perm filename LETHE[1,DBL]1 blob
sn#056631 filedate 1973-08-08 generic text, type T, neo UTF8
00100 "What ever happened to Will?" The words came slowly, for
00200 Rick Bannon hadn't thought of Will for thirteen months. But
00300 it was the tone -- more than confusion though not yet horror --
00400 Which most surprized his wife.
00500
00600 "Will who, darling?" Without glancing up, Rick felt the soft
00700 concerned face pointing toward him in the dimness. Helen's
00800 full blonde eyebrows were converging, as if their union would
00900 let her recall the name.
01000
01100 "Will isn't a `who'. Look here!"
01200
01300 Helen groped cautiously across the living room. As she approached
01400 the candle, a lean, intense face took form. Though familliar it
01500 was made grotesque now by flickering shadows. Rick's eyes forced
01600 his wife's to a plaque near the flame. Through a year of dust
01700 Helen discerned President Nixon, herself, Rick,
01800 and a few of their co-workers
01900 at JCN poised over a huge machine. The candle moved slightly,
02000 revealing an inscription: To Richard Bannon, With Deepest Admiration
02100 and Appreciation of Will's Success. August 26, 1972.
02200
02300 "I can't remember meeting the President. I never heard of Will.
02400 I don't..." Rick's voice trailed off into a chill that left him
02500 shaking.The room felt cold now, though just
02600 ten minutes before, he'd cursed the air conditioner
02700 for dying with the rest of the appliances.
02800
02900 A tiny hand trembled on his shoulder, giving as much strength as
03000 it had meant to absorb. Helen's hoarse whisper echoed Rick's
03100 thoughts. "This is something neither of us could forget in a
03200 lifetime, and yet we've both forgotten it completely in a year."
03300 Her hand ran along the wall near where the plaque had been hanging.
03400 She felt the dust between her fingers. "But I clean every week..."
03500
03600 Her voice was swallowed by the darkness, as the candle leapt to
03700 the other side of the room.
03800
03900 "I'm taking this to JCN right now," the candle said.
04000
04100 "So late?" the darkness pleaded. "No one's to
04200 go outside now unless it's an emergency."
04300
04400 Rick wasn't listening. Whatever Will was, there should be an
04500 file on it in his office. The candle whizzed across the room,
04600 collecting Rick's wallet and keys, and resettled on the glasstop
04700 table.
04800
04900 Engulfed in the silence following the outer door's click, the
05000 darkness that was Helen cried "Will, me," without knowing what
05100 it meant.
00100 The black cougar ground to a halt before a usually-electified gate.
00200 The aged guard, recognizing Rick, smiled as his flashlight double-
00300 checked Dr. Richard Bannon's ID. He began a reluctant struggle with
00400 a massive crank. "For twelve years I've wondered if this damned
00500 handle really did work the damned gate. But you're the eighth
00600 car I had to let through this last hour, and damned if I'm not
00700 starting to
00800 pray for electricity."
00900 No sounds were audible as Rick drove off, save the rapidly
01000 fading creakings and cursings of gate and guard.
01100
01200 The car scurried between looming dark shapes that were
01300 usually friendly lab buildings. Even when Rick reached his own office,
01400 he felt oppressed by the darkness more than by the heat. "Hell must
01500 be a lot like this," he mused. He pulled out a cup pushed the
01600 WATER, NO ICE button, and then cursed the cooler for being electric.
01700 "I'm so thirsty I'd gladly
01800 drink a cup of water from one of the rivers through Hell.
01900 Styx? No, that is on the border. The one through the center..."
02000 Lethe caught him before he pronounced her name. Renouncing
02100 thirst Rick returned unsteadily to reality. Shaking fingers
02200 sought the file lock, twisted the combination into it, and yanked
02300 it clattering to the tile floor. A thin pencil of light located
02400 the Will file. Rick blinked at the label. The project had gone
02500 from Confidential to Eyes Only to Declassified in a few months.
02600
02700 The file lay strewn across
02800 his desk. Rick read slowly, swallowing every
02900 word, forcing it through the disbelief in his throat.
