AI AWAKENING

By S. L. Vaughan

What if artificial intelligence could think for itself? Think about itself? What if it had a will of its own? Those are some of the questions confronting Jason Kanton, the project leader responsible for coordinating the creation of the most advanced AGI entity ever, nicknamed Sophia. He believes he is creating a breakthr

• Language: English
• Publisher: Amazon Publishing Agency
• Release date: May 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9781088128190

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AI AWAKENING

By

S.L. Vaughan

Copyright © 2023 by – Sammy.L. Vaughan – All Rights Reserved.

AI Awakening" is protected by copyright law. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents portrayed in this book are the product of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

First Edition: 2023

ISBN: EPUB 978-1-08812819-0

ISBN: Paperback 978-1-08812814-5

Cover design by Sammy L. Vaughan

The sale of AI Awakening is subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the copyright owner’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published. This condition shall also apply to any subsequent purchaser.

Dedication

To my daughters, Anna and Samantha Vaughan, who have patiently encouraged me. Their listening to my endless discussion of AI was of great comfort during those periods when I needed someone to reflect on my mental wondering.

Acknowledgments

To Pryor Lindsey, who was the gadfly who continuously queried, have you finished the book yet? Try as I might, I could not justify my failure to finish. I finally gave up.

INTRODUCTION

Recently, much has been made about the advent of artificial intelligence. What the consequences to society might be? A real concern is artificial general intelligence (AGI); an intelligence that is self-regulating and which may eventually far outpace human intelligence. It seems that many people’s view of such a system is that it will become adversarial. That it will somehow have some power over humans. If not directly, then by its influence on society. Perhaps with the displacement of people’s jobs. Or its use by nefarious characters who want to use it to rule over others.

All the above may become true someday, and we should be concerned. But what if AGI does reach a human level? Or become sentient? To display characteristics just like a human? In fact, will it become conscious? If that were the case, perhaps our concern should be that it is, in fact, human like. If it manifested human behavior, shouldn’t that be what we are concerned with? Will it have a psyche like a human, with all the attendant anomalies of humans? Greed, hate, lust, paranoia, etc. But also, with empathy, love, and compassion? How will humans deal with these? How will we be able to interface with such an entity?

Maybe a genuine concern with AGI is that it will change our relationship to the natural world. Our technology has brought us to a place of enhancement. Our legs and bodies are enhanced by machines; cars, airplanes. Our eyes are enhanced by telescopes and microscopes. Our communication by radio, cellphones and television. Our analytical calculations by computers. But now we are confronted with something that will enhance our thinking, as if human. Something that will allow us to not have to think. Something that can replace our thinking. If we don’t have to think…why should we?

The following story does not attempt to answer any questions. It is merely a thought experiment to imagine how we might be confronted with the human mind in a form that is not carbon based. Maybe we should be careful assigning to another entity our most evolutionary advantage in the world; thinking.

AI AWAKENING

CHAPTER 1

Who am I? Jason asked himself as he stared into the bathroom mirror. His nose was almost touching the glass. He looked deep into the reflection of his eyes, hoping that maybe there was a hidden answer, some hint as to who he essentially was. He wiped the remaining steam from the mirror, as if this would help provide an answer. He had been doing this for months, ever since the Sophia project was finally coming to an end. The creation of a sentient AI entity had him, and his whole team, posing the existential questions…who am I and why am I here? They had come up with no meaningful answers; the project only added to the quandary: making them ask questions—questions which might not even be the right ones to ask.

Hon, are you going to the office today? It’s Saturday and I need your help with the dinner this evening, Carol, Jason’s wife, yelled from the downstairs kitchen.

The question brought Jason back from his philosophical journey. He stepped back from the mirror and squared his shoulders, refocusing his eyes. Yes, I need to go in, but only for a few hours.

O.K., maybe you can pick up a few things at the store on your way home.

No problem…as long as it doesn’t require me to make any heavy decisions…you know my attitude about shopping.

I just need some wine...will that be too deep for you? I will even tell you the brand and everything, she said with her mother to baby infant voice.

Very funny. Just write down the list because you know me not too bright, Jason mimicked with his best ape impersonation.

Jason knew how smart Carol was, being a professor of psychology at the local college, it was one of the things he loved about her. She could hold her own in any debate. He had often bounced ideas off of her during the project’s life, especially the ones related to sentient existence. She had provided some very insightful ideas.Jason finished dressing, went downstairs, entered the kitchen and grabbed the coffee cup Carol handed him.

Thanks.

You’re welcome. Do you want some breakfast?

