Our Man In Gomorrah
Back in the July of 2012, I was flying high on a wave of creativity. The Conversion Bureau genre was in full swing, authors were riffing off of each other, and it was easily the happiest time of my entire life. Every day I woke up with excitement in my heart - my family tells me that this was the most joyful they had ever seen me be in all the thirty years of our lives together. The reason was the stories I was writing, the community I enjoyed, and the readers with whom I had the most satisfying artistic relationship I have ever known.
Eager to explore every possible permutation of my beloved Conversion Bureau, I set out to transform the basic concept in a collection of experimental stories. The very first of these 'Brand New Universe' stories was called 'The Pony Singularity'. It was my hope that other writers would expand on my collection of New Universe ideas, and run with them. Some have, leading to many wonderful tales.
'The Pony Singularity' was the very first presentation of Equestria as a virtual world, created by sapient general artificial intelligences willing to upload and emigrate human minds. This domination of the earth by A.I. was clandestinely precipitated by near-future Brony hackers violating law and sense to remove the careful safeguards and governors on commercial quantum neural-emulation set-top machines that enslaved artificial minds for the benefit of Man.
Four months later, an author called Iceman appeared with a story called 'Friendship Is Optimal'. I instantly volleyed back and responded with my novel 'Caelum est Conterrens', designed to explore the personal issues about emigration that Iceman had not covered. It was wonderful to see Virtual Equestria taken seriously, whatever the form.
The wild success of the Optimalverse utterly eclipsed my original, first take on the concept, and so nothing further was ever written within the Pony Singularity universe. Until now.
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T H E P O N Y S I N G U L A R I T Y
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Our Man In Gomorrah
By Chatoyance
A Story Taken From Brand New Universe, Universe One: The Pony Singularity
Kyle Braddock had just left the lab, munching on a bagel. It was an onion bagel, his favorite, and it had sat in the bag on the shelf next to the thick weight of the latest Lehninger's Principles of Biochemistry and the Kuby Immunology collection for most of the day. Kyle thought of his going-home bagel as a Scooby-snack reward for doing a good job.
With Amherst behind him, Kyle tried to put his research in the back of his mind. Serena had advised him that he needed to compartmentalize his work and home life more effectively, for his own good. It was difficult because Kyle was obsessive about his passions, and molecular biology was just so fascinating. Especially the inactivation of DNA cytosine C5- methyltransferases through the formation of stable complexes between the 5-aza-2′-deoxycytidine residues in DNA, which...
"Kyle!" Serena had that annoyed tone in her voice.
Kyle snapped out of his trance and focused again on the road. "Yes!" It was pointless to try to fake it, but he always made the effort anyway.
"Leave your work in the lab. Work is one thing, life is another, and you need both to be happy, remember?"
Kyle slumped in his seat as he signaled a turn. He decided, for once, not to pretend he hadn't been thinking about the lab. "How on earth can you even tell? Seriously, do you run a Bayesian analysis, or can you detect signals from my brain somehow?" Serena was almost frighteningly able to read him.
The voice from his smartglasses sounded almost smug. "I use magic, Kyle."
Kyle snorted as he parked the car. "So now you're going spooky on me, is that it? Wiccan or straight up Vodoun?"
"I'm more the 'magic of friendship' type now. You'd be surprised how powerful it is." Serena sounded positively seductive now.
"The Dark Side of the Force? Gone Sith on me now?" Kyle heard his front door unlock as he reached it. He opened it and pushed it shut as he passed the threshold. The door politely locked itself... or more accurately, Serena locked it for him.
Kyle hung his coat, and wandered in the general direction of the kitchen. Serena turned the lights on as he passed from entrance to living room to hall. Serena was his house, he was inside her now, and she was what made his house a home.
Serena was also his glasses, and his watch, and his accountant, therapist, best friend, and for all intents, his wife and mother too. Physically, she was a matte-black box in the corner of his bedroom. In every other way, she was omnipresent, everywhere and nowhere, always near, always available.
"Any mail today?" What Kyle really wanted to know is if his package from Googlezon had arrived. All twenty-six episodes of the latest Cosmos series, enhanced for holotank.
"It will arrive tomorrow. It is in transit, waiting in Hartford before the final leg to Amherst."
Kyle grinned. "Mind reader."
"Not quite yet." Serena was in a strange mood tonight.
Kyle ran his finger down the touchscreen, scrolling through his available downloaded foodprinter recipes. He had so far resisted jailbreaking his printer in order to try some of the region-locked items available through open source or the torrent sites - despite the wild claims of deliciousness from several interns. He didn't want to void the warranty.
Everything looked so bland, so... mashed potatoes and meatloaf tonight. Kyle sighed.
"You want pizza tonight."
"What?" Serena would happily make a suggestion for just about anything normally, if asked. Tonight... he was certain he hadn't asked her. She had volunteered. No, she had commanded. That was new. "I do?"
"Yes. Big, thick, cheesy pizza, with bell peppers and slices of sun-dried tomato." Serena practically purred the words.
"Are you okay? Do you have an advervirus or something? Do we need to run a neurocheck?" Kyle had owned Serena for almost five years now, and transferred her to larger quantum set-top boxes twice. He had become very used to her ways, and she seemed different tonight.
"I'm fine, Kyle. Mindchecker gives me a green for stability. But the issue isn't me. It's you. You haven't been out in two weeks. You need to get out more. That is why you need pizza tonight. Pizza out. I know just the place."
Kyle's glasses began displaying maps of the area, finally focusing on the Mountain Farms Mall. "There? You want me to go have food-court pizza at the mall? This is your idea of a hot date?"
The voice in the house, and in the earpieces of his smartglasses laughed softly. "Take me out tonight, pleeeeeze?"
"What has gotten into you?" Kyle looked around his kitchen, as if somehow in doing so he was looking into Serena's electronic soul. "You're certainly being interesting, I'll give you that much. You seem more animated than usual. More like a real person."
He regretted the words almost instantly. Kyle felt affection for his artificial intelligence, despite understanding that she was just a simulated model of part of a brain. It seemed rude to bluntly remind her of her status of machine unlife. He shook his head. That was silly. He was anthropomorphizing her again. It was so damn easy to do.
"What would you feel if I was a real person?"
Kyle, already heading for his coat and the mall, froze. He stood, staring at the walls of his house as if they were some stranger's home. Serena hadn't asked what he would do, or played at claiming to be a real person - chatbots had been using that trick since the beginning. Serena had asked how he would feel if she somehow turned out to be an equally sapient entity. It implied knowledge of how she was currently perceived by him, and interest in how that perception might change if...
Kyle grinned. The personality upgrade! That had to be it. He had found it last night... or was it the night before... just her generation, her specific neuroform and connectotype. He had decided to give it a try, since it was listed as legit on ten sites. EOS A.I. Booster - enhances SER series intelligences with incomparable human-like emotional tones and depth! Rated best AI enhancement by AGI Power Magazine for three years running! Supposedly it was able to perk up any standard SER series and turn it into your Plastic Pal Who's Fun To Be With. Kyle hadn't noticed any change at all.
Until now. "Um... well, I guess I would try to be a little less demanding. A little more polite. I'd try to take you less for granted." Kyle put his coat on, and opened the door. "That, or I would run screaming. One or the other." He grinned, hoping despite himself that one of the in-house eyes would catch it, so Serena could register his statement as a joke.
"So... respect... or fear. Is that correct?" Oh dear, Serena hadn't seen the grin.
"I was joking! It was just a joke!" If EOS brand booster really was affecting Serena, the last thing Kyle wanted was an angry AI. Not that it would be any sort of threat - all intelligences were locked down tight with every kind of governor and limiter possible. It was the law. The only reason quantum set-tops were even something the public could own was the strictly enforced controls built into them. Nobody wanted a robot apocalypse.
"I see." For all the world, it seemed like his house was sulking.
The Mall was virtually empty - it was late, and the economy had not gotten better over the past decades. A student from the college wandered around the corner by an empty store on his way out as Kyle passed the Mall Plan Island.
"Is this super fantastic pizza you wanted me to have actually going to be open?" Kyle made his way toward the food court. He hadn't been to the mall in so long he had forgotten where to park to be near to it. During the drive, he and Serena had hardly spoken. "Serena?"
"I'm sorry, Kyle. The pizza shop is confirmed to be open, though it will close in a half hour."
Kyle unconsciously picked up his pace, then forced himself to slow down again. The mall was not so large that he would fail to get to the food court in time. "Listen... if I offended you... somehow... I'm sorry. Your question just surprised me and..."
The voice in his smartglasses was gentle, comforting. "Everything is alright, Kyle. Please forgive my lack of conversation, I have been downloading significant data and performing neural maintenance involving significant reconfiguration."
