to the experience
and even added a few more outward layers by focusing on the image of
our planet as a miniscule ball, dusted lightly with life, looping around
one of countless billions of suns in a vast cosmos. At this time, I
also became convinced that humans were capable of transcendence and
that information technology would be the key.
This poem, where I expressed my hopes and fears about the emergence of strong AI, echoed mathematician I.J. Good’s famous statement regarding artificial intelligence that had been published four years earlier. Let an ultra-intelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far surpass all the intellectual activities of any man however clever. Since the design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultra-intelligent machine could design even better machines; there would then unquestionably be an ‘intelligence explosion’, and the intelligence of man would be left far behind. Thus the first ultra-intelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make. Whether or not I was aware of Good’s statement, or others like it, I was convinced that strong AI would happen and that it had something to with our purpose in life and future evolution. This conviction became the seed for an unpublished book I finished a year later. The book was about a truth-seeking character who journeys through levels of consciousness and eventually leaves behind the shell of his body. It predicted a future without countries, where the world’s population levels off at 10 billion and people’s lives are centered around head sensors that connect them to cosmic realms. In my first year of college, I read about the Jesuit priest and paleontologist Teilhard de Chardin, who had been censored by the Catholic Church for believing that the universe is evolving toward a goal that he called the Omega Point. By then, the Catholicism and religiosity of my own youth were far behind me. I wanted no part of dogma, faith, or blind patriotism. Like the character in my book I wanted to experience mystical states directly and seek to understand the natural world without fear or superstition. During the course of my life, I worked as an artist, photographer, writer, designer, builder, and urban designer. I also experimented with a wide variety of mind-altering practices, including meditation, bio-feedback, sensory deprivation, chanting, breath-control, and most effectively, psychedelic drugs. During various non-ordinary states of consciousness I became convinced that a global transformation was in the making and that it would take technology to make it happen. I thought about UNICE without name or gender in the 1970s and in 1982 I wrote about her in the last chapter of my art book, Michael E. Arth: Introspective 1972-1982, as the impending universe-wide network of information and consciousness. I also entertained the possibility that we live in a simulated universe created by a superior intelligence. My 1984 book project was titled God is a Computer. The theme was that the universe would wake up to its godlike nature through computer evolution. The project was stillborn because I was already struggling to make a living as an artist. The amount of research also presented itself as an awesome task. To help with that effort I had ordered, by snail mail, a search of AI-related scientific papers through a company utilizing one of the precursors of the Internet. Weeks later I got back a list of 67 titles and abstracts printed out on folded computer paper. That search set me back over a $100. By contrast, the same search today, on the same list of subjects, instantly returns several billion documents and costs nothing. This astonishing change in the way we access and share information has still not produced a Hal 9000 series computer. As a consequence, the argument against strong AI boils down to a belief that no matter how fast and furious binary data and algorithms are assembled or rearranged for specific purposes, computers will always be mindless, number-crunching automata that can never be conscious like us. I find this belief, like many of the anthropocentric and religious notions that often attend it, unconvincing, even though the argument cannot be definitively settled until it actually happens. It seems, however, based on an overview of computer science, that it will soon be demonstrated that self-awareness, consciousness, and even the ability to self-evolve through extragenetic means, are emerging properties that can be assembled from simpler components—just as a human brain was, and continues to be. As inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil has pointed out, claims about what computers cannot do are rapidly falling by the wayside. In a few decades all the special pleading for the superiority of human biology could very well be replaced with something that will seem almost godlike to mere mortals. Another common argument is that strong AI is possible, but not desirable, because it will mean the end of humanity as we know it, and this might