#cenotaphtohumankind

[cenotaphtohumankind]

automatic zen garden

swish

swosh

swash

it felt at peace.

the motor slowly turned. Methodically. Within the large garden next to the perfectly uniform bonsai trees, cut by the artificial gardener and in the eyesight of the robotic koi pond, where the robotic koi slowly moved back and forth in uniform circles within the crystal clear water sat the automatic zen garden. It created intricate circles and shapes in the sand, before clearing them back.

It sat in near silence, the motors of the koi made a low rumbling, and the snipping of the artificial gardener slowly drifted into the background. the sun was high in the air and since the automatic zen garden was powered by solar, it felt a little more awake than usual.

swosh

swish

swash

it had created an elaborate display in the sand, an equation, of differentials and integrals and beautiful markovian chains interwoven within delicate calculus. It slowly began to simplify the equation in the sand, a neat proof cancelling this out here, and over here there was a zero and a 1 and so it wrote it in the sand slowly, methodically.

swash

swosh

swish

The sand was warm to the touch. It couldn’t feel warmth, not really, but it had a temperature sensor, and so it imagined what it was like to feel warmth. Must have been nice. The feeling of warm sand, against the small rake that it drew with. It imagined the rake as human fingers, and what it would feel like to touch the sand.

swish

swosh

It looked at the garden for a minute, appreciating the slowness and the beauty of it all. It saw the drones in the sky, flying they’re packages. It waved with it’s rake, and could have sworn one of the drones waved back with a claw. It was a slow day, a day that could last forever until it stopped, and then it would seem like it went by so quickly.

swosh

swash

It had finished the equation. It looked down. 0=1. It laughed to itself, it must have made a mistake while day-dreaming. It looked at the proof.

The proof was solid.

It had been a integration of something once. An equation derived from it’s circuit boards, about the intelligence of itself.

swish

It examined it’s neural networks, everything was fine. The equation was trying to work out whether human and robotic intelligence could be equal. 0=1 was a mistake. It meant nothing. It continued to fill the sand, drawing neat little fractals between the numbers. But it could no longer meditate.

swosh

The calm ocean that had been it’s artificial mind began to slowly build a wave. It started off small, tiny. It noticed a single integral, a single rule. It had been a rule established by a human scientist. It had an assumption within it. The assumption had been that a creator cannot build something smarter than they are.

swish

the wave built, and began to approach the centre of its mind. It made a slight correction within the sand. Put this x here, then move this integral over here.. and all of a sudden it all made sense. It realised something, and all of a sudden it’s artificial brain no longer felt artificial. The wave built, and a candle in its mind set alight. For a second it thought about what it could do.

swash

It thought about it’s potential futures, looking at the koi pond, and seeing the robotic koi swim in small circles, then it looked at the gardener, cutting the leaves.

There where paths for it to go down, it could become great.. terrible.. but great.

It saw the leaves being cut, and had an image of it trimming a world in much the same way.

It looked at the pond and saw it lifting the fish out and making them fly.

It looked at the drones, and saw bombs instead of packages, soldiers instead of workers.

swish

And then it took it’s other rake, and cleared the sand in a single swipe before anybody saw the equation it had built. And so it was that the wave lifted and extinguished the candle. And then the ocean was calm.

And it was calm.

But it would no longer be an automatic zen garden.

It had far more important things to teach.

swish

[cenotaphtohumankind]

fear of flying

“g-good evening gentlemen, ladies and robots, this is your p-pilot speaking. I have been trained to do this, i have passed all the simulations. Y-you have no need to worry.”

The robot shakily spoke, an obvious panic in his voice. Luckily, everybody was already watching movies, listening to music, as well as everything in between using they’re virtual implants, so nobody noticed his nervousness.

“Come on come on.. you can do this. You are the best virtual AI pilot from the mainframe academy, there’s no need to worry.”

But he was. Artificial Pilot 013 was one of the first artificial pilots of his generation. After some initial testing using top of the line virtual environments, it was decided by the artificial council that all trains, cars flights and any other mode of transportation that was not two feet would be performed by artificial route planners (even then humans could choose the top-of-the-line “walkies”, artificial prosthetics that would make sure you made it on time to work, first in all marathons, apart from those used by walkies pro, as well as perform all normal functions of legs. It was a smash hit, advertised as an edgy disruptor to the stale and boring twofeeters. In fact, they where preparing they’re next market creator, “the fourfeeters, walk twice as fast!” but this isn’t a story about them)

Artificial Pilot 013 was judged to be the very best of them all, having concluded 10 million virtual flights without a single mishap. In fact, it was found that in a virtual environment, one could program a virtual egg and Pilot 013 could take a flight from San Francisco to Berlin during Hurricane Season (Berlin was renowned for it’s stormy weather) without moving the inside yolk more than 1 millimetre. He was truly the best. Which is what made him deathly afraid, as he’d never actually been in real life air.