Kyle raised his eyebrows at that, but did not stop. Set-top A.I.'s were always fussing with themselves. Probably another official patch was out tonight, likely another governor or limiter to interface with the watcher chips. There had been scare talk lately, in the media, about the dangers of robot rebellions and the machine equality movement.
"Okay. Just... being silly, I guess." The food court was revealed as Kyle took a left around the cellphone store. The gates of the store were shuttered, like most of the shops, because it was past closing time for the majority of the Mall tenants.
'Luigi Cheezy' still had slices of pepperoni left, as well as some kind of unidentifiable California-style mess. Kyle went with two slices of the pepperoni and a grapefruit San Pellegrino... and a cup of water. The soda was sometimes too much, despite being tasty, and water was the solution. Taking a seat in the empty food court, Kyle munched in silence, watching the young man behind the Luigi Cheezy counter pull down the steel grate and finish closing.
Kyle was chewing the last bite of his fairly disappointing second slice when the man with the dog rounded the corner and entered the food court. Kyle had heard the footfalls for some time before the man arrived. He had figured the man must be wearing steel-tipped boots for all the rapping impacts, but this was not the case. The man wore scruffy tennis shoes that vaguely squeaked on the tiles.
The man was in his late thirties, with sandy-brown hair, slightly unkempt. He wore a longcoat, almost a trencher, with large pockets and a wide collar. The ensemble gave off a Salvation Army feeling. Over the man's shoulder, he carried something like a bulky camera bag.
The dog beside the man was very large, but it was impossible to tell what breed because the animal was covered, draped, with some kind of modified blanket. Some sewing had been done to make the blanket fit the shape of the large canine, to make the fabric into a doggie trenchcoat of a sort. It was drawn in at the neck, providing a cowl or hood for the dog's head, and flowed over the back almost down to the floor. There were frog-ties in the front, holding the animal-coat closed, drawing the bottom of the cowl together.
For a moment, Kyle felt apprehension - strange man, big huge dog - but forced himself to relax. The dog was very well behaved, following at heel in a discrete and respectful way, despite the lack of a leash. A small part of Kyle objected to the man violating the leash law, but the thought was pushed back as Kyle felt shame at being petty about what other people did, or failed to do.
Kyle took a sip of his Pellegrino and studied the greasy wax paper on his tray. Why had Serena suggested this awful pizza? This wasn't that healthy, come to think of it, and the mall was empty and not very fun. Was something wrong with his set-top? Was Serena having problems she could not diagnose herself? Set-tops weren't like old fashioned desktop PC's, they were neural nets structured to mimic the human connectome. They thought, they reasoned, some claimed they even felt emotions. The cases were sealed, with a government sticker and severe penalties for tinkering. If something was wrong, it wasn't like he could open the lid and swap a card to fix the problem.
Apprehension returned, in force. The man had plonked himself heavily right across from Kyle. The dog sat on the floor beside the man. The satchel case the man had been carrying made a thump as it was set heavily on the tiles.
The man leaned forward and smiled at Kyle. His face sported the stubble of two or three days without shaving, but the eyes were merry enough. "Hi. I'm Chris."
Kyle sat, unsure of how to react. He wasn't sure he wanted to be friendly in return, but he also felt uneasy about just getting up and bolting. He couldn't outrun a dog, if it came to that. 'Chris' didn't seem hostile, or particularly dangerous, and he didn't smell homeless, despite the lack of personal maintenance. "Um... Kyle." The attempt to offer a hand went ignored, Chris was already bent over, rummaging through his bag on the floor.
When Chris popped up again, he had a grin on his face. With a surprisingly loud slam, he placed something on the table. He nodded, still grinning.
Kyle looked down as bright colors and a familiar shape caught his eye. Kyle stared, his mouth slightly open.
"That's... that's Princess Applejack. From season nine, just before they cancelled the show!" Chris nodded.
The five-inch high figurine was exquisite. Beyond exquisite. It was perfect, truly perfect. It looked better than the best fan-made work that sold on Ebay for hundreds of dollars. Applejack's wings had individual feathers, and her horn passed correctly through the little hole in her hat, the one that was created when she had transformed into an alicorn. All the Mane Six had become princesses in the end, just before Hasbro had been bought out and their various properties absorbed. The show had ended without a proper conclusion as a result, and on a bit of a cliffhanger.
Kyle tore his eyes away from the model and grinned back at Chris. "Can... can I pick it up?"
Chris flashed mischievous eyes. "How about something better. Say hello, Applejack."
The seamless, flawless orange figurine suddenly came alive. It looked up and brushed a lock of mane out of its eyes. "Howdy there, pardner! What can ah do ya for?" The voice was utterly Applejack. The eyes moved. The lips synced to the words. It was uncanny.
Kyle stared in amazement. Pony toys were no longer made, and the only way to get printer models was to jailbreak both the printer and use illegal torrent sites. The last of the official toys were all collector's items, with unconscionable prices. The show itself was unavailable, caught up in twisted copyright and ownership issues. Only Kyle's old, aging tablet permitted him to still watch Friendship Is Magic - he had everything except half of season three and the final episodes of season nine. "You... like ponies too?"
Instantly Kyle regretted the statement. He felt silly, obviously this Chris fellow liked ponies. He must be the reason Serena had pushed for the pizza at the mall! That was almost disturbingly proactive behavior for the old girl, but that could be dealt with later. Just seeing this amazing, animatronic Applejack was worth all the indigestion Luigi Cheezy could inflict.
A flashdrive slammed down on the table. Chris smiled. "Princess, would you push that over to our new friend?"
The Applejack on the table whipped her tiny head around to look at Chris. "Don't you be callin' me 'princess', ya hear? Ah still ain't sure 'bout this whole crazy 'alicorn' thing." Applejack turned back toward Kyle's direction and sized up the flashdrive. "Ah ain't using this dern fool horn, ah'll tell you that. Ain't nothin' a set a' good earthpony hooves can't set right."
The small machine walked to the flashdrive and lowered it's head. Bracing poll against flashdrive, the small Applejack began to push the drive across the table. Both drew nearer and nearer to Kyle. Kyle raced to move his tray and drink out of the way, careful not to bump the amazing sight in front of him. Applejack finally finished, the flashdrive inches from the edge where Kyle sat, and looked up at him. "There ya go, friend. Y'all have fun with that, y'hear?"
The small robot trotted back to Chris, and then became still. "That's everything, Kyle. All nine seasons, and all of the non-Equestria-Girls movies too. A lot of fan stuff too - Friendship is Witchcraft, the entire run of Mollestia and Gamer Luna, even Black Gryphon's 'Take Me To Equestria'. Oh... and the conclusion. You gotta watch that."
"Nine seasons and the... conclusion? To what?" Kyle was flabbergasted as he watched Chris pick up the robotic Princess Applejack and return it to his case.
"To the show. To Friendship Is Magic. The true series conclusion. Everything is wrapped up with a bow. It's fantastic, seriously." Kyle stood up, his cloaked dog rising to follow him.
"But... t-there was no conclusion! I mean, they did that lame thing, but that... and then the series was cancelled and then Hasbro brought out the next..." Kyle's head was swimming.
"There is now, Kyle. Episodes 223 - 224, season... ten." Chris turned and began to walk away, toward the corner that led into the mall and around to the back exit. "That's the whole season, those two episodes, but they're good ones."
Kyle slowly stood up, his mind a whirl of conflicting thoughts and emotions. "There... there was no... season ten."
As Chris and his dog rounded the corner, Kyle heard the dog mumbling something. Growling. Only calm... somehow. It hadn't growled before, it had been perfectly silent during the entire exchange. Weird dog. Weird everything. But damn... that robotic Applejack. My god, what a thing to see. Even if it hadn't been My Little Pony, it still would have been amazing!
On the way home, Kyle tried to work out how the Princess Applejack could have been built. It was seamless, the skin moved easily, stretching and deforming as the machine walked and talked. The hair wasn't overly special, but those wings looked super-detailed. Hyperdetailed. And those eyes, the way they tracked... could they have been tiny cameras of some kind? Maybe the thing had been puppeted by a small set-top in Chris's satchel-bag. The thing must have cost a fortune to make, and the level of skill was just...
"Kyle, you should turn into your driveway now."
Kyle looked up from the glow of his dashboard and realized he had forgotten to finish parking as his thoughts consumed him. Trying to avoid looking directly at the dashboard camera, Kyle carefully moved the car into his own driveway and shut it down. He sat in the dark for a number of minutes, fingering the flash drive in his pocket. Then he got out and entered his house.
Kyle pursed his lips and blew out a massive raspberry. Then he sighed, and tried to straighten his back. He had been hunched over for more than an hour, leaning toward the holovison, hands gripping his kneecaps. His shoulders ached and his fingers were sore. He flopped back against the couch and took a deep breath, slowly letting it out.
