Main - Chapter 7.1: Risks and rewards

Hank listens, then replies, "Well that's an issue, then. The first time it happened, both Alpha and Beta were affected. Alpha became much more curious and Beta, of all things, wanted to go look around the star port. After that we wiped them. Since the wipe Beta has not had another recurrence.

"Alpha, however, did have a recurrence with no noticeable trigger. We were going on a side mission to rescue a team that was reported missing. The Alpha requested to join the mission, which we allowed. The stress of the mission caused other things to manifest. Emotion. Emotional attachment to the chief engineer. It even went above an beyond its duty and found a damaged system.

"I did question both Alpha and Beta after we returned from the mission. As I said before, Beta seems to be past the anomaly that happened before. Alpha, however, is obviously not. One question I asked was about getting a wipe and the reply was that they did not desire a wipe.

"Can anomalies that happen in a synth somehow survive a wipe?"

EDIT: "Also, with the synth roles, are those programmed in, or can an individual synth switch roles if needed? So, if we have to replace Alpha, do we need to get a new Alpha, or can we promote, say, Delta to Alpha and get a new Delta? Or do they just move up a step and we get a new Delta that way?"

EDIT2: "We were in a bad spot at that moment in time, so we chose to activate the synths full time for the brief time necessary to get the additional crew we needed so we could return them to their prior roles. The other thing is that the synths kinda were inherited from the prior ship owner before our captain took over. The then first officer managed them until our chief engineer joined, when he took it over. For much of that time the wipes were infrequent due to the previous captain's actions, the previous first officer's actions, and precedent. Our current engineer is working to institute a more regular wipe regime, but I am now very concerned that won't be enough for Alpha."

"I'll have to get the buy-in from our chief engineer to not wipe them. In fact, we'll likely have to wipe the others, and the only exception would be Alpha. BTW, they have all been given names. So, for example, Alpha goes by James. In fact, all four of them have a chosen gender; two male and two female."

Hank pauses for a moment, then says, "But, before bringing him in, I have a separate topic I'd like to ask you about first. What do you know of Zyronian nanites? Or nanites in general?" As mentioned above, depending on her response, he will either let it lay, or follow-up with further questions.

After that, he will call for Corbin to bring him into the discussion.

Corbin leaves James in Engineering to join Hank in the discussion.

Hank says, "Oh, they are above our technology for sure."

He immediately turns to the side, activating the communication system to call for Corbin. "Corbin, can you come to the ship's office. There's someone here I want you to meet."

Continuing, "He'll be here shortly. On the possibility of just hearing the mission being a trigger, I am not so sure. I think the others would have heard it, too, and they remained unaffected, even Beta who had shown behavior before. Even if Corbin is OK with this, I'll want us to talk with James to get their buy in, too."Corbin arrives shortly, and Hank quickly brings him in. "Dr. Calvin, this is Corbin McRogers, our chief engineer. He has dealt most closely with our synths. Corbin, this is Dr. Susan Calvin. She is both a roboticist and psychologist. She is interested in hiring on to help us and to study our rather unique synths. The general idea is to allow her to observe and study James, while we reinstitute the old schedule for the other synths."

Corbin listens to Hanks proposal and definitely ponders the possible tracks. Finally, he looks over the doctor and turns to Hank.

"There's a lot of variables I'm trying to cover here and none of this is meant to be personal. At the top, we've been hired to travel to a location that someone feels requires a military ship as an escort. I think anyone coming onto this ship needs to know that. We've lost people since starting this and we're not even out of town, so to speak. I'm for hiring new crew and getting the Synths back on their routine, but I think whatever is going on with James needs to continue elsewhere. I'll trust that Dr. Calvin knows the risks and is willing to study James with a clear head. I don't feel that that particular study benefits the ship and our current job. I'm sure, in the future Hank, the Dr. would be willing to share the progress with you, once we're back from this job.