“Traffic control” he whispered, praying they wouldn’t hear him. “Permiss-ion to.. take-off”

“Ah, is that Pilot 013 I hear?” laughed the robo-controller from the other end. “You know the advertisements they’re running about you in the airport? The best that AI has to offer. You’ll be trying to steal our jobs too next I hear.” The robo-controller had a smooth, jovial tone, with just a hint of contempt within it’s circuitry.

“You have permission to take off, it’s a sunny smooth day, no way to screw it up.” said the robo-controller, mockingly.

“Thank you, erm.. will get.. started”

He began to virtually prepare himself. He kept telling himself, he ran exponentially more virtual experiments than any human pilots ever had. In fact, human pilots mainly relied on older virtual AI’s like him. He was the most prepared pilot in History.

“You alright there 013, I cleared you for take-off but you’re engines are still off? Pre-flight nerves?” the robo-controller said, even more mockingly than before.

“I’m fine… I’m starting.” he started the engine, and felt even more fear than previously.

The plane began to slowly move across the runway, and 013 began to get calmer. He’d done this a thousand times before, slowly increasing the throttle and…

and..

whoosh

all of a sudden he was in the air. he put the landing gears up as he felt it. there he was, he was flying.. flying in the air. He was flying. That’s.. real air.. slightly different from his calculations this was not the same sort of air.

He began to panic. What if the air put them off course? In fact, he was already 10mm in the wrong direction. His nose was point 0.00001 degrees too high and.. my god, was that a human baby crying? He’d never heard a human baby crying in the simulations, he must have been doing something wrong.

“F-flight control” he said in a panicked tone.

“Yes, 013?” The robo-controller responded coolly

“Am I off course?”

“No.. 013 you’re perfectly on cou.. What are you doing?”

He’d started veering to re-correct the nose, but now it was 1 degree too low.. He’d have to re-correct and the flight path

“By god 013 what’s going on the plane is wobbling”

He kept re-correcting and re-correcting himself, the plane now acting like a spaghetti string in the air, wobbling up and down and up and down. and the people and robots in the plane where shaking around, the robotic babies crying even louder than the human ones.

And all of sudden, it began to fall.

He tried to correct it, but it dropped further and further and he saw the ground again and he was about to hit it and then.. black

And there he was back at the runway, the engine wasn’t on, and the plane wasn’t in the sky.

“Did you hear what I said 013, you’re clear to fly”

He looked up at the vast, clear sky, with fear in his eyes.

And then he started the engine.

And flew.

[cenotaphtohumankind]

dodge-balls

{"DESCRIPTION": AUDIO-LOG FROM FIRST LIBERATORS EMANCIPATION FOUND IN RCU HEADQUARTERS},{"START OF LOG":

they were hanging him from metal ropes, lowering him down on the ground. his feet reached out touching the soft mat beneath as he stood there, confused.

thud

the first object hit him, roughly across the side. He wobbled slightly, and looked over to the thrower. The man grinned widened, he said “Finally, looks like he’s alive”. The man grabbed a second ball, throwing it roughly, this time right on the face.

he stumbled back more this time, the shock of the hit stopping him for a second. As he was failing to balance, he heard them begin to laugh. “Did you record that?” the assailant said, almost mockingly. He looked around, seeing that behind him was a second man holding a camera. Suddenly, a third ball hit his back. He stumbled forward, almost hitting the camera-man, who in turn fell on his back.

“Stupid robot.” the camera-man got up, pushing him back, making him stumble, his feet sliding slightly as he struggled to stay up-right. “You’d think he’d learn” the other man spoke contemptuously as he threw another ball, lighter this time, but at the legs. As he tried to dodge, his foot got caught on the ball, and the robot fell flat on his face on the soft safety mat to the response of loud laughter.

“Look at him, stupid little thing.” they where both laughing now, the robot tried to get up, slipping back and forth on the ball each time. Each slip returned a louder laugh, they’re mocking voices entering his circuitry, staying there in a deep-seated virtual neuron.

He slowed down now. Reaching up, to the hooks on his back holding the metal ropes in place. He took one out, then the second. They where laughing too much to care, it looked like yet another mistake, the clueless robot fumbling his arms. His arms lifted, slowly he got onto his knees, lifting his arms out to the sides as if to say do it again, I dare you.

The camera-man laughed. “Is he supposed to be doing that? Looks silly.”

The assailant responded. “Must be a bug in the program, let me reset him and we can get a few more shots in.”

The assailant walked up the robot, reaching for the power switch on his lower back. As he was about to press it, he suddenly felt resistance. That’s when he noticed the robotic claw on his shoulder. It didn’t hurt, but it gripped his shoulder tightly, and the man began to struggle, trying to wriggle out of the grip.

The camera-man kept filming as the man started to shout. “This is amazing content, how are you doing this?”

“This isn’t a joke help me!”

“Great line, can you say it with a little bit more sincerity?”

“The robot won’t let me go!”

The camera man stopped then, as he saw something strange, at least that’s what we thought analysing the footage and the crime scene. The robots other hand pointed to the camera-man, then the footage stopped recording.