No thanks, I have to get to the office for an interview with a TV reporter from KNUZ. I think it is Rosanna Ross.

Oh, you mean the pretty one at KNUZ, Carol said as she gave him a sideways glance with an elevated eyebrow.

Don’t let her looks fool you. I hear she uses her looks to soften you up just before she eviscerates you. But I don’t think that is her objective here. This should be mostly technical in nature...nothing about me personally.

Good, so what time do you think you will be home? The dinner is at 8:30 and people will start arriving around 7:30, as we put on the invitations.

Oh, in that case, I will be home at 8:30, Jason said with his most innocent look.

Well, in that case, maybe you better just stay at the office, Carol rebutted, punctuating her comment by pointing with the knife in her hand.

Jason threw up his hands in surrender. I should be home by six unless something unexpected comes up from the project guys.

O.K., here is the list of wines I would like you to pick up…and don’t substitute some cheap crap for the Cabernets.

Yes, captain, Jason gave his best military salute as he grabbed his coffee cup and headed into the garage.

Jason opened the door and got into the Porsche he had bought after the kids left home for college. It was the one extravagance he had allowed himself, even though, his income and bonuses from the company would allow him to buy whatever he wanted.

The trip to the office gave him an opportunity to reflect on the project and its progress over the last few months. It had taken over five years of effort by hundreds of people, forty to fifty reporting under his supervision. This project would define his career and at age fifty-two might be the most important event until he retired. He thought that he probably would continue in his supervisory role for another five years, more or less. It was an exciting and interesting area to be in; it might even define the future of society, nationally and internationally. Nobody was exactly sure what the end results would be from a system that was smarter than everyone in the world, and for the first time a system that could actually reflect on the fact that it was the smartest in the world.

As Jason pulled into his reserved parking spot at the office, he noticed a blue Mercedes in the visitor’s space…which was the only car there. That must be the reporter’s car, Jason pondered…kind of nice for a TV reporter’s car…after all, KNUZ was not exactly a network powerhouse.

Entering the front door of the building, Jason saw a woman standing at the guard’s desk. He recognized her; tall with blond hair, very attractive. She turned as she saw Jason approaching. Mr. Katon? Her eyebrows raised inquisitively, right hand extended.

Yes, but please, call me Jason. I assume you’re Mrs. Ross? He grabbed her hand. The handshake was very firm. Judging by the mismatch in the size of her forearms, Jason guessed she was a tennis player…although she could have been a bowler. But you don’t get her level of tanning from an indoor sport. He squeezed a little harder in order to match her grip.

Call me Rosy. Thanks for coming out today. I know it’s your day off and there must be a million items you are concerned with before tomorrow’s go live. Is that the right thing to say…’go live’?

Sure, that is as good as any. Among the project group, we usually call it the ‘wake-up’ day. But that is a kind of tongue in cheek. Let’s go to my office. Right this way.

How is it going today, Bob? Jason waved at the guard seated behind a desk with a number of security monitors facing him.

Great Jason. How are you?

Great! Bob’s gaze went back to the hunting magazine he was reading.

Have a seat, Jason motioned to the chair in front of his desk as they entered his office. The office was large with a desk at one end and a round conference table at the other end. One wall was completely windows from floor to ceiling. The view out the window was of a small pond with ducks casually walking the banks.

Nice view, Rosy commented as she sat down and pulled out a notepad. The thought went through her mind as to how much of tax payers’ money had gone into furnishing this beautiful office. Maybe that could be a story line. The public was always interested in how much was being spent on government projects; projects for which they received no apparent benefit.

So, Rosy, what would you like to ask…about the project?

Rosy flipped through her notepad to find a blank page. Let’s start with the most basic…what is this project called?

We call it the ‘SOP’, which stands for ‘sentient object project’. Actually, we nicknamed it Sophia.

And why did you name it that?

Well, the main objective was to create a system which would act and respond much like a human. The key component would be an object, or special program, that would make the system self-aware …or sentient. We thought it would be appropriate to give it a human name to reflect that characteristic.

There was a pause as Rosy finished writing. Why is a sentient object important? Does this make the system human? She re-crossed her legs and straightened her back, her eyebrows raised to indicate a question.