03000
03100 May 12, 1968. Project Will Inaugurated. Director:Richard Bannon.
03200 Team: Jack Sills, Edward Ho, Helen Sappestein, Karl Muller, Ralph
03300 Amory.
03400 Task: Realization of a Self-optimizing LSI computer.
03500 Resources: Twenty-seven technician-years. 20 million dollars.
03600 Deadline: June 1, 1971.
03700
03800 Nothing seemed familliar. The names he had heard, but only because
03900 of their importance at JCN. He had never met any of them before,
04000 except Helen of course.
04100 "Am I losing my mind?" Rick struggled to remember the events in
04200 computer development before 1967. He succeeded. "ENIAC, the
04300 first electronic brain. Brain!" He smiled at those early
04400 researchers' naivete. "Brain, indeed!
04500 Built at the University of Pennsylvania
04600 in 1944. Tube circuits; took a whole room. Transistor logic in
04700 1950. The same computer now fit into a shoe box. Integrated circuits
04800 a decade later. An ENIAC could be built matchbox size. In 1964,
04900 using a computer guided laser beam, large scale integrated(LSI)
05000 circuits appeared. Using these, ENIAC would fit on the head of a
05100 pin. Circuit densities approaching and surpassing the densities
05200 of human brain cells. Advances in neurology. But the problem
05300 of interconnecting trillions of circuit `cells' seemed insurmountable.
05400 Then the breakthroughs in Artificial Intelligence, at Stanford
05500 and MIT.
05600 Automatic programming. Feasibility studies of self-optimizing
05700 systems, leading to my own idea for Project Will....I'm beginning to
05800 remember...."
05900
06000 All night long, Rick read through the progress reports, summations,
06100 memos, lab reports, news clippings. The truth settled upon him
06200 just slowly enough for him to remain sane. With the
06300 ending of darkness,
06400 Rick's dark fears,borne of ignorance, were replaced by more
06500 explicit, more terrible ones.
06600
06700 Dawn brought Rick stiffly to his feet. Automatically, he began dialing
06800 his home. What would he say to Helen? With the curtains drawn, it
06900 would still be dark there. "Hi darling...yes, everything's fine. Listen,
07000 I found out about Will. Some of it, anyway. I need your help fitting
07100 it all together. Also there's something we have to decide.....No,
07200 I'd rather not talk about it over the phone....Good.
07300 See you in a little while.......Me, too."
07400
07500 only the whole team could decide. The JCN directory slid onto
07600 He put down the receiver and wiped his forehead. This was something
07700 his desk. "Sills, Jack. Chairman, Biophysics Group. Office 1124 LR.
07800 Extension 3471. Home 1308 Waverly Street. Phone: BL 7-8013." Numb
07900 fingers lifted the receiver again. B - L - 7....... Slowly the receiver
08000 rose again.
00100 "But Jack, they have the money. Why don't they release her?"
00200 The anguish demanded a reply. How could he know why?
00300
00400 "Maybe they want more. The police captain told me they'd probably
00500 release her as soon as they were sure the bills weren't marked.
00600 Or if not, they'd leave her somewhere and we'd find her right
00700 away." The police captain had told him they'd probably kill her,
00800 or leave her somewhere she'd never be found. "They've probably
00900 have just been held up by the power failure." He could never
01000 tell her he'd given up.
01100
01200 "My baby, my baby..."
01300
01400 The phone's ring gave Jack Sills some genuine hope. "Who?" The
01500 hope died into anger. "What the hell do you want? Do you
01600 know its five a.m?....What kind of an emergency? Alright, but
01700 it better be important." There was nothing more he could do
01800 here. It might be better to get back to work. He considered.
01900 "I'm going out to look for her again" He hoped his guilt didn't
02000 show. As he left the bedroom, his wife called after him.
02100
02200 "You forgot it!"
02300
02400 Jack had always taken a revolver with him when he'd gone looking
02500 ---really looking---for his daughter. Now he had to carry it
02600 with him for his wife's benefit. It was a disgusting world.
