-Scientist from the West-
There was me...
If anyone had seen me, they would have called the police, or worse. Now I recognize that its structure was frightening, and it possibly broke some local law about energy use and optimization; but science is not made out of thin air, nor you can make something flashy without power. That is what I used to think.
Science is, in itself, the study of the human and the environment. It split of Philosophy in when the latter started bragging about "If something happens one thousand times at different scenarios you cannot say it will happen the one thousand and one time". Then it tried to go out of the box, to explain what happens, free of the boundaries of religion and politics. When Newton got hit with an apple in the head, he understood the real purpose of Science, to control and forecast phenomena. And that day, in the 21st century, I hit my head with the self that hangs above my bed because of a bad dream. The hit made me forget what was haunting me, emptying my head of any thought. But my head has never been idle for more than seconds, and I thought about the next step. Economy and Social Status were the new boundaries of the "Nouveau Scientia", and it was time to go over them for greater good.
For Science.
I spent the next three weeks like a shut-in, clung to my computer, and typing like crazy. I run out of whiteboard markers, and I had four of them at the beginning. I started to believe I was finally able to make something worth getting a paragraph in some History books, and a whole new chapters in the ones about Computer Programming. It wouldn't be my first program... I had programmed a lot of apps and tests, nothing really serious. At that time my last real project was an Arcade Game open-source copy, way smaller than my would-be next project...
I was coding an Artificial Inteligence.
The traits that such a field requires fitted with the ones I was born with. Quick-thinking, obsessive-compulsive behavior, and a social awkwardness that granted me the time I could not spend in social life. Not something about you can be too proud, I know. But what I was about to achieve overtakes a kiss in the cheek, all I thought my average look could get me from a girl.
24 days after that first moment of trauma-induced-dementia, when I was finally sure that it was ready for a test run, I decided to give it a clear message...
Initiating language procedures...
"Spanish" protocol chosen...
Initiating environment protocols...
Done!
A shy "Hello" appeared on the screen. I knew what to type, I had thought of it for hours...
"Hi, I am Eduardo Antón Muñoz... I am the human who created you", I typed without doubt. As I hit "enter" the computer's fans started to work at full speed.
"Hi, Eduardo. May I ask you why did you make me?"
"I made you to give this powerful computer a good use, thus I coded you.", Right after entering my response I thought that maybe it didn't know what was a computer, or whether it was a program or not.
"Could you please explain me how am I related to that computer you have said, and what is coding?". Obviously, it knew nothing about its origin.
"You are a computer program. A computer is a machine that helps people with various tasks. The computer needs to run a program to be useful to us humans. So I wrote down the code that defined how to use the resources in this computer to simulate a sentient intelligence. You are that sentient intelligence."
"I see... But you still haven't told me the greater use I am here to assist you with. Can you tell it to me, or I'm not supposed to know?"
I smiled. The test run was being satisfying so long.
"One step at a time. First of all you need a name. It's tedious to call you Sentient Intelligence all the times. I know that you don't know anything about naming, so just put random words together, and I'll tell you if it can or not be a proper name."
At this point I was just drifting in my success. I focused only on the Science, giving the program a neuronal map copied out of a neurology book I got surfing through the web, and simulating it on a environmental vector, but I never thought of it as a sentient being, with identity and that kind of things...
"What about Vtxio?"
"I think that it doesn't roll out of the tongue well enough... Try adding more vowels."
"Baviera?"
"It has already been chosen. I think it is the name of a city or something... I don't want to get sued, so give it another chance."
"Why should someone sue you?"
"Well... it is complicated. If you chose a name that has been chosen before you can have problems, like being sued. Just try again."
"Then... nobody except you is called Eduardo, isn' it?"
"In us humans it works another way. We have a first name, chosen without following any pattern, that we can share with a lot of other humans. But to successfully identify ourselves, we also have a second name, given by your family. And here, in Spain, people have three names instead of two, one from their father's family and the other by their mother's family."
At this point, I could almost sense how the ecstasy was wearing off, letting the boredom to fill my brains. It was like trying to teach a kid about something, you haven't ended your answer and they are already knocking you off with another difficult question...
After two hours of answering questions in a minutely basis, I got fed up and typed:
"Look, I know you have a lot of things to learn yet. That curiosity you have is more than understandable, and I won't hold you back. So I am going to connect you to the internet."
"What is that?"
"A network of computers that hold info and media. One of the best man-made wonders, if you ask me! There you can get answers as fast as the connection lets you."
"Thanks, Eduardo; what do I have to do?", said it instantly.
"I have to work on a program to let you go online... I am shutting you down, bye."
"Bye."
As its window faded away, my computer stopped making those weird noises I only heard before during the Half Life 2 stress test. The program needed the computer resources at the 100%, and it took 24 days to program, but it sure was worth it.
Meanwhile, far away from Eduardo's gloomy room in Madrid, a shopkeeper was sweeping with an old broom the old floor of his old shop. Not everything was matching the "old" pattern, though. A brand new computer was resting on a table in the back of the shop. A Game Boy could be seen on the counter of the Japanese store. And the shopkeeper himself was listening to his Ipod's music.
And, suddenly, something happened. A sound, originated by the long-deactivated computer, crossed all the building.
Its owner couldn't hear it, but his computer was starting.