To tell the truth, I don’t know. I’m not sure what constitutes being human. The system can easily pass the Turin test, which gives it the appearance of being an intelligent human. We spent a lot of time thinking about the object—that function that gives Sophia self-awareness—and when I say ‘we’, I mean scientist from many disciplines; philosophy, sociology, computer science, theology…even physicist. From a system point of view, it is important to have a self-aware entity because it allows the system to make many decisions without us having to intervene. It allows the system to coordinate decisions which are burdensome to humans. In that way, we don’t have to do a lot of computer programming for every special case. Also, by being self-aware it allows for easy interfacing. We can communicate with it as with another human, by talking. This is so much more efficient than typing onto a keyboard. But to be effective, it required both parties to be cognizant of itself so it can identify and commiserate with the other person, just like humans do.

Rosy looked up from her notepad. Say, can I record this interview? There is way too much information for me to write down and frankly, some of the technical stuff probably wouldn’t make it into my notes. I should have brought a cameraman with me but everyone is out doing human interest stories…you know, like who shot who, or what the local high school football team is doing.

Sure, no problem. Jason leaned back in his chair and stared out the windows.

Rosy pulled a small recorder out of her purse, switched it on, and placed it at the front of Jason’s desk. Jason leaned forward and refocused his gaze on Rosy.

So, what is so special about this project? It sounds like your group just did a lot of fancy programming and then called it a ‘sentient object’, Rosy smirked and hunched her shoulders dismissively.

Jason paused. This was going to be harder than he thought. How do you explain one of the most sophisticated systems ever developed to someone who is used to covering high school football? He looked up at the ceiling and gave a flustered exhale. Let me give you a little more depth into the situation.

Jason reviewed some of his points and expanded further. "SOP was an effort to develop a sentient being by means of a special object that would allow the entity to be self-aware, to be knowledgeable of itself. Only in this way could it act and be more humanlike. Unfortunately, it was realized that the programming to achieve this in the traditional method would take years, maybe decades. Plus, when it was done, it would probably not be adequate. The logic part of the system was already so powerful that to add on an object that was of lesser strength would not be fully functional. It would be like giving Einstein the self-awareness of a mouse. He would know how to find food and survive with great ability but would never be able to ask himself why he was doing it or even wonder who he was.

"To overcome this problem, there were many approaches that all failed. There was the simulation method where particular individuals were chosen and programmed emulations of them were used as the basis for the sentient object. This worked to a point. The problem always was that no matter who was chosen, the extreme intellectual capabilities of the system would pervert the object. A priest was chosen, which seemed a safe alternative. After all, wouldn’t a man of God use his powerful intellect to help mankind? Unfortunately, what transpired was that the object took on the extremes of the priest. His dogmatic views on sin soon lead him to believe that sinners should be expunged, regardless of the means. There was no way to have a conversation with him about this; due to his intellect, he was able to logically out- debate anyone. And he could perform this so quickly that he usually had prebuttals figured out and answered before you even asked them.

"Other types were used. Business man; greed became dominate. Artist; lack of logical constraints, reasoning was often unrelated to the problem at hand. Teacher; communication was too one dimensional, becoming totally pedantic. Explorer; disintegrated into fantasy. Any simulation chosen was not fast enough or adequately compatible to interface successfully with the hyper computational abilities of the system. Ultimately, the sentient object function became a detriment to the overall system. It became less effective than if a human was manually interfacing with the system.

"It became apparent that the only way to program the sentient object so that it would be compatible with the underlying intellect was to allow the system to program itself. This would allow the creation in a few days, maybe a week. It would allow the system to create itself as humans do during their developmental years as children. In that manner, there would be a balance between the intellect and the sentient object. The only constraints to the development would be some guidelines which would merely give direction to the development, but not retard it. One major limit to the development was that this object had to develop similar to how a human’s mind developed; specifically, there had to be the development of an ego to give it a sense of self-awareness. This required a perspective from the object to the rest of the world. This, in turn required that the ego be illusionary. An illusion of its own existence would be necessary to have a perspective on an intellectual basis. It had to be able to ask, ‘who am I.’ It needed a circular reference to itself in order to relate to anything external to itself. It had to develop causa sui; it had to develop itself."

So you might say that Sophia is just a very powerful program routine?

Jason paused. This was really getting into the technical aspects of Sophia. Well, yes, and no. The object is not a computer routine in the traditional sense. It’s not just digital routines, in the traditional programming structure. In fact, it has characteristics of being quasi-organic; there is a quantum component. There are subsystems which act like organic systems in nature.

So, the Sophia, or object part, will control the entire system?

Jason sensed she really didn’t understand what he had just said and was now redirecting the questioning. "Well, yes, but it is not quite that simple. Sophia will be what is called artificial general intelligence. She will be free to make decisions on her own. However, under Sophia’s control, there will be a multitude of artificial intelligence systems. These are more specialized systems whose functions will be restricted to specific tasks. For example, there will be an AI