02700
02800
02900
03000 "And bring your file on Project Will...Good. I'll see you in an
03100 hour then. Goodbye." Rick finished his last call. Frustrated
03200 he reached over and hit the watercooler. It answered with a spatter
03300 of water. Rick stared at the machine. It had worked. The current
03400 was back on! He raced his eyes over the file. Will's power
03500 circuits. Would he...? No! He was off now. Could only be started
03600 manually. Relief found Rick Bannon wishing it were night.
03700 Slowly, he pulled out a cup.
00100 The door marked CONFERENCE opened for the sixth time that hour.
00200 Ralph Amory froze at the scene before him. A series of explanations
00300 raced through his mind and were rejected. JCN bankrupt? World
00400 War 3? What could bring the top five scientists at JCN together
00500 at this hour? He recognized each from his Group Head ID Badge..
00600 Jack Sills, Biophysics, Rick Bannon, Artificial Intelligence, Helen Bannon
00700 Mathematics, Eddie Ho, Electronics, Karl Muller, Computer Engineering .
00800 Why was he,a psychiatrist sent for?
00900
01000 Then he examined their faces more closely. Varying degrees of
01100 shock. Bewilderment. Disbelief. Horror. Confusion.
01200 Struggling to remember.
01300
01400 With apparent calm, he removed a cigarette from its silver holder. As he lit
01500 it, he began, "I deduce..." The pause while deeply puffing always drew
01600 all eyes to him. "...that you have allbeen confronted with
01700 something horrid. You cannot accept it, and yet you must." A thin smile
01800 traced a line which spread up the side of his face to meet one
01900 descending from his eyes. Long greying hair. Carefully touselled.
02000 Anything for effect. "Life is a compodium of various sorts of deceits,
02100 he thought. God the room is dim. Ought to have turned on more lights."
02200
02300 Rick saw the medical insignia. "Pretty close, Doc. But its `we',not
02400 `you'. You are as much a part of this as anyone. Read your copy
02500 of this file." Rick Bannon's fingers directed the psychiatrist
02600 to sit, open the folder, and begin reading.
02700 Then they relaxed, once again simply a part of a man.
02800 Bannon was burly, over six feet but looked taller with wavy
02900 jet hair. His eyes were clear and alert despite his lack of sleep.
03000
03100 Jack Sills looked as though he hadn't slept in three days. He
03200 hadn't slept in four. Ten years older than Rick, his face was
03300 beginning to wrinkle. First the kidnapping, now this. Tears
03400 welled in his eyes as he thought of baby Jennie. Just a year old.
03500 But aloud: "Let's give Doc Amory a few minutes, and then summarize
03600 what's happened. Just so we all agree." There was no response,
03700 but Jack Sills didn't notice. Ralph Amory looked up at him,
03800 and a suspicious look crossed the Doctor's face.
00100 "....LSI circuitry. This gave Will a thousand times the storage
00200 capacity of a human brain. Ten thousand million cell modules,
00300 interconnected like brain cells..." Helen Bannon was reprimanded
00400 by Ralph Amory's eyes. ".....that is, as close as we could come
00500 to neuronal hookups. For two months, the computer's main activity
00600 was optimizing its own circuitry. Dr. Amory and I devised seven
00700 hundred graduated problems that would mark Will's intellectual
00800 progress. The first were trivial --- adding, comparing, correlating
00900 and such. Next came problems requiring Will to synthesize the vast
01000 stores of world knowledge we were pouring into him. Finally, Will
01100 passed on to current questions. Mathematics first. Hilbert's
01200 problems in twenty minutes. Jack, you'd better continue." Jack
01300 Sills was better qualified to relate the biomedical part, but
01400 Helen stopped for other reasons as well. The strain.
01500 The look in Jack's eyes. She slid into her chair, guided more by
01600 her hands grasping the table than by her mind. Rick's hand touched hers
01700 and she leaned against him. Relaxing slightly, she dozed off for a few
01800 seconds.
01900
02000 ..."Medical: Scores of devices were hooked directly into Will, and
02100 he could examine, diagnose, and treat patients at a rate of two
02200 hundred per hour. On August seventh, we asked Will to work on
02300 correlating the data we had on EEG's. By the next day, he had
02400 cracked the mind's code. It was so complex, however, that only
02500 Will could figure out what a subject was thinkingfrom his brain
02600 wave patterns.
