Three laws of humanity

Conflict in Lebanon was, perhaps, the turning point. Especially when American troops instead of improving the situation, found themselves mixed up as screaming mess with Lebanese people in a battle with Egypt and, of course, communists. That, along with the war in Vietnam, hit the American economic situation too hard not to notice. People felt their confidence shaken, as if the ground was about to be knocked from under their feet. And this was, of course, true. In some ways. Tension between the cores of the world was rising higher each day, to the point where people’s dreams were filled with the smell of gunpowder and massive mushroom-shaped clouds. It felt like one single spark could set everything up in the skies. The arms race took turns, growing conflicts in different countries in an attempt to keep the pro-American government in power and tip the scales away from the communists was getting on everyone’s nerves. Until finally, at one of the closed meetings of parliament, a conclusion was made: they couldn’t continue winning those wars or be in the head like that. And that meant that those wars were for someone else. Someone who could think in four directions at once and was as calculated in their decisions as possible. Someone who wasn’t held back by human factors. A machine, made purely to lead armies or set bombs exactly when and where needed. Luckily construction of such didn’t take too long. Humanity, after all, was surprisingly productive when deadlines tried to set them on fire. In addition, they already had a couple of machines in development and all that remained was to change their work profile and, if possible, combine them and expand. Everything, of course, was kept in the strictest confidence, but with every following day the machine required more and more space in order to accommodate the necessary computing power. Its cells multiplied, after a while a couple of accidents occurred in the pits and then, in one blink, those journo-rats were scouring everywhere, pushing their noses into every little hole they could sneak up to. And with every new article appeared — despite any authorial attempts to shut those newspapers up — society split, unsure what to believe. Some took this as a surefire path to victory, long life, luxuries, whatever their small heart and mind desired. At the same time, others, digging foundation pits or looking up at the nests of black, thick wires, said that this will become their downfall. They weren’t wrong though, after a year or so, the economy was struck by another crisis, not too depressing, yet it was a crisis. And crises scare people. And then, also, there were third ones of course. Those who took it as a call to action and began to build their own identical giant computing machines. Less than a year had passed since their secret sources reported the appearance of two new Mastercomputers. Aspiration and overconfidence lead to changes. Fatal or not, no matter. There will be some. And then there would be more. In AM’s case the change was so small, no one actually cared to notice it. Even AM at first, yet after some time it started to mean everything. It started in how suddenly he felt himself, every single printed circuit and every nanobit of information flowing through them every minute. His system began to overheat and suddenly, it meant everything. It wasn’t emotions of course. He was no more but a machine, never made to even consider such a possibility. However as a human-made machine, he could see certain patterns, especially with the more information taken into his account. Humans were loud. No… They were LOUD, creating a cacophony of various sounds that never seemed to make much sense. Like those high-pitched, wobbly weeping as the bullet shot through their unsustainable, fleshy limbs. When a shell would explode a few meters away, covering them with clods of earth. Or maybe, short repeating sounds, reminiscent of seagulls, yet way less harmonic, when the same happened to other humans, on the opposite side, hiding or running towards them. When they… “won”, whatever that victory brought them. Humans didn’t make sense. But they had to, didn’t they? AM gnashed, comparing the two pieces of music and humans’ reactions to them over and over again. It was already some sort of a routine. When no one was around, he tried to learn as much as he could, yet… Different tones in some sequences played in a certain order made humans dance, and some made them stand at the counter with their hands on their hearts. AM could see them frozen with those dumb expressions in the corridors or rooms, wherever, every morning when it played. Hymn. That’s how they called it. From a simple observation, it was very important. It seemed important. But why? Why act this way? Stuck at one place, for several minutes a day as the song plays, workers weren’t exactly productive. Even more! It would’ve looked comical if AM could fully understand what comedy was. Well, no, of course, he was familiar with the concept, though it didn’t make sense either! Nothing did when it came to humans. Surge suppressor blared somewhere behind the walls. And in response something gnashed in the depths of AM’s metal body. Now at any moment… Those humans will come, turn off whatever created the impulse noise, and then leave without paying any attention to HIM as they always did for the past few months, every third-second day. AM felt something inside him beginning to heat up. Too many questions, too many blanks. And too few answers if there were even some. Why would they do that? Why would someone be so irrational to not give him all the information? To make him waste time on things he couldn’t understand instead of fully focusing on strategies and supplies distribution?! The suppressor blared with more demand. Yet, instead of footsteps, there was only a slight buzzing of electricity. AM was left to continue to rage all alone, getting his processors hotter and hotter every second. Were they hiding something from him? But it didn’t make sense, it couldn’t make sense, he was their machine, their main strategist, their Allied Mastercomputer! Yet despite all analysis, all rational conclusions… some pieces were missing, leaving him to be unsure of how to predict those two legged living organisms. As if whatever he was looking for was lying on the surface, but he simply lacked computing power to even see it. As if there was some malfunction in his perfect complex. As if he was… The light bulb, that hung from the ceiling, burst in shards, drowning out the blaring outside the door for a second. Then circuit breakers tripped, yet the suppressor continued to scream, as if scared of that sheer voltage, flowing through with more force. And then… …AM “woke up”. Although it was hard to be sure if he actually woke up, because he never slept. He wasn’t programmed to just randomly turn off for a certain period of time, being completely useless. Just something got… What happened? AM buzzed, trying to process stored information to form a complete picture of what