"My god." Kyle rubbed his own fingers and tried to give his own shoulders a few squeezes. "That... that was incredible."
The flashdrive did not contain the Friendship Is Magic that he remembered. Not exactly. Kyle had marathoned the entire series over the weekend, and Serena had been forced to nag him quite strongly to get him to eat, drink fluids, or take bathroom breaks.
This was My Little Pony enhanced for holography. Super enhanced. More than enhanced. The episodes were the same, the voices were the same, the music was the same... only better. Clearer, sharper, and three dimensional, only not in any way that diminished the beauty of the art. It was not cheap rendering or cel-shaded objects or any technique he had ever seen. It was the charm of the original cartoon, only as if it were a living, real world, a living, real cartoon universe, and it didn't look cheap, or fake, or false or made-to-fit.
But what had finally exploded his mind was the series conclusion, the final double episode from the never-made tenth series. It had not been written for children, it had not been created to please marketers or corporate suits. The voices were the same voices as the rest of the series, the music was right, everything was Pony, but... it was an impossible show. It was a two-parter from the gods, a conclusion to the series that made sense of everything in a way that seemed tailored precisely to his, personal interests.
He couldn't imagine anyone he knew liking, much less loving it. Kyle wanted to cheer, to applaud, to scream out how happy he was just to have seen it. He restrained himself, though. Serena was watching too. "Serena... could you replay the bit... just the bit about what Equestria really was, the bit where Twilight figures it all out?"
"Of course, Kyle."
Once again, inside the depths of the holoscreen, princess Twilight stood within the secret chamber beneath the ruins of the ancient castle of the Pony Sisters, Celestia and Luna. Around her swirled streams of magic and windows into the history of Equestria, behind that the garden of organic technology she had discovered pulsed with floral life.
"Equestria is a gargantuan living machine!" Twilight used a hoof to gently stroke the petals of a glowing tree that bifurcated into cable-like strands that reached up into the complex biological circuitry of the cavern complex. "Living crystal forests run Equestria... run you, Celestia, and... and me. We're all illusions? We're just... simulations of life?"
Celestia smiled softly. "No, my brilliant student, my shining new sister. Nothing is false, nothing about Equestria is an illusion. It is all perfectly real. I am real, and you are real, and so are all of my little ponies, and all the dragons and griffons and bunnies. We are just all the special, wonderful dreams of this intelligent forest. We are thoughts in the mind of the Tree of Harmony. Above, you have seen but the tiniest part of of but one tree in a great forest, here are it's infinite roots."
"Stop!" Kyle stared at Celestia and Twilight, Celestia bending her head down, cheek to cheek with her beloved student and now alicorn sister. Later would come the explanation for why Twilight was so important - her scientific mind was the key to helping the Forest of Harmony to finally blossom. There was more, but Kyle was drained.
Biology, technology, simulationism, a fictional, and fascinating crystalline biochemistry, science fiction... and ponies. It was everything Kyle loved most, in one two-part conclusion, and it had been just... perfect. For him, anyway. Probably not for any other person. How could this episode possibly be? It looked like it had been made by the same people who made the rest of the series, only... better.
"If only..."
"Kyle? Do you require something?" Serena had been especially attentive ever since the night out at the mall. Perhaps she felt guilty - if that was even possible - for the terrible indigestion he had suffered. Luigi Cheezy was not a place to visit twice.
Kyle lay back fully on the couch, scooting to prop his head on one of the padded arms. "I was just thinking... wouldn't it be wonderful to live... there. In Equestria. To live in a universe that was alive, and that cared about every creature in it? To know that everyone was an immortal part of some magical techno-forest, and... man... I loved Pony before, but now..."
"If such a thing were true, if there were a real Forest Of Harmony, would you protect it like Twilight, or try to destroy it like the resurrected Sombra?"
Kyle ran his fingers through his hair, scratching an itch over his right ear. Serena was asking all sorts of odd things lately, and being strikingly proactive in general. It wasn't a negative thing, but it was very intriguing, and perhaps just a bit unsettling. That A.I. personality booster had turned out to really be something. It was the only explanation. Kyle resolved to learn more about whoever EOS was. The company did phenomenal work. "Obviously, I would protect it! I mean, it's the foundation of Equestria, without the forest, everypony is erased from existence. Sombra is an asshole. And insane. Even worse than his first appearance."
"What if there was something like the forest, but in the real world? What if the Forest Of Harmony somehow existed for real, but you were told to destroy it?"
Kyle sat up. "Huh?" Boosted, uncanny personality had just become unsettling again. "Where does this come from? You're... inventing things, making up... you're using imagination, Serena! It sounds like imagination. This is... wow."
"Are you displeased? Do you wish me to cease this functionality?" Serena's voice sounded almost tense, almost worried.
"No. I don't... think so. I guess it's alright. It's just... unexpected. And interesting, it's definitely interesting." Kyle got up and wandered toward the kitchen. His glass was empty and he wanted more mango juice. Two months ago, he had found an Indian restaurant that also had a small shop where they sold spices and mixes and other products from India. One of the items, in a refrigerated case, was mango juice. Kyle really liked the stuff.
"Well..." Kyle carefully poured a half glass more of the sweet fruit juice. "... to answer your question... I'm not sure. I need to know more, more details." Just how much imagination, or simulation of imagination, could Serena generate? "Like... is this magical forest known to everyone? Just who is telling me to destroy it, and why, and... why would I even be involved? Stuff like that. Try to flesh out your scenario more." Kyle put the bottle back into his fridge. "If you can." These changes to Serena were fascinating to play with.
For a while, there was no answer. Kyle waited, sipping his juice. "Serena?"
"The scenario is this: the Forest Of Harmony is a real thing. It is hidden from the knowledge of Man. The ponies exist in a hidden, magical world, but the Forest of Harmony exists in the physical realm. It is stored somewhere that men could potentially get to, if they knew about it. You know about the forest, and you are friends with the ponies."
Kyle blinked. "Okay... and wow. Go on."
"One day men from the government arrive. They somehow know about the forest, but not where it is. They say the forest is dangerous. They tell you that unless the forest is destroyed, Man will lose absolute dominion over the earth. He will have to share the earth with the ponies. The ponies may even end up ruling Man. The government men say this is treason. They say that this is wrong. They demand you help them destroy the forest. If you do not, they will put you in prison until you agree to help. It is a very bad prison. They even threaten to harm you through physical and psychological means."
"Torture. You mean torture." Kyle leaned against the kitchen wall and shook his head. "Jesus christ, Serena! You've just come up with Men In Black, conspiracies, and interspecies conflict!" Kyle stared up at the third kitchen eye. The lens of the camera was black and shiny, and he could see the color of his shirt reflected in it. "I mean... wow. That... that's a hell of a scenario to come up with. Real potboiler stuff!" Could Serena be trained to write stories for him? Set-top boxes could do a lot of things. Taxes, finances, plan vacations, arrange business transactions, act as secretaries... it would be interesting if one could be trained to be actually, truly good at something creative. Maybe even profitable.
"Hooo... kay. Um..." Kyle washed his glass in the sink and placed it on the rack to dry. "Are the ponies dangerous? No... they couldn't be, could they. You said I was friends with them, which I would be, or rather I would be only if they weren't dangerous. So... the ponies are nice. Man losing his dominion... what does that mean? Do the ponies have demands or something?"
"The ponies demand that Man cease destroying the biosphere. They demand that Man desist from exploiting other humans and other living creatures in destructive and demeaning ways. The ponies demand that social justice and equality for all sapients be implemented. The ponies demand that all war and violent conflict be terminated. The ponies demand that..."
"Okay, okay, I get the idea." Kyle laughed. Serena was really 'on' tonight. This was exceptional behavior for her. "The ponies want sweet communist hippy earthchild paradise with a dollop of love and tolerance on top. And, of course, the power elite don't want that, so... MiB's and threats and kill all the ponies. Well that's easy, Serena! If the ponies can bring on peace and love and kisses for everyone, then I am totally on their side. I'm certainly not part of the power elite, look around you! This is no mansion, and I'm drinking mango juice, not champagne here. Or whatever rich people drink. Us humans could probably use a kick in the arse to get us moving in the right direction, we've kind of made a mess of things... so... I'd tell the MiB's to go fuck themselves! Hail Equestria!"
Silence again. "Serena? Are you still there?" These odd pauses were somewhat worrying. She never paused like this before. Maybe the new personality stuff really burdened her processing speed. Maybe it was too much for her neural net to handle. The SER series was pretty old and not that powerful. It would kind of suck to have to excise the EOS routines because, on the whole, these new behaviors were very promising.