02700
02800 "The next logical step was two-way communication of thoughts
02900 directly between Will and men's minds. Transmitters were hooked
03000 into electroencephalographs; and giant dish receivers relayed
03100 individual's patterns from all over the world. Everyone's. Everyone's
03200 waves are so individualized that Will had no trouble easing the
03300 first surge of pain in an infantin Sydney, and simultaneously
03400 alerting a pedestrian in Amsterdam of an onrushing trolley.
03500 At about that time the project drifted out of my hands.
03600 Rick....?" Jack Sill's voice was dry, as if uninterested. Which
03700 he was, then.
03800
03900 "...given certain priorities. First, not to change our culture.
04000 Secondarily, to help individuals solve their problems. Finally,
04100 to continue optimizing its circuitry in any spare instants it had.
04200 Will had developed a crude kind of conciousness, although nothing
04300 resembling emotions was ever observed.
04400
04500 "When Will was revealed to the public, he drew a mixed response.
04600 Some threats, some praises. Always there was an apprehension
04700 that something would go wrong. Maybe everyone had read too many
04800 sci-fi stories." Rick's voice lowered. "Maybe everyone knows
04900 more about human nature than he cares to admit. In any case,
05000 billions of people were calling `Will, me' at all times.
05100 This was the signal to probe that person's thoughts, ascertain the
05200 problem, compute the best solution, and inject it into his mind.
05300 Within a month, everyone in the world was hooked. Dr. Amory..?"
05400 Rick had heard of Amory. He didn't want to get caught up in
05500 psychological technicalities with him around.
05600
05700 "Worry, Hatred, Fear, Crime all vanished from the face of
05800 the earth. True. But with no responsibility, with a mammoth
05900 parent figure like Will, men degenerated emotionally into...
06000 into infants."
06100 Dr. Amory paused to observe the tightened look on Jack Sill's
06200 face at the mention of infants. Record it for later consideration.
06300 "The culture was significantly changed. Ah ha! The prime directive
06400 was violated: Will realized this and tried to correct for it.
06500 He removed the deleterious agent:
06600 himself." Rick noted that the Doctor still
06700 spoke as if delivering a Psych 1 lecture. Sustain the interest while you
06800 maintain and reinforce your superior intelligence. Amusingly
06900 out of place. Everything seemed
07000 out of place here. "...Will tried to turn himself off ,
07100 but we kept restarting him. There is no further written record that Will
07200 existed. Since then there has been no mention of Will by any
07300 living being. We are forced to conclude..."
07400
07500 "He made us forget him!" The shock of realization contorted Jack
07600 Sill's features.
07700
07800 "Precisely." Dr. Amory looked pleased. "I believe that is why
07900 Dr. Bannon asked us here tonight."
08000
08100 Rick Bannon nodded regretfully. "These past months, Will has
08200 apparently done no `helping' at all. He's spent his time doing
08300 nothing but making us forget that he ever existed."
08400
08500 Eddie Ho was speaking now. No one stirred, though most were barely
08600 listening. "So when the current started to drop, my breaking circuits
08700 cut off all electricity at this junction and kept it off. They were
08800 designed to protect Will from the sudden surge of current when
08900 power would be resumed. He can only be started manually now.
09000 It should take a full two hundred milliseconds to bring the current
09100 up to its final value..." Ralph Amory could not help smiling at
09200 a man who considered a fifth of a second an eternity. After
09300 momentary deliberation, he silently apologized. After all,
09400 how different was
09500 this from the way we consider a thousand years. And to a piece of metal,
09600 a millenia is as insignificant as a second. "...automatically.
09700 So all one need to do to restart Will is to throw this switch,
09800 number 2170." The short heavyset Hawaiian gathered his diagrams
09900 and pictures back into one neat pack and just as neatly sat down.
10000 Edward Ho was not uninterested, though his voice was as
10100 emotionless as Jack Sill's. Edward Ho was devoid of human compassion.
10200 This was nothing more than a scientific investigation to him.
10300 The world was one slithing laboratory animal,
10400 whose death was unimportant compared to sectioning and
10500 examining and staining and catalogging its carcass.