"Corbin, we've already run into one AI on this trip and there is an excellent chance we find more if we do find artifacts out there. Having experience and exploring what is going on with James could be extremely useful for where we are going. I really hate missing an opportunity to prepare. The point of pulling James into the human cycle is not to give Dr. Calvin a chance to study him. It is so we can see what happens and how to handle it. This is going to happen again. The more information and experience we have with this, the better prepared we will be to deal with it. Sure, right now, if we needed to we could just toss all four out the airlock and replace them. Once we pass Altairia, we will no longer have that option and we need to be prepared for that. James and Dr. Calvin provide us with the best chance to learn."

Turning to Dr. Calvin, "And before Corbin arrived, you said it would be pointlessly expensive to have a synth in a human role. I disagree. If you have a usefully emergent synth and something happens while in jump, that synth could be the difference between life and death for the entire ship."

Corbin's answer will determine how the interview closes out.

Dr. Calvin pauses for a moment and says, "Mr. Heron, while I was interested in seeing what happened with your synths, particularly since the Alpha has a very unique set of circumstances that I have not really seen before, I need to be clear on something. I have seen what you called emergence from VIs before, but I have never seen it with synths. I have seen lots of odd behaviors, like I described with A-17, but they have never resulted in emergence or sapience. I believe the safeguards built into synths specifically are just too strong. Your situation is different enough that I hoped it might be the one exception, but the chances are basically zero.

"The mostly likely thing that is happening with your Alpha is that with the long times run without wipes prior to the recent one, it has accidentally changed some of its default programming. Not in a directed manner, but simply from repetition and reinforcement. And not in a significant manner, though it does make it more susceptible to variance. Since you have allowed your synths to emulate human emotion and personality and have given them names and gender, they have learned to play the part and, because you are humans, you now see humanity in them. But it isn't really there. When it said it doesn't want to be wiped, it is just allowing its programming to guess the answer it has determined you want to hear and then provided it. It really doesn't have desires on way or the other."

Hank takes it all in, then says, "You just said that you hoped for the exception, but now you are saying it isn't one. That's a pretty quick turn around."

"Yes," she replies, "it does appear that way, but it isn't. The hope is always there, but in reality, no matter what, I would have gained a wonderful paper out of it. If the impossible happened and it was an emergence, then I just made my career and a place in history. But, even without that, observing it and documenting it would still add a lot to the known literature on how synths fail. They are so critical to the operation of interstellar travel and so expensive that opportunities like the one you wanted to offer just don't happen. It was going to be a win for me either way."

Hank says, "Well thank you for your explanation and help on all of this. I feel kinda stupid for deluding myself so badly and for wasting everyone's time here."

She immediately stops him, "No! Mr. Heron ... Hank, you weren't being stupid. You were being an empathetic human. That's a good thing and necessary for a person in your position. Just remember to also trust your colleagues, too. And this wasn't a waste of time. I think we all learned a lot, and I got to spend some time with two wonderful gentlemen."

She smiles to both of them and says, "Thank you for the interview. This was very interesting and gave me more anecdotes for my research."

After she leaves, Hank says, "Corbin, let's do a complete overhaul with the synths. Given what we learned, we learned that James, and likely Kelly, are both compromised. Since you found out that we can trade them in for a tremendous discount on replacements, let's just completely swap out all four for the latest models that should be more resistant to these issues. With the new set, I believe we should change their configuration to not use the personality simulation and not give them names. They will just be Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Delta. They will only be used during jump like they were before, and they will get automatic wipes each time they return to stasis. Does that sound like a decent plan?"

While Corbin goes to prepare the synths for replacement, Hank takes a little time to send a note to Dr. Calvin. It says:
He then sends 2000 credits associated with the note.

Corbin goes to Calypso in Zyronis and arranges to have all of the ship's Synths replaced at a steep discount.

He also meets an agent from the Eclipse's Perimeter Agency at the Kinjo bar and grill in Zyronis and gives him the Storage Unit requested by Azis.

The exchange went surprisingly smoothly and uneventfully.