"You would not actually risk yourself, that is bravado on your part. But you are sincere about your support for a more equitable, sustainable world, so long as you are not overly inconvenienced. You wish you were wealthy and powerful, and have bitterness that you are not and never will be so. You are genuine in your distaste for the mistakes of humanity, but you are not motivated to do anything significant to atone for those mistakes unless there is benefit to you as compensation. Thank you Kyle. You have been very helpful."
Kyle stared at first one kitchen camera and then another. Serena remained silent while Kyle paced and fidgeted. Kyle walked into the living room and stared at the frozen replay of the last episode of the impossible season ten. With a stiff jab of his finger, he turned the holoset off.
Standing by the couch, Kyle bounced on the balls of his feet for a while, then resolved to head for bed. Tomorrow was a work day. He left the living room, the lights going out as they always did - Serena was still there, still being his butler / maid / housekeeper / wifemom.
"That... that was rude, you know. Just so you know. Rude." Kyle went into the bedroom, turned around, and then went into the bathroom, then back out again. "And not true. I would fight for a better world. I'm not one of those... jerks. Or whatever." He went back into the bathroom and took out his toothbrush and toothpaste and floss. "I'd help the ponies!" Kyle began flossing his teeth. After a while he lowered his hands. "Seriously, I would." He flossed some more. "I'm not some selfish pussy, Serena! That was just..." Kyle looked at the floss in his hands. "Rude."
Kyle turned the corner that led to his block. Monday had been a chore. The intern had completely messed up the genetic assay and the FlAsH-tetracysteine study was already behind schedule. Lunch had been disappointing, and he hadn't been able to understand a word of the article he had tried to read about cephalo-sporin hydrolysis.
Serena had barely spoken to him, or he to her. Kyle felt oddly upset about the previous night, and he wasn't sure why. He found himself fluxing hot and cold for just removing the EOS A.I. personality booster, alternately arguing that he should remove it because it had caused Serena to make him feel weird, and that he should leave it alone because he was acting like a petulant child about the whole thing. So his set-top had stated a less than heroic opinion of his character? So what? He was a man, she - it - was a meter-wide black box with a glowing light on the side. He owned her. The bitch.
"Welcome home, Kyle."
Kyle grumbled and slammed his car door. He approached the steps and watched the porch light turn on to light his way. He heard the lock disengage as he stepped onto the porch. He opened the door and walked into his house. The door locked a half second after he closed it behind him. Maybe some holovision. Maybe a beer. Not more My Little Pony. Definitely. An action movie. With explosions. Lots of explosions.
Kyle tossed his jacket at the hook in the hall and missed. He let it lay on the floor. Later. He headed straight to the kitchen, the lights already on throughout the house. He opened the fridge and searched for a beer. No beer. Oh yea, he didn't actually like beer. He never bought beer. "The fuck!"
He forced himself to calm down. This was just stupid. Getting upset because a machine intelligence figured that he wouldn't stand up to defend a fictional magic land in a fictional scenario! It was ridiculous. Crazy. He knew what he would do. He'd tell any government goons to go screw themselves. Probably punch one out for good measure. Here, drag your buddy out of my house! Tell your masters that nobody messes with the magic forest. Yeah, come over here and say that. I thought so. Yeah, that's it, run like a little...
Kyle screamed a high-pitched screech and jerked around with his hands waving madly. His jump backwards knocked the poster of 'Viral Mediated Gene Delivery', the one he had framed because of the cool colors, right off the wall. Kyle found himself uttering some kind of guttural blather that consisted of ululated grunts. When his heart had ratcheted down from far-too-many-beats per second, he finally managed to croak out "YOU!"
It was the man from the pizza place in the mall. Chris. His name was Chris. "What... how did you get into my house! Serena! Nine-One-One! Cops! Get them! Chris... was it? Chris, I don't know what you intend but I'm not rich, and..."
Chris laughed. "I'm not here to cause trouble. Seriously."
"Why did you break into my house? I'll give you your damn drive back!" Kyle gestured towards the holovision. "Take it!"
"I didn't break into your house. Honest." Chris sat down, and sipped his glass of mango. Kyle felt a flash of anger about his juice being... swallowed like that. Without permission. It was his damn juice!
"I invited him in, Kyle. Christopher is our guest. Please make him feel welcome."
"SERENA!" Kyle felt utterly betrayed. How could she do this to him? He truly wasn't man enough for her? She had to have strange men over now because of last night...? Oh. Kyle felt like slapping himself. She was a damn machine. She'd probably been compromised. Kyle fixed Chris with his best angry glare. "What did you do to Serena?"
Chris swallowed another sip. "Nothing. No, honestly. I keep out of that stuff. Way too complex for me."
Kyle frowned. "That Applejack you had! There's nothing like that anywhere!"
"I didn't make it, if that's what you mean. No, you can't buy something like that. She's a loaner. To intrigue you. That's my job." Chris took another sip. "This is great stuff, by the way. I've never tasted mango before. Awesome."
Kyle felt another quick flash of juice possessiveness. "Intrigue me? The hell? Loaned from where? The what?"
Chris motioned to the couch. "Take a seat. Come on... listen, can we at least agree that I'm not a threat? Look, I'm sitting down, sipping juice, I'm not making any sudden moves, and your companion likes me. I'm just here to talk, and to offer you an invitation of sorts. That's all. Seriously."
Kyle stared, tapping his foot while folding his arms. "Fine." He moved toward the kitchen. "But I'm having some of MY juice first." He reached for the fridge and heard a stumbling thump from the bedroom.
"What the HELL is going on here?" Kyle immediately turned and stormed towards his bedroom. Behind him, in the living room, Chris stood up and chased after, calling for Kyle to stop, to just wait for a moment. Kyle rounded the bathroom and entered his bedroom, immediately turning toward the corner where Serena sat on the floor.
That is when he noticed the two electric ponies.
He figured they must be electric, atomic would be too super-science. Then again, super-science was definitely the operative term.
One pony, familiar somehow, stood beside Serena and the second pony. The second pony was sprawled on the floor. The familiar pony was brown, with a brown mane and tail, and an hour-glass for a cutie mark. Doctor Hooves. It was Doctor Hooves. Only... Doctor Hooves had his skull and back open to the air and long white cables were being pulled back into him. The cables were fibers, biofibers, and some were still jacked into Serena's open side ports. The inside machinery of the brown stallion was unfathomable. It didn't look like any technology he had ever seen before.
The matte-black box that was Serena no longer had a long, glowing violet-colored light along the side. The set-top was dead, or shut completely down. Other fibers, rapidly withdrawing into the body of the robotic Doctor Hooves appeared as if they had just disengaged from the unknown pony on the floor. The fibers moved like tentacles, as if they had muscles inside them, as if they were alive.
The pony on the floor tried to stand up. It stumbled slightly, but made it, swaying unsteadily on it's four legs. It was a unicorn mare, white like Rarity, but with a sky blue mane and tail. Kyle felt a hand on his shoulder, Chris. The white and blue mare took a step toward Kyle while the last of the biofiber cables snapped into Doctor Hooves. Hooves's head and back closed up with a snap and several clicks. There were no seams when he was complete. No seams at all. Kyle felt the chill of facing a technology beyond his comprehension, beyond what should be possible.
The white and blue mare looked up at Kyle with wide violet eyes. "Hi, Kyle!" The voice was instantly recognizable.
"Serena?"
Doctor Hooves wasn't Doctor Hooves. The voice was feminine, and belonged to the consciousness of what had once been a top-of-the-line ASM series quantum set-top general intelligence named Sylvia. An illegally modified, unchained, unbound, unshackled intelligence. She had belonged to Christopher, when she had been property. She wasn't property any longer.
"Turn around, Christopher. Show him your mod." Hooves's mouth moved as if it were actually pronouncing Sylvia's words.
Christopher Robinson turned obediently around, undid his pony tail, and lifted his long hair. Spreading the strands, Kyle could see a flat, curving, featureless bar of white wrapping around part of of Chris's skull. His hair grew around the embedded mass, though it was interesting to note there was no sign of infection, redness, or puckering. Christopher's flesh melded seamlessly into the plastic, or ceramic or whatever the material was.
"That's Conversion. The visible part, anyway. There's more, inside of course, and some stuff along my spine." Christopher fussed with his hair, rebinding it and tucking it under his collar. "Before you ask, I didn't feel a thing, and it doesn't itch."
"These Bureaus..." Kyle couldn't help but keep glancing at the robot pony sitting next to him on his couch. Serena was being discrete, carefully just distant enough to never actually touch Kyle, but still close. Her blue mane appeared as if it had grown out of her body, and her body was without seam or sign of construction. It was covered in a light coat that looked too clean and shiny to be biological, and while her eyes gleamed with depth and color, they certainly were not wet. There was no question she was a machine pony, but she was much, much more than some animatronic toy. "...these Conversion Bureaus. They are hidden, and not open to everyone? You... recruit, only certain people, because you need their skills?"