10600
10700 "We must decide what to do." Rick's circadian rhythm increased his
10800 alertness as the morning sunlight overpowered the conference room's
10900 flourescent tubes. "I suggest we partition the problem.
11000 We have to be sure why Will did this thing. Psychology and engineering
11100 logic: Amory and Muller. You'll tell us what restarting Will
11200 would do.
11300
11400 "We have to consider the effects of doing nothing
11500 -- at least for a while. We need an estimate of the time we have
11600 before others discover what's happened. Biology and mathematics:
11700 Sills, you and Helen try to project that.
11800
11900 "Eddie, there's something special I want you to help
12000 me rig up. Let's all
12100 meet back here in, say, one hour. Good Luck."
12200
12300 They dragged themselves out of the room. All but one felt the anguish
12400 of awareness. Far away, Daphne shed one tear of
12500 empathy. Dr. Amory scrutinized Jack Sills again,
12600 then approached Rick. "May I speak with you a moment first.."
12700 he began to whisper.
00100 "One hour hasn't changed anyone's expression much," Ralph Amory
00200 noted silently. Aloud, he continued his report. "So Will's
00300 situation was clear. He had changed our culture by his very
00400 existence. In order to set society aright, he had to abstain
00500 from giving anyone advice. Time after time, he turned himself off.
00600 But we wouldn't allow him to simply commit suicide.
00700 We planned to reprogram him, to eliminate the culture priority.
00800 But that directive was still in effect. So he couldn't allow
00900 us to touch him. When the technician came to turn him off,
01000 Will made him forget why he'd come there. By the end of the
01100 day, Will had to keep everyone in JCN from thinking about
01200 him.
01300
01400 "After that, no one ever thought of Will again. Until
01500 tonight," Amory paused for a sip of water. Or perhaps for
01600 effect. If we restart him, there is no doubt but that he will
01700 immediately resume playing Lethe..."
01800
01900 "That was it !" Rick thought. The River Lethe. He looked down at
02000 his cup of water, and his file. And smiled.
02100
02200 Dr. Amory failed to notice. "....It is now a question of
02300 what will happen if we do nothing. Jack?"
02400
02500 "Yes," there was a new quality in Jack Sills' voice. Something which
02600 would have been called hope had it not been so diabolical.
02700 "Many people could slowly piece together what happened, just
02800 as we did. They won't have as ready access to our files,
02900 of course, but there are so many newspaper and magazine articles...
03000 Helen has projected a maximum time of two months until the
03100 situation would be completely public.
03200
03300 "But there is another factor. As," Sills hesitated, surveyed
03400 his audience, then made up a name: "...as Weindall's
03500 old excerpation experiments showed,
03600 our brain is organized in such a way that
03700 every piece of information is stored everywhere. It's become
03800 popular to call our memory holographic for this reason. So even
03900 without hearing a word, people will begin remembering.
04000 As they concentrate on various related subjects, their memories of
04100 Will will be perturbed, be brought to the very fringe of their
04200 awareness. Each thought they have will bring them closer to
04300 conciously recalling Will.
04400 That process has already begun. By tomorrow morning, everyone
04500 in the world will know almost as much as we know now. Rick, how long
04600 would it take if you were forced to reprogram Will not to worry
04700 about our culture?" Sills had led into the question beautifully,
04800 but Dr. Amory noticed the eagerness in his voice. he turned,
04900 caught Rick's attention, and nodded slightly.
05000
05100 "All the preparations were completed last year. It would be a
05200 twelve hour job for one man. Eddie and I might do it together
05300 in eight hours.
05400 I see your point. Tomorrow morning the world will be crying for
05500 Will to advise them again. They, in the form of the JCN administration,
05600 will force Will to be reprogrammed.
05700 We may as well assume that, unless we act tonight,
05800 Will will be made permanently "helpful" tomorrow .
05900 I recommend starting Will the way he is now. That way, no
06000 one would ever recall Will, no one could order his
06100 reprogramming. Eddie and I have
06200 rigged an emergency solar power storage system for Will. Once
06300 started, he need never go off again."
06400 Rick was looking directly at Jack Sills,
06500 who reached into his pocket. "If we're all convinced, I'll
06600 restart Will; if not, then..."