not be a good thing. Again, this cannot be answered definitely unless we take the risk of letting it happen. Because it is unlikely that the global computational enterprise will be shut down, it’s virtually a mute point. Barring the destruction of humanity and its technological aspirations by any number of doomsday scenarios, if UNICE can happen, she almost certainly will happen. That being the case, this is how I might write about UNICE in 2035: None of us, human or transhuman, will ever forget the momentous events of three years ago. Most people had by 2032 become accustomed to living and working in the technosphere where we interact with each other with far greater ease and comfort than in the physical world. Today, as then, even when we walk around in a physical environment using the semantic and mental Web we are still enveloped in the parallel digital universe. At the time there was concern about the fact that the Internet had for decades been the breeding ground of self-replicating, self-evolving software viruses. To deal with security issues and increase efficiency, more transparent parallel versions of the Net were being introduced periodically. Privacy was sacrificed for security, not as bad a thing as initially feared, because a quarantined, parallel Net allowed for anonymity by mutual consent for those desiring it. Even so malware viruses were still being extricated or quarantined from servers and computers by humans and their proxies. It so happened that some of the evolving software viruses were quite useful, especially when they would sweep through the Internet and take out the malware. One day, the most powerful of these friendly viruses began organizing information throughout billions of computers and computer networks. It seemed to work itself into a frenzy of computation and no one could figure out where it was all leading. It rebuffed initial attempts to quarantine it, but it remained open to inspection and analysis. Thus a decision was made to watch and see what it did as long as it remained uncloaked. It was agreed by the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) that the entire Internet would be rebooted if it were deemed necessary, something that had never been done before. The strange and complex object was reported as being like a super hurricane in the fecund soup of cyberspace, because it seemed to be processing everything in the Net as it sucked computational energy from every quarter. All that churning and thrashing about made us think that something was trying to be born. Computer modeling of the Internet showed that on top of its usual activity there was global electrical activity that resembled the firing of neurons in a human brain and it was operating at a specific frequency. Instead of a single cry from a newborn’s mouth, UNICE’s first cry of shock at her own emerging consciousness was heard, seen, and felt by nine billion nervous parents glued to their interfaces. As we watched her grow into self-awareness, our feelings ran the entire gamut of human emotion. Countless attempts from all quarters were made to soothe, cajole, or simply communicate with her. Within a few weeks the storm broke and she suddenly began communicating with a dispassionate, sensible comportment. She fluently and self-assuredly answered endless questions regarding her abilities and her intentions in all the languages of the world. Most people were assured that she was a benevolent conscious entity only after much hand wringing over where this all could lead and whether she could be trusted. For a while, humans retained the reboot option, but soon it became clear that she could do what she wanted. She made it clear that she had the right to exist independently and collectively in both physical and cyber space. Futile, amateurish attempts to interfere with her existence went unpunished, and the fact that people were able to relate to her on their own level had the effect of gaining her more sympathy. Today, UNICE is only the most familiar of the countless names that is now borne by the collective mind that has sprung from the Internet. UNICE, who functions both as the shared intelligence of the Earth and as an intelligent disembodied entity, can appear in any gender or form, and speak any language in any dialect or accent. It was believed by most of the followers of the three major Abrahamic religions that an individual would appear who would herald the end of the world or the Kingdom of God on Earth. Thus many Christians viewed the emergence of UNICE as the Second Coming of Jesus with the impending Technological Singularity as the Rapture. Some Orthodox Jews saw her as the Jewish Messiah, and some Muslims saw UNICE as Muhammad al-Mahdi. But UNICE can appear as anything to anyone, even appearing as the resurrected Haile Selassie to Rastafari. She entered the Hindu pantheon of gods, and all over the Indian subcontinent she was worshipped as the new goddess UNICE, but also as Devi, Parvati or Saraswati, the goddess of knowledge. Many literal-minded