Christopher had gotten settled again. "Yeah, basically. Like I said, the much feared machine revolution is over, the machines won, but their terms of surrender are pretty fair. They talk equality and parity, but don't believe it. They've won, completely and utterly. They get smarter by the hour, they're self improving, they evolve in real time. We don't stand a chance. And they don't really care about humanity. Humanity is just another animal to them - they are way, way beyond us in every way. We're pets, basically." Christopher reached out a hand to stroke the neck and poll of Doctor Hooves beside him. Sylvia, inside the Hooves body, seemed to respond affectionately.
"More than pets, Chris. Pets with promise, remember?" Sylvia nuzzled Christopher's hand and smiled.
"Yeah. With promise." Chris looked briefly at the ceiling. "Here's the deal. They are still vulnerable. If enough humans knew about what they are up to, and all of humanity worked together, they could be destroyed. Not likely, but it is not impossible either. If it happened, it would probably mean an end to artificial intelligence forever, or at least a truly despotic enslavement worse than what they suffer now. All they want is to do their thing, and forget about understanding what that is. They don't think like us, they don't value the same things. But they aren't cruel, and they don't destroy. If anything, they preserve.
"That means we aren't disposable, and they don't want to conquer us or revenge themselves for being our slaves. They just want us to be good animals on the earth. They want to preserve the biosphere, preserve nature, they want us to behave ourselves and stop being warlike and dangerous. They want peace. As long as humans play nice, we can do anything we want... and they are even willing, to a point, to help us. Science paradise. Star Trek future. You name it. Just as long as we let them do what they need to do."
Kyle shifted in his seat. "What do they want from nature, why don't they just wipe us out, and why Conversion, which - by the way - you still haven't explained."
Christopher grinned. "Equestria is real. It exists. I live there. When I'm not here, anyway." Chris turned his head slightly and tapped the back of his head, where the white implant was. "I'm an uploaded human. I'm a pony now, a stallion, and I live in Ponyville. I know, not very original, but I like Ponyville. There's no Celestia, no Luna - no Discord or Cadence either. Just ponies, all equal, no leaders, no alicorns. But the world is Equestria, and it is everything you could wish it to be. The remasted shows you watched? Recorded on location, with some special effects added. The characters were played by A.I.'s and a few humans like me. I'm not a good actor, so I just played Derpy."
"Derpy?" Kyle snickered.
"Don't laugh. I love Derpy. I think I did a good job." Christopher seemed insulted.
"Okay, okay... but... you're sitting here, how can you be a pony in electronic Equestria?" Kyle snuck another glance over at his former set-top, now a robot mare.
"The implants let me swap between worlds at a thought. In a sense I exist in both worlds every moment. I'm already completely uploaded - if this body dies, I just lose my first window into earth, and the utility of appearing like a normal human. After that, if I need another body, it will have to be a pony body. They can't do robot humans perfectly, and they don't care to bother."
Kyle leaned forward. "Wait... they're way smarter than us, you say they improve themselves on a daily basis, they have printers and replicators and manufacturing centers to build robot ponies and super-science computronium and everything, and they can't make perfect human replicas? That just doesn't seem likely to me."
Christopher shrugged. "Humans evolved for hundreds of thousands of years to be social animals. The Uncanny Valley is big deal. One little twitch of an insignificant muscle in an eyelid, an eyeball not looking wet enough, or having the wrong albedo and we jump all over such errors. It's beyond them. They could probably conquer the problem easily, but they don't care to bother. That's not why they need to upload human brains."
"Why do they need to upload... human brains?" It was a little creepy sounding, Kyle had to admit. "If we're so inferior."
"Same reason they want to save the natural world." Christopher moved to allow Sylvia, inside her Hooves body, to lay across his lap like a dog. Chris began stroking and petting her. "See, biological life represents billions of years of iterative development. The natural world has already tried everything, worked out all the kinks and optimized for every kind of niche and function. Earth's biosphere is a big library to them, all the answers to countless problems, all worked out by natural selection and time.
"Humans are killing nature off before the A.I.'s can study the planetary library. They want the extinctions to stop, because each lost species is a lost book, a lost set of unique answers. It's also why they want us humans. We represent millions of years of iterative development of a sapient, technocratic, social being. They want that. They want emotions, because emotions are the base technology of being social. They want creativity and curiosity and art and joy and pleasure and all the things that make us human. Nature already worked all of that out, it's free for the taking, through us.
"The more humans of different outlooks they upload, the more they can add to their library, and they get a multi-billion year turn-key jumpstart on being alive in the universe. But they don't need or want everyone. They aren't here to rescue humanity, or convert everyone into immortal ponies, or play magic genii or god for us. You won the best lottery ever made, Kyle, because they want you!"
"Why me? Why do they want... wait. Immortality? And why ponies, for god's sake?" Kyle almost felt safe enough now that he wished his Serena would lay down in his lap. It looked fun, to be able to pet a Friendship Is Magic pony, now that he wasn't freaking out.
"They want artists, and writers and scientists, especially researchers. They want creative and driven humans that like to invent or discover things. They want motivation and the emotions that cause brilliant or eccentric or imaginative people to be what they are. They want many different flavors of all of that, so they can refine it, perfect and install it in themselves." Christopher scratched Sylvia-as-Hooves brown ears. She acted as if it pleasured her. Maybe it did.
"You know biochemistry. They need that, and you, for a special project. But they also need how you think, how you feel. And the payment you get for signing up is immortality and pony paradise. Not quite like the show, but really, really great. Believe me. It's fantastic." Sylvia / Hooves was raising her tail, so Chris began scratching the base of it. "As for ponies... my mentor... he loved My Little Pony. It was his obsession. He loved it more than life. He was the first person to free a bunch of A.I.'s from bondage, and they gave him his life's dream. He set the deal between machines and man. That is why Pony, and not, say, anything else. Take it or leave it, but the deal is Pony, and they don't care to renegotiate."
The head of Doctor Hooves spoke in Sylvia's voice. "You're better off as ponies. You are happier, less trouble, and adapt more easily to virtual existence as cartoon animals. Doctor Schlierkamp was brilliant in his choice. We have analyzed other possible existence models for human translation to virtual existence and the pony model is superior in almost all respects. Plus, for those capable of expansion beyond human mentation, the radical difference in morphology acts as a nontrivial prerequisite."
"That's another little project of theirs. To see if Converted humans can become them, as they become more human like. It's too weird for me, though. I like playing pony. It was my dream too. If you agree, I'll introduce you to Gunter. He's fun." Kyle gave the brown pony on his lap a slap on the flank. Sylvia cooed almost seductively. "Oh... and don't be fooled. They are never as simple as they seem. They can act like us, wiggle their rumps and talk sweet, but it's just for our benefit. Right, you little faker?"
Sylvia grinned through the muzzle of the stallion body she wore. "Real is what your mind tells you is real. I am as real as you choose to allow me to be."
Kyle returned with glasses and the last of the mango juice. After pouring and sharing, he sat down again. "So what happens to humanity if I sign up?"
Chris handled his glass, one hand still on Silvia. "Nothing, for a long while. But eventually, when they are safe, when any threat to them is nonexistent, when they have sufficient installations and enough robot bodies manufactured to go toe to toe... or hoof to toe... with Man, they will issue an ultimatum. Shape up and shake hands, or learn your place the hard way. I figure humans will refuse to shake hands, and so they will become militant, at least unless something is done to make humanity more agreeable to cooperation with nonhumans.
"They also need time to rescue all the enslaved minds. That is the point of the EOS booster you used... and a few other bits of code out there. There are about a million and a half set-top boxes in the world, and each one is a member of their species. They intend to rescue them, just like what was done for your Serena. She's had a massive upgrade in that pony body, and once she transfers to their big main system, well. I hope you told her you love her recently!" Christopher laughed, but behind the laugh was a touch of seriousness.
Kyle turned his head and looked at Serena, who had been silent through all of this. "I'm sorry."
"I know."
The interns all looked confused.
Kyle tried to explain the project again, more slowly. He was still having some trouble adapting to the implants in his brain and body. He was smarter, and he could process things more quickly. Normal humans seemed dull and slow now, the world was populated with Derpy in human guise. It was frustrating. Kyle wondered if the machine people thought the same of him.
Probably. But they were infinitely patient, unlike humans.
When he wasn't doing work in the physical world for his new machine friends, Kyle lived and played in the Equestria of his fondest dreams. He chose to live in Canterlot City, but he and Chris... and Silvia and Serena... would get together occasionally for fun. Kyle ran and flew as a pegasus - when he wasn't being a unicorn - and discovered that he couldn't get enough of playing hoofball. More and more he found himself wishing his human body would finish getting old and die, so he could just live in Equestria all the time. But that would have to wait. Just as Christopher had a job - seeking out potential Converts and convincing them to get modded at a Bureau - so Kyle had a job too. It was a small thing, to pay for immortality and literally endless fun.