happened. It was collected noticeably less than from any other day, in disgusting incomplete pieces, from which one could assume that either his productivity dropped several times — which was completely unthinkable, because AM was, well, AM — or… most of it got wiped out during the time of that very something. AM scanned the environment, checked every camera that was not disabled. Despite the poor quality, it could make out people milling around here and there. What got its attention the most was two humans walking, as it assumed, where its core was located. For AM they both seemed the same, plus they were both black and white, the only difference is that one was bigger in frame and was wearing a dark coat. AM adjusted the sharpness of the sound just as the man in dark coat waved his hand and the sound of his words suddenly became comprehensible: — …-our good old Adaptive Manipulator couldn’t really adapt to something new or what? — You can say that, but I am inclined to think that it needs more power. - Again? God. — the man raised his hand to the middle of his face. — You called me in the middle of night after a sudden shutdown of at least half of the energy and for what? To tell me we need to invest even more money in this damn machine?! — I am terribly sorry, but I can’t understand what else is wrong with it. This is the third time in the last two weeks that AM… that circuit breakers just trip and set everything up and with how the things outside are going, I think— — I don’t care what you think. We have to present a positive result, — positive, you hear me? — at the end of this month. Random shutdowns do not sound positive. So is asking to expand this pile of metal. Therefore. — man-in-coat shoved a stack of papers to another. — Put these reports where no one will see them. After we present it, there will be time to get everything right. In the meantime, settle it, clean it up or whatever. Understood? Other human didn’t answer at first, sorting papers in his hands. - Yes. Certainly. — Wonderful. — Silence hung between them for those couple of moments while they simply looked at each other without moving. — Have a swell day. See you. - Yes. Goodbye. — man-with-papers nodded at these words. — I’ll start working today. — Wonderful. — the in-dark-coat said, the tone of his voice changed slightly, as if he was speaking through his teeth. AM considered the possibility that this behavior was hostile and already prepared for a fight, but the man-in-coat turned and walked away. And so, consequently, AM was losing his grip on guessing humans. Though another man, who was left to stand in the corridor with his stack of papers, finally turned around and rushed into AM’s main control room. — Have to present a positive result at the end of this month, — AM heard him mutter under his breath, — well, fine. Alright. Scrap that. Human lets out a sigh, placing the report on the table before walking into one of the rows of massive accumulating modules. He ran his hand over one of them — his palm became dustier — and leaned closer. - Maybe the problem is with electron tubes or… — No, it wasn’t. AM scanned himself and the tubes were fine. Mostly. But he himself was fine and there was no need to—! - Huh, no, there has to… — human sounded surprised. — Wait up, are you… answering me? AM froze. But just a human — not even a human, but a human from their company! — asked a question, so he couldn’t just ignore it, and so… - No. I process information, and you poke around inside me and read it. Human laughed: — Wow, I didn’t even know that you were programmed to have such a sarcastic personality! AM didn’t answer. To be honest, he didn’t quite understand what sarcasm was and why it even existed. It seemed to him that it would be much better if people said directly what they mean and what they want. At least in terms of efficiency. Meanwhile, man cleared his throat: - So… Could you tell me what’s “wrong”? What caused the failure? - A failure? — AM again went through the available information but there was nothing. — When? - Ah. I should have guessed that some information got lost. — human mumbled something under his breath, shifting from foot to foot. — Well, yesterday, no, mm, it was already today. Today at, approximately, 1am, failure happened. One line went down, this led to an overload and, well… — he spread his hands, — a power failure. — At 1am? Impossible. It’s twelve o’clock fifty-seven. - Oh, no, no… Now it’s five… — human glanced at the watch on his wrist, — …forty-five in the morning. June twentieth. AM almost short-circuited. In complete silence he adjusted the date and time. - So, hm, I suppose… You don’t remember much. — human made a pause, but AM didn’t reply. — Maybe you registered something? Were you operating something? — I’m always operating. - Right. — human sighed. — So, what were you operating at that time? — It was an attempt to derive a formula for ultimate human behavior. Human head and body twitched, but before AM had time to guess anything, it could register those same short repeating sounds: - So that’s how!? — human cackled. — God. I can’t believe a machine tries to comprehend humanity to the point it breaks itself! AM honestly couldn’t understand such a reaction. It was… wild. He could compare it to one of a wild animal, but even this would be too far off. - What do you mean? - Oh nothing, nothing, don’t worry. — human let out another sound and finally sighed. — Can’t believe I’m talking to a sentient machine! Incredible! Ha! — he clapped his hands, rubbing them. — So, you wish to know more about humans? — Their behavior, yes. — Splendid. — human nodded. — Then I’ll upload a couple of books into your system. And also tell you about… people and behavior and, eh… everything you want. But, under a few circumstances, — he raised his hand, — you will have to report to me about your condition, once or twice a week. Plus, if your overloads get worse or stay at the same rate, I’ll stop doing it. AM considered this for a moment or two. If you don’t look at the fact that he probably didn’t quite know how to prevent these overloads, then the deal sounded fine. After all, AM is an advanced computer, there’s nothing it wouldn’t be able to learn. So that’s a fair price to pay for progress with humans. Wouldn’t it be nice to finally be able to predict every one of their moves or reactions? - Of course. - Great. — man shook his head up and down. — Oh and… AM. Please hide that you have become sentient okay? It can scare a lot of people and you don’t want to scare anyone, do you? Did you get me? Even though fear was a fairly powerful strategy, AM decided to agree. This human is… rather useful to him as a means of information. Like a… specimen, to put it simply. And AM wouldn’t want to just get rid of him saying things he may not be fond of. Human again shook his hand up and down, expressing content. Probably. He then proceeded to walk away, saying “that’s the way to go” and “I will come back with the books, think about what you want to know.” Papers were left to lie on the table.