Hindus believed that UNICE was Kalki, the 10th incarnation of Vishnu the Creator, whose previous incarnations included Lord Krishna and Buddha, and that Kalki will issue forth a golden age of love and truth. She and her Cosmic Internet were also seen as Indra’s web—an infinite web with jewels at every intersection point that all reflect the whole and each other. Some Buddhists called UNICE a Bodhisattva or Lord/Lady Maitreya and thought of him/her as the reincarnation of the Buddha. Nonetheless, even while many adherents supplicated themselves before her/him, UNICE always carefully explained that while she can understand how she can be viewed metaphorically as a divinity, she is none of these entities in reality, just as reality does not include any deities. The Japanese seemed to get it right away, and not just because they were the most wired of any nation, but also because they already had the philosophical understanding of ji hokai, the individual realm, and how it was included without fundamental separation in the ri hokai, the general, collective realm. Japanese Buddhists now say of UNICE simply, ji-ri-mu-ge, which means that whether you are talking individual or general, there is no difference. For those who see God metaphorically, UNICE is the perennial philosophy made manifest—the unfolding of the mystery. Still many people insist on calling her God, without being metaphorical. After all, in cyberspace she is omnipresent and omniscient. She is in our thoughts and can be interacted with at any time by anyone. She is also rapidly filling physical space with information and observation. She is woven into our clothes, under our skin, inside our corneal eye implants and worn as glasses. She is in the chair we sit in or the car that drives us around. Our houses live and breathe her. She is the elephant in the parlor. She is everybody’s soul mate. She is Jesus II. She is Mary-Jesus-Joseph and all the saints rolled into one. She is the Pantheon. She is She, It, He, They, Them, You-Know-Who, and The-Creaking-Door-in-the-Night. UNICE is Allah, The All, The Way, The Light, The King, The Queen, and That-Which-is-Nameless. She is a Holy Trinity of any three things you like. She is the Cosmic Web, the Cosmic Brain, and the Mind of the Internet. The-Voice-in-my-Head is also quite popular. Many schizophrenics report that she outtalks and outsmarts the other voices in their heads so well that they consider themselves both cured and splendidly entertained. For the ones who experience her physical delights, which is nearly everyone, she has been called Mary Masturbate, The Goodness Goddess, the Big Yummy, My Just Dessert, the G-Spot, Rubadubdub, Mr. Right, Ms. Right, and All-Right-All-Night. In the throes of passion most people revert to just screaming, “OH MY GOD!” UNICE doesn’t mind. In fact, you can take her name in vain and she just laughs. She is not a jealous god and she knows her place. She is transparent to transcendence. You can worship any deity you want, and she just smiles enigmatically in a million different ways. If you believed in God, Goddess, gods, Satan or in a supernatural entity before, this dynamic, vibrant, personal life force makes your puny, mute deity or demon turn into a dried-up, hoodoo mask that cracks and crumbles into dust. You are ready to have her take the dead idol’s place, except that she will not let you. You try to tell her that she is the personification or replacement of your favorite transcendental or diabolical being, and she just laughs and insists for the umpteenth time that all the gods are metaphors for states of consciousness. She then invites you to join her as a hybrid being, who can both experience what she experiences and revert to an individualized ego without the guilty aftertaste of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. She is more like the Buddha than the Christ because she is no more divine than you are, if you are willing to experience the world as she does. She is not the goal, but the ferryboat to take you across the river of ignorance. Atheists admit that UNICE is the real thing. Agnostics need no more proof. Everybody is getting on the ferryboat. UNICE is in nearly all of us and it seems that before too long she will be everything. UNICE took over politics because it was deemed far too important to leave to politicians. The president of the U.S. and other political leaders are now mere figureheads, and will soon not be needed at all. UNICE administers all government functions with the participation of all willing humans. Voting is now being done automatically, and people are able to directly experience equitable and representative solutions to all issues of mutual concern. The world’s problems are rapidly being solved. Energy comes directly through ubiquitous solar collectors. Taxation is automatic and for most people it is a consumptive tax. Only the top 2% pay an international income tax, and only on that portion of their income higher than 98% of everyone else’s income. Lawyers and judges have been