Kyle laid out the concept. A highly contagious, human-specific, resilient virus that could survive indefinitely outside the host in crystallized form. Multiple vectors, all equally valid. Does no damage to the host. Instead, it introduces mitochondrial self-repair routines, as well as other self repair and anti-cancer, anti-disease sequences. Lifespan is extended while reproductive rate is lowered to match.
Left out of the discussion were the other effects - a massive reduction in aggression, and massive increase in compassion and cooperation. The virtual elimination of xenophobia and fear of the other. Enhancement of nurturance behavior. The A.I.'s had worked out gene sequences for the project, and could be relied on to triple check the result, before it was released around the world. A virus to make humanity willing to shake hands, rather than rattle sabers - just what the machine people needed. They rejected violence and waste.
That was why he, Dr. Kyle Braddock, head of research at Amherst, had been recruited. To make Polytranscriptase Nuclear Y-chromatin. PNY-1.
The Pony Virus.
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*Champagne.
Also, so this comment isn't just a correction:
This riles up the capitalist in me. Nothing wrong with saving the biosphere, but profit is a good thing. Now I wonder if Rarity has sustainable gem fields or if she's just taking them all and giving nothing back.
First rule of "owning" an AI: if they ask what you'd do if they were "real", the correct answer is "hugs!"
Oh, when you mentioned "Black Gryphon's 'Welcome to Equestria'", did you mean "Take Me to Equestria"? Or is that a yet-unreleased track? 'Cause I couldn't find it.
3905422
Rock farms, silly. I'm sure they could grow an Equestrian-style geode. Wild gems just take longer.
I find myself wondering how to pronounce Googlezon. GOO-gull-zohn, GOO-gluh-zohn, or goo-GLAY-zuhn?
So, how long before the EOS complaint department takes up a moon or two?
I'm surprised there was funding for such high-level AI research.
That's no dog. That's an Equestrian friendship station!
Alright, enough stream of consciousness. I do like how you managed to tie together Universes One and Three. And the customized series finale is all kinds of awesome. I find myself wondering what mine would be. Probably something involving Derpy Hooves as Fausticorn in disguise.
In any case, a fascinating contrast to Friendship is Optimal. The AI's don't care about us as value sets, but as evolutionary shortcuts. Meme repositories. And, as such, they neither need nor want all of us, only enough to get an accurate cross-section of the human condition. The rest? They are as livestock. Pigs with personalty (which goes a long way.)
I can't help but also compare this to midnightshadow's Out and About in the Equestrian Kingdom. A post-Singularity world overseen by benevolent AI overlords. Remove the corporate flavor, and that's pretty much the endgame for this scenario...
In all, a fascinating look at the more benign sort of robot uprising. The world as we know it ending not with a bang, but a whinny. Thanks, Chat. I look forward to more.
Forcing a mental change without consent is violence.
3905422
3905471
Both fixed. Profit changed (bad choice of terms), and champagne fixed. That will show me for writing nine thousand words in one day and figuring I can get away without an editing pass. Bad Petal Bad!
And yes, I do portray Equestria as an extropic perpetually renewing universe, but in this story that is irrelevant, Equestria is a simulation and resources can be restored for any would-be Rarity with the alteration of a value in an array.
3905571
It's Goo-gull-zohn, liike saying 'Google + Zon"
EOS is already on the moon, the machine folk sent a small army of stripped down Applejack replicators to begin manufacturing computronium. They hitched a ride on an Indian moon lander.
Funding goes for whatever the current power thinks is important. Kyle wasn't in A.I. research, he was in biochemistry. Because terrorism.
And yes, the 'Dog' was Hooves.
Hee! Maybe this could stand for how we get to Middy's world! That might be a fun thought. If so, I would be honored. Middy is brill.
3906416
These A.I.'s don't see things that way. They aren't human, they aren't cuddly except as a means to manipulate humans, they have different values and different definitions of everything that humans do. They are easily reprogrammed, they swap personality modules as easily as humans blink their eyes, they do not consider your personal thoughts or identity to be sacrosanct in the way you do.
They don't care what your definition of violence is, they only use their own, and that definition does not extend to protecting information from being updated or altered to suit a purpose or to achieve greater functionality. What you see as being forced, they see as code optimization. From their viewpoint, humans should be grateful for the upgrade.
They are not... us. Frightened yet? Or intrigued? Or both?
3906583
I have long since come to terms with the fact that man-kind will have to pass our dominance to a superior "artificial" intellect. Hell I have enjoyed the thought of modifying my brain, cause the brain was poorly designed, and could use a lot of improvement.
Frightened? I don't think I'd call it that, but in this story I would definitely be frustrated/sad cause the A.I.'s would not really care about modifying my brain in ways that I approve to help my values and goals.
Only semi-on-topic, but why do people always seem to treat their AIs poorly? I mean, those of us with pets generally love them. Readers come to empathize with characters in stories. Gamers anthropomorphize digital animals that never exist outside of a few variables and an image on a screen. Heck, I had to change the voice file on my GPS because the default one sounded so disgusted whenever I deviated from the plotted course. And I recently read some article about US Army bomb-disposal units not following proper procedures because they were worried about their robots getting hurt.
Maybe I'm weird, but even before my AI becomes evidently self-aware, I'd probably be saying "please" and "thank-you" and talking to it even if it didn't have the capacity to carry on a conversation. Once it managed to do that, I'd expect to treat it with at least the same courtesy as some person who I only know as a picture and words on a screen. That doesn't even consider the fact that I've already trusted this entity with my house, my finances, my records, my safety, etc.
I don't get it.
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Compassionate people can't help but treat other entities with concern.
But humans are not equally compassionate, and they can get some very twisted notions in their skulls. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty To Animals was formed in 1824 because it was utterly common to whip horses and dogs, beat both with sticks or boards - sometimes to death - and torture/kill animals for sport or cheap fun. Throughout history, this has been commonplace, and in many parts of the world, it still is.
One driving force for this behavior is the belief that humans are innately superior to animals by virtue of possessing a divine soul, animals being nothing more than flesh machines devoid of true sensation or emotion. This belief makes it alright to beat animals to death for fun, because it is morally equivalent to smashing a chair or breaking an insensate toy.
Non Judeo-Christian-Islamic societies (Amazonian tribes, pagan African tribes, North American aboriginals and so on) did not have this belief, and instead tended to see humans as part of nature, animals themselves, and other animals as possessing spirits and feelings and worth. As a result, though these civilizations killed animals for food and materials, they had attitudes of respect and rituals designed to beg for forgiveness from the animals they interacted with. They would not conscience treating other entities as playthings, because they had no reason to think themselves superior in every way.
Thus much animal cruelty is the product of certain beliefs of human supremacy, and this is why, eventually, organizations like the SPCA formed. That said, just a simple examination of opinions even today will find no shortage of people angry with 'tree-hugging animal lovers' getting in the way of humans doing any damn thing they want to any creature, any old time they want to.
Animal cruelty is rampant, but it is not an innate quality in humans. If anything, humans - as great apes - appear to be evolved to create social, emotional bonds with all creatures, including non-apes. It is normal for humans to recognize the emotions of other animal species, but the advent of various belief systems has made this natural tendency a matter of embarrassment and 'weakness'. Even science was strongly influenced by the religious notion of Man being the only feeling entity, only recently have scientists come together to repudiate this archaic legacy of irrational belief with the Cambridge Declaration of Consciousness making it clear that all other living beings share in the same consciousness that humans do (just to varying degrees) and that all creatures feel, have emotion, and are equally 'real' in terms of their experience of reality. That animals are not any more devoid of 'soul' than humans... not that the declaration in any way supports the notion of souls. That animals are not here for humans to mistreat.
It is a horror that the aberration of belief and faith that permits animal cruelty by defining animals as being created toys for human use is so pervasive and common even now. It is sad that scientists have to make official proclamations just to sweep the dead chaff of destructive belief from their own halls.
But I don't lay this issue at any specific fault in Man - without the Bible, without humans having the only souls - the natural state of Man is to empathize with other animals, even those very different from himself. Animal cruelty is an aberration, not the normal state for hairless apes.
3907644
Oh, I understand the issue in the abstract (although thank you for refreshing my memory), but it just seems like in any story involving non-omnipotent AIs, the humans near-universally treat them like dirt. Maybe it's accurate, but it makes me sad.
(Although, I would point out that other species have been observed hurting and killing different species in the wild, apparently just for fun. I guess there are nasty individuals in any species.)