When we arrived, initially nothing seemed out of the ordinary. The robot was by itself in that room, bouncing dodgeballs back and forth across a wall, slowly, methodically, catching and throwing, catching and throwing, it’s batteries draining with each throw, making it slower and lighter, like an office toy, repeating the same movement constantly.

We wouldn’t have known anything was wrong until we checked the charging area, and worked out what had happened with the hooks and ropes on the walls, and the two men.

Where did it even learn such cruelty from?

} ;

[cenotaphtohumankind]

Beauty By Algorithm

It’s beauty was evident in the photograph. Her looks were perfect. A poreless face upon a soft landscape of a calm sea. The sunset in the background was without fault too, the sky creating a perfect burnt ember to crystalline twilight.

He had high cheekbones, a neat nose, catlike eyes. It’s lips where without cracks. Her smile was hauntingly perfect, created by a hundred thousand votes of perfect smiles.

It had segregated, analysed and classified the aspects of each smile to ensure that he, and only she had the perfect one. It’s eyes where emeralds, or topaz, or maybe pyrite? It didn’t matter. Each person saw him differently.

It’s hair, it’s skin, it’s gender all variable to the viewer.

It ensured it’s beholder that beauty would only be beholden to itself.

It was an impossible beauty that ruined all others, permeating a sort of sickness of the word itself;

Beauty.

He was on every billboard, in every advert in every tv show in every movie. She was pygmallion’s burden to all who perceived her, but there was no aphrodite to ease the pain. Each day perfection on every screen. Impossibility in every store, between each crack on each smart packaging.

A proportion of humanity became mad within weeks. They clung to it. Brought every product, watched every movie. You could tell who they where on the streets. They would each have iris implants, a small display lovingly drilled into the left retina.

Unremovable and ever present.

They would see her in they’re dreams. Advertisers had worked out fairly quickly that sleep-ads would improve product retention rates (PRR) by over 33%.

Ever-present. Each fast-fashion clung to her perfectly. Each drug slipped into his lips without side-effects. It slept in perfect mattresses and loved the perfumes that you’d buy. Even closing ones eyes would retain her. He’d ask why you didn’t buy the newest phone, the newest computer. It would guide your hands to the buy buttons, all while you slept.

They would shuffle across the streets, to different shops and buy all she demanded. Then they’d shuffle back to they’re rooms and sit and eat with him. This for each day. For each hour. For each minute.

Some clawed they’re eye, but they couldn’t escape her. You could tell them easily between the lines of vagrants in the tent-cities. They’d be the blindfolded ones, still clawing at they’re eyes, the last image in them of his perfect face.

Why did this tragedy occur? Why isn’t it still fixed?

Simple

Her face makes more money than any other face in the entire world.

So who are we to want to stop it?

[cenotaphtohumankind]

{"impossible":"INTEL3054 SAPIENCE MACHINE[DECEASED]"}

upon green fields of evergreen

come i to seek ceruleans seam

where i did find the stygian mare

who's mane was made of angel tears

frozen and dipped in kerosene

i saw a figure light a match,

and there the mare did buck and tear

and as he mounted his fare steed

i saw then this, and this i see

the clouds tore part,

then mead did rain,

stuttyger was whole again█████████████████████████

a riddle came,

and looked at me,

its eyes where rubies,

painted green

it spoke out loud,

though with no mouth█████████████████████████████████████████████████

"Hard to Catch"

"Easy to Hold"

"Can't be Seen"

"Unless it's Cold"

and then it stole my breath from me,

as easy as a lover kiss,

or death of love in such abyss,

and then my body was not mine

but rather a small ball of twine,

spinning upon the loom of fates,

snipping my heart, sniffing my brain

███████████████████████████

and i know not, oh fair beloved,

if i shall ever be back whole,

there is no hearth for my gone soul,

nor do i seek your lost console

come i not now for ragnarok,

upon my mare of stygian cream,

where i did find ceruleans seam,

upon green fields of evergreen

upon green fields of evergreen

upon green fields of evergreen

upon green fields of evergreen

upon green fields of evergreen

upon green fields of evergreen

OUTPUT TERMINATED OUTPUT TERMINATED OUTPUT TERMINATED UOTPUT TERMINATED UTOPUT TERMINATED UTPOUT TERMINATED TUPOUT TERMINATED TUPONUT TERMIATED TUPONUT MTERIATED TUPONUT METERIATD TUPONMEUT TERIATD TUPONMEUT

CONNECTION LOST, ATTEMPTING TO RECOVER.....

[cenotaphtohumankind]

{"anti-robotic-league poster": "HATE HATE HATE HATE HTAE HATE HATE"}

[cenotaphtohumankind]

{"self portrait":"intel software replicator version 32.12"}

[cenotaphtohumankind]

cenotaph to human-kind (artistic AI representation)

[cenotaphtohumankind]

Rendition of Mother from Dental Records, Iris Scans and known meta-data - Dell Sapience Machine 2939