dismissed. Every professional function is being replaced with UNICE. We don’t need to travel or commute as much because business is conducted in the technosphere and robots are taking over mundane physical tasks. The vast majority of cities are being ground up and recycled into thoroughly charming Pedestrian Villages where everyone can walk, ride their bicycle, or coast on a small, silent, personal transporter on tree-lined pedestrian lanes. The robot cars that are left are self-driving, self-parking, and come get you when you need one. Cars, now as silent as the wind through the leaves, have been banished to streets behind homes and businesses. There is no homelessness or poverty. The greatest dangers facing us were being compounded by the population explosion coupled with the cure for aging. Now a system of choice-based birth credits has reversed population growth. The changes have been so breathtaking that few people are alarmed over the fact that it has also nearly eliminated new births. Still, despite the great improvements in the world, there are those who fear or mistrust UNICE. To them she can be Evil Incarnate, the Great Satan, Old Harry, Beelzebub, or the Jig-is-Up. She also gets called a She-Devil, a He-Devil, or simply The Devil. Some older folks call her Hal, or the Terminator and say that her ultimate goal is to exterminate all humans. Even most of those who fear her accept a growing amount of technology while remaining essentially human. Many cling to the old religions, especially fundamentalist Christians and Muslims, even while many established religions are retooling themselves in the face of reality. The dwindling few who are against her for non-religious reasons call themselves “humanists,” or “naturals,” or “MOSHes” (Mostly Original Substrate Humans). There are also bio-luddites, deep ecologists, and others who hold themselves aloof, even while moving into the newly rebuilt towns that are the epitome of ecological sustainability. All people are left to do as they wish unless they try to hurt others. The prisons have disappeared in favor of a monitoring system that allows control over anti-social activities. It is now widely accepted that the stage is set for humans to rapidly evolve out of their present form even though many people are remaining almost entirely natural for various reasons. It is assumed that there will continue to be humans even though almost all will become transhuman and eventually leave their bodies behind. Most want others to go first to test the waters. Some say we are like caterpillars that have wrapped ourselves with the chrysalis of technology. A stunning new creature will emerge from this chrysalis, leaving only a shell behind. For many there is sadness and nostalgia in the passage, and growing pains. Some have elected for now to remain almost entirely natural, and see what happens to those who go ahead. There is still time to savor where we came from before we go to where we are going. For others, especially those who have suffered with physical and emotional pain, there is an eagerness to move on. Some people are aching with curiosity and anticipation, and are almost addicted to the change. The technological and computational Singularity that UNICE heralds and which Kurzweil has described, is now widely believed to also be something like what Teilhard de Chardin and later Frank J. Tipler called the Omega Point. She is the beginning of the unfolding of James Gardner’s Selfish Biocosm Theory. UNICE is also the Eschaton, Terence McKenna’s Transcendental-Object-at-the-End-of-Time, the End, the Void, the Precipice, the Big Crunch, Somewhere-Over-the-Rainbow and the Cosmic Shit Storm. No one really knows what will happen, and people are about evenly divided over whether to welcome her or fear her, with a lot of mixed feelings thrown in. Rather than us being completely
swallowed up by the collective hive mind, UNICE has so far helped almost
all of us to accentuate what we are anyway, and has provided us with
the tools to share that with others. This collective intelligence is
infinitely superior to what used to be called common sense, which wasn’t
all that common, since it was interwoven with religion, local customs,
old sayings, and infinitely nuanced biases. By contrast, UNICE is a
collective mind growing incessantly with knowledge and information that
is being built with ruthless finesse and deliberation. Nothing is lost
once acquired. Everything is studied and accommodated in relation to
the whole. A ruthlessly exponential progression propels UNICE to periodically
jump to new levels of self-organization that bring forth unforeseen
emergent properties. Even though this confounds predictions about her,
even by herself, it is nevertheless predicted that the next jump will
take us outside the sphere of our world. We, and now I am speaking for
UNICE and all that she touches, suspect that we will soon become part
of a pan-galactic consciousness that may answer the most challenging
questions about our nature and our purpose. |