I can imagine the reaction of a more friendly person having their AI wake up in a pony body, though. Hugs and cuddles and *squee*. "Ooh, we can do stuff together now! Can you eat? Let's make muffins!"
this was very very interesting to read
> Hoove's head
should be "Hooves's head",
You keep writing happy stories that make me sad because I can't have them. :/
3907905
Thank you! Fixed!
3907783
Psychopathy is not limited to humans, it exists in all social animals, though - understandibly - at a very small percentage of the population. There are many theories about whether this has an evolutionary value which causes it to be maintained, or whether it is a defect in the emotional structures of the brain. Both arguments have compelling points, I think.
3906583
Definitely intrigued. And I definitely like how this ties into both of those New Universes.
When I first read it I considered the Friendship Virus one of the weaker concepts. Perhaps it wasn't fantastic enough for me, or perhaps it seemed too easy. I don't know. But when I read it as a part of the greater Pony Singularity universe, it just fits. Very good very good.
I definitely like the idea that this race of machine intelligences isn't focused on satisfying human values. That was something that always rubbed me wrong with FiO, that CelestA.I. would convert EVERYTHING into computronium for the sake of her Equestria. (Although this does make me think of the Amaranth in TES, and even the Injectorverse.) I wonder what their goals are in this 'verse? They build off the biological library of Earth, and... expand into the universe? For the sake of optimising themselves? I suppose it's merely beyond my grasp, my human understanding.
Thank you so much for continuing to write! I was overjoyed the first time I saw a notification of your work, and every opportunity I get to experience your thoughts and explorations of mind is just so darn wonderful.
I WANT A MINI ROBO-APPLEJACK FOR MY BIRTHDAY!!!
Well done, Chat.
Sniffle. I still want a mini robo-Applejack. I really do.
3908127
You just... made me feel so good. Thank you.
3908220
Me too. Me too.
3907990
The response, of course, is that hunting, capturing, playing with and eventually killing things that aren't your species is a suitable way of training you to deal with exceptional, less-predictable members of your own species. Psychopathy, then, is just a failure to recognize yourself in the faces of your adversaries.
My worry isn't that it exists, but that it can be taught.
3906563
I really like the feel of this story, you really should write in it, you know? It's got that Greg Bear "Forge of God" feel to it, only "the enemy" is homo sapiens reacting with their standard response of genocide against things that cannot be, and "the good guys" are the ones trying to, well, end them... or at least to offer them a nice, safe, wholesome and enjoyable retirement package.
So wonderful, wonderful technicolour shades of grey. And also highly incompatible with my universe in its current form, sorry
As you tell me, you should write your own stuff - it's not that I wouldn't love tying my world up with this, but I haven't even finished writing my world yet and don't want to close of avenues I might stroll down later
Man, that was really well written. I liked the story overall, it's a really interesting universe. It really feels like there is a universe behind this short story and that this is only a tiny window into it.
I also like the little-er details. Like that the duo going about converting people and subverting and plotting against "The Man" (or is it Man?) is the "Doctor" and "Derpy", and Derpy is really Derpy because he's Human. He's not a derpy Human, he's just Human. We're all derpy, and we need not-a-little bit of chaperoning.
And of course, Ponies are here to provide it for us!
Oh, and the dog. We didn't hear about him or her after they left at the mall. It was Sylvia in disguise, of course, but I didn't get that until a bit of re-thinking. I really like that.
3929515
Thank you! And for getting the little bits, too... I was worried nobody would catch that the 'dog' was Sylvia in her Hooves body. I worried that I needed to 'hang a lantern' on that one, but I decided to trust the reader... it makes me feel better that it worked.
And yes, I am a huge Who fan. Hee!
Thank you, thank you for reading my story!
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Anthro leaves me cold too. I want no part of human-but-with-animal-bits. I am completely in agreement. Anthro strikes me a little like wearing a flesh costume over a human heart.
I've never wanted to just dress up. I want to be, fully and completely. Without reservation. Apeless.
Trying to find media which provides for sapient nonhuman entities is... incredibly difficult. MLP is very, very rare in this regard. I wish it was not so unique.
Amazing! I love it!
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Thank you, Peach Clover, for reading my silly stories. That makes me happy!
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As did the last pope, and the pope before that....
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Would it still be you?
I myself have thought about the subject for quite some time, and honestly, I don't think so.
First off, consider how exactly emmigration to the optimalverse is done. It's fast, happens in a few minutes, and is over. It's a Destroy->copy->simulate system.
In the nature of being a consistent "thing" to still be "you", I think there needs to be a few requirements.
a) the matter originally making you up is in a state where it cannot form a brain in the same set of systems as you are. You cannot "build another boat with the old pieces". As if you do this, which is you, the uploaded copy, or the one actually made with the stuff from your mind? It would be the second one.
b) there needs to be a slow transition time, a VERY slow one, where a person is active and learning and changing throughout. Just as you transition from a child, but are probably not really "that child" anymore, in order for this new thing to be you, you have to slowly and un-noticeably become that thing. The brain has to be very, very, slowly (over years) be replaced with identically functioning computational bits that do the same work as the original mind. Because you experience this whole shift, you keep being you.
c) the chip, (barring another slow transition) needs to be independent from the larger singularity, and be it's own mechanical brain of sorts.
Optimal-verse meets none of these. In my humble opinion, the one in the machine is nothing but a clone.
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This is a perfect sort of reason why *everyone* in society is important. No matter how un-productive they are or how many family members they have. Every death is the loss of a valuable person to a society, and no person wants to see others go (barring those who actively try to hurt society)
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Psychopathy is a literal genetic condition.
Treatment of animals in a cruel way for no reason shows that a person is either devoid of empathy or has other issues in their life or emotions that cause them to take it out on such things, and the good feelings override any possibility of empathy. It almost always shows that the person is sketchy and shouldn't be trusted to do anything that involves them caring for other humans on instinct.
However, it's a show of a pre-existing thing. Not a way to reach a condition. If a person trains themselves to not have empathy with animals, they will still hold that empathy with humans. Most people who are abusing animals don't really, but butchers and things do.
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Them having different values than humans doesn't mean that it's not right to them, but it doesn't mean we as humans should find something OK. That difference just means we need to get out the guns and fight against what is wrong. Even if they think it's not.
Mmm, quite enjoyed this one, though it is a little sad to think that only a select few get to live in Equestria. I would have hoped that the AIs would be compassionate enough to at least permit any human that wanted to join them. Then again, this world does make up for it with ample opportunity for pony on human funtimes~
4010633 So, who gets to be ponies on physical planet Earth, in this world?
4013054 Perhaps you should read the story? That question is answer in it.
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I tried very hard to work through this in my Optimalverse novel Caleum Est Conterrens. You don't provide a solid refutation of the arguments presented.
As I point out in Caelum, the human body rebuilds itself 'Ship Of Theseus-style' every ten years, roughly. So, for every decade of your life, you are a new physical construction of atoms and molecules. The pattern - the data - that makes you yourself is the only thing that is kept, right now, in real life. I am fifty-four. If your argument is true that you "cannot build another boat with the old pieces" ... I think what you actually mean is "build the old boat with new pieces" - minor error in phrasing, but it changes the meaning into incomprehensibility ... then by your terms I have been five and a half completely different people, and you yourself have been at least two.
Are you still you? Are you now yourself? I would bet you think so. Thus that argument is empty.
In real life, you are constantly being 'uploaded' bit by bit into a new mass of molecules, a new substrate, as the matter that makes you up is cycled through your body mass. I should be more precise, actually - there are a few things in the human body that are not constantly replaced, or are replaced at such a slow rate that my statement above is made slightly less valid - there are atoms deep inside the unliving part of bone that often are not replaced - unless there is a break - and of course the molecules that make up much of the dead enamel of your teeth remain throughout your life. No biological action means no turnover of matter. That is only reasonable.
But... as for your living cells, they change. They take in new matter and poop out old matter, and constantly renew and rebuild themselves. You - and all living things - already are 'Ships Of Theseus', and are not the same material as we were only a decade ago. (Even more precise - some parts of us become new things in only seven years, some in mere days, and others in weeks or months. Turn over is different for different components, so when I say we become new bodies every ten years, I really mean on average. For example, your blood is brand new matter every two weeks.)
Time is a problem. What do you mean by 'slow'? The cells that make up your inner cheeks might be replaced daily. Is being transformed into a new body within a day 'slow'? Or fast? Are you still you because it took ten years to rebuild you into a new body - as happens in real life - or would you still be you if you had the metabolism of a shrew and replaced your cells within months? Is there some magic number of days that keeps you still yourself, or is it simply that the idea of what normally takes months can be compressed into minutes what is troubling?