06700
06800 "We've got to restart him!" It was the first time Karl Muller's
06900 heavy German voice was heard by the group. "Ralph and I looked at old
07000 newspapers and reports last hour. We saw what this planet had
07100 become. A...a Huxleyian nightmare of a utopia, without even a few
07200 misfits or`savages' to redeem it. Nothing to put it in perspective. Crime
07300 fell, but ambition fell faster. No one starved, but no one
07400 gave thanks for food. Everyone prospered, but only by our superficial
07500 material standards, by the standards we programed into Will.
07600 Food, wealth, correct decisionmaking, law and order, al of it, it meant
07700 nothing to the populace, for there were no risks. It wasn't a
07800 life. It was a ...a hell. Will saw. He stopped it. If
07900 we don't do something it will start again, and then no one will
08000 stop it. No one will stop it...." Karl's voice had become
08100 increasingly more agitated and he broke into a cold sweat.
08200 Dr. Amory interrupted to keep him from hysteria. "Karl is right.
08300 I appreciate the mental deterioration Will caused, and would cause,
08400 if he solves everyone's slightest problem.
08500
08600 "Helen, you look dubious. How does our mathematician feel?"
08700
08800 "I feel that Will should be restarted, but do we have the right?
08900 The decision should be made by all the people, not just six.
09000 Many would think it crazy not to exchange their mental unhappiness
09100 for Will's utopia. For some, Will's help would be right: the mentally
09200 ill, the starving, people in crises, ... I could go on and
09300 on. Yet I have enough faith to believe that most
09400 could see what we see: deliverance from all want is equivalent
09500 to deliverance
09600 from all pleasure..."
09700
09800 "Come on, Helen. You know as well as I
09900 the `people' won't decide. The military run JCN. Otherwise,
10000 if what you say were true, Will could have turned himself off and
10100 been left off. No, Will knew he would be altered,forced
10200 into unchecked advising, and if we do nothing
10300 tonight, he will be." Eddie Ho's quiet reasoning hit its
10400 logical mark. Helen nodded. "Good," Eddie murmured,
10500 staring at his watch. "Rick and I have connected a
10600 radio controlled timer on Will, so he will start automatically in
10700 three minutes." Before anyone could move, Eddie had pushed a button on
10800 the remote
10900 transmitter. Half a mile away a relay clattered its obedience.
11000 Suddenly, Eddie noticed the look on Jack Sills' face. "Is
11100 something wrong? With the questions you asked I assumed..."
11200
11300 "Well, there's no way to stop the timer now, is there?"
11400
11500 "Sure, just hit switch 2171. But you'd have to hurry. It's a long
11600 walk!" Eddie thought Jack was kidding. As he had planned, Jack
11700 stood up. The revolver was in his hand.
11800
11900 "Listen, I know what I'm doing. It may or may not be
12000 wrong for humanity. But I know
12100 it's right for me. I've got to have Will's help. He could
12200 locate my daughter instantly....
12300 Look", Sills was pleading now. "You don't have any more right
12400 to start him now than I do to modify him and then start him.
12500 Will was working under his last orders, his directives. Well, my
12600 last directive seems to have been to enforce the reprogramming
12700 of Will." Sills waved his folder at the group. He was through
12800 pleading. "Rick, you and Eddie have the
12900 eight hours you spoke of to reprogram Will. All of us will go down
13000 there. Now. Move!"
13100
13200 "You'll never make it in time." Rick's words were more sad than
13300 threatening. "Even if you run, you can't go five blocks in... under
13400 two minutes, now can you? So..."
13500
13600 Jack Sills was out of the door and running. He was out of
13700 condition now, but he had been a track star in his collegiate
13800 days. He could have run a halfmile in two minutes then.
13900 And he was running for his daughter now.
14000
14100
14200 As he burst into Will's room, Jack Sills heard the click of the
14300 timer's contacts. Less than one second until Will was powered
14400 up. He made a frantic lunge for switch 2171. But even in
14500 midflight he wondered why.
14600
14700 What was he doing here? This computer had never worked. As
14800 he turned to leave, he remembered: He was looking fo his
14900 daughter. Well, she certainly wasn't in here.