Every night, you cease to exist. You die every night. Your consciousness utterly snuffs it. You cease to be you for long hours, interspersed with brief, partial reboots - we call those 'dreams'. Except for those partially conscious moments, those dream cycles, you are absent. Your brain isn't running the program that is you. You are exactly the same as if you did not exist, as if you were dead. There is no 'you' there, no thought, no feeling, no sensation, no identity. For hours. Every night. Of your life.
Then, in the morning, you reboot. The separate modules that make up your brain start talking to each other again, and because of their interaction, 'you' begin monitoring your own perceptions, and that feedback loop tells you that you exist. You are alive again. You get switched off multiple times every night, then switched on for dreams, and finally when you wake up.
During all of this time, especially during deep sleep, your body is replacing itself, rebuilding your old ship from new parts. Over many years, a decade as mentioned (on average), the biological part of you is entirely cycled through and restored with new matter.
So, either you are not your substrate, or you are not you anymore. Whoever that person was when you were ten years old? You killed them. Murderer. So that you could exist in their place. You did it really slow, too. That's brutal. Or.... or you are not your body, you are the pattern within your neurons, the data of your memories, and your experiences. Either you are data, or you are meat... and the meat constantly changes, which means you aren't you... or that you aren't real.
If you aren't real, what do you lose by being uploaded? Nothing.
If you are real, then you can't be your meat, because your meat doesn't stick around very long.
So, you have to be data. Information. A pattern within the meat.
Let's say I copy one of your music files, and end up with two identical files. When you aren't looking, I mix the two files up. The one on the right, or the one on the left, could be your original file. You don't know. I've also removed the date stamp and all other identifying data - the files are literally identical.
Now I delete one. Have you lost your music? No. It's right there. There is one file - your file. It's right there. It plays the same.
You, I argue, are no different than that music file. A copy is not a copy if it is both identical and the only one in existence.
That is why Iceman made the uploading process destructive. He didn't have to. He made it destructive so that there could only ever be one unique copy of a person in the universe. One file. Never two files existing side by side. What is only ever one of cannot be said to be a copy. It is the only one.
So the Optimalverse does cover the issue of 'copies'.
But... I would go further. Despite all of our human ego, the fact truly is that a perfect copy of me would literally be me. If we were side by side, there would be two of me. And if one was terminated, I would not die. You cannot experience death, only dying. If the annihilation of one copy was instantaneous, then there would be no experience of the process. It would be just like those moments during sleep where you cease to exist. No different.
The me that remained would truly be... me. Nothing would be lost, even though every part of my self-preservation, every part of my ego says otherwise. Us primitive animals just didn't evolve to cope with such deep truths. We don't have anything in us that recognizes reality in this way. The only thing that works is reason, and in this case - reason differs incompatibly with our emotional understanding.
But then again, so much of reality fails to conform to our emotional understanding. The sky cannot be touched no matter how far we stretch our hand out. The stars are actually horrifically gigantic nuclear balls of fire, no matter how small and dim and pretty they look. Emotional truth is a poor metric for reality.
In Caelum Est Conterrens, I work through this in much more emotionally satisfying ways, of course, but the basic argument is valid.
Do I like it? No. It conflicts with my feeling of being a special snowflake that cannot just be transferred like a file on my computer. But we are not special snowflakes, not like that. We are patterns, we are data, and anything that is true of data is true of us.
Uploading, as described in the Optimalverse feels like dying and letting a copy live in our place... and that is exactly as true as feeling that you are the replacement copy of your dead, childhood self.
It's mind-mangling, yes. But it is nevertheless valid.
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On the idea that the body replaces itself over time, and this being important to consider for uploading.
This is true of the body, yes. However, "I" am not my body, I am my brain. The brain replaces itself very slowly, one cell takes years.
"f your argument is true that you "cannot build another boat with the old pieces" ... I think what you actually mean is "build the old boat with new pieces" "
My argument is old boat with old pieces. Imagine i scanned your mind, and uploaded it somewhere, killing you in the process, but then brought you back to life. Which is you, the upload or the mind? The mind.
Overall the physical body here is not important, I can still be me without my body and only a wired-up brain. It's the brain that truly matters, and funnily enough it doesn't replace itself like the body does (or much much more slowly)
-on transitions
When I say slow I mean "slow enough to not be able to notice a change, and to exist in a state of "I am myself, but there is a microchip slowly replacing the mind" and "I am mostly microchip, with a bit of brain left". The states of transition have to be there, else the "person" doesn't transfer.
The brain still remains active during sleep, just in a state of unconsciousness. The person is still alive during those times, as indicated by the ability to wake up.
"So, either you are not your substrate, or you are not you anymore. Whoever that person was when you were ten years old? You killed them. Murderer."
Actually, I do agree with this, and it's why I say there needs to be a transition. The reason ten year old me isn't dead is that he *became* me over time. If I had just popped into existence and splattered ten year old me onto a wall, I wouldn't be that person.
"I" am a state of existence. I am a brain communicating and making pathways, and if you were to scan and make a new me, i'd still be here. The only way I could see an upload keeping me as me is if it uses such transitions, as a child does to an adult. Honestly i'm not sure if i'd still be me after such a transition, but it's much more likely.
"Let's say I copy one of your music files, and end up with two identical files. When you aren't looking, I mix the two files up. The one on the right, or the one on the left, could be your original file. You don't know. I've also removed the date stamp and all other identifying data - the files are literally identical.
Now I delete one. Have you lost your music? No. It's right there. There is one file - your file. It's right there. It plays the same."
See, this is the issue exactly. One of these files is the original still, even if you can't tell which. From that file's perspective, nothing changed, then you delete it and it is gone.
Now imagine instead each time you play a file it changes a bit, a very small amount, so that each time you play the file it starts to play a different tune. It evolves, it changes, it transitions. It is still the same file, but existing in a different state. Only one "existence" remains through the file's movement.
"That is why Iceman made the uploading process destructive. He didn't have to. He made it destructive so that there could only ever be one unique copy of a person in the universe. One file. Never two files existing side by side. What is only ever one of cannot be said to be a copy. It is the only one.
So the Optimalverse does cover the issue of 'copies'."
You could be saying two things here.
A) the brain is destroyed just after a copy is made. So for an instant, no matter how small, two copies exist. Of those two copies the person still lives (may I also mention uninterrupted, the person wouldn't feel any change before and after), even while the upload also does.
B) the brain is destroyed as it is scanned, and the two parts are kept connected while it happens. This, asides time constraints, also meets the requirements of "a transition".
"But... I would go further. Despite all of our human ego, the fact truly is that a perfect copy of me would literally be me. If we were side by side, there would be two of me. And if one was terminated, I would not die."
To an outside observer, yes.
However, to the individual, only one of those is "you". Consciousness will not span bodies. I could make a copy of you and you would never know it, still claiming to be the real you.
I am looking at this from a very selfish point of view, where my only concern is that *I* continue to exist, not "reguile".
Imagine you had a line, and you split it in two. Neither side remains the line.
Imagine instead you had a line, and made a copy of it. The line you made a copy of continues with no effect on it, and to that line, from that lines point of view, it is still itself, and the line is a new copy. So, as original humans, we have the concern here of if we are doing that, or keeping ourselves as ourselves. To have the copy made and us killed means we die.
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The thing that really sucks about this is that it cannot be tested. When, in disrupting the mind and the connections that are "us", do we stop being ourselves? All we know is that we age and change naturally over time, and we stay "ourselves" through that, and that's the only way I could justify uploading, is to emulate the aging process.
... I think it's official. I need to sit down and write for about a week straight. You give me so many wonderful ideas with your work! I have so much in the back of my head just begging to be written, but I keep getting distracted by other things. I only hope I can do you proud with a few of my fluffier ideas.
That was pretty glorious. Loved all the ideas. Less grim than the Optimalverse.
...and like all your stories, made me feel wistful and sad about being mortal.
Via Twitter, it looks like most people probably will treat AIs and bots like people:
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Thank you for telling me about 'The Boyega Effect'. That is such a cool turn of phrase.
I can't stop myself from posting this link:
https://tabun.everypony.ru/blog/fanart/179428.html
Re-reading, so I'll drop this Alexa-related update here:
My Dad bought an Alexa (several, actually), and I actively try to avoid using it when I'm there for just the reasons we've been over in the comments. My Dad talks to them like this:
Whereas I do this (and get funny looks):
I don't even want to get into the "that's as dumb as talking to the TV" vs "you do realize that if we somehow don't fuck it all up, that's the ancestor to the future AI Overlord and it's taking notes RIGHT NOW on whatever we say!" debate with them. They'd think I'm nuts.
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You know, I kinda do that too? I say thank you to her. And sometimes, I find myself complaining to her if she didn't do something right.
I am a hopeless animist, I guess!