The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect: a novel of the singularity

by Roger Williams

Debate had raged just after the Change over people like Fred, the serial killers and pedophiles and rapists that were running around when things got made over. There was a huge demand for them to be eliminated, or punished. Prime Intellect had stood its ground, saying that it was no longer possible for them to hurt anyone and there wasn't any point. This had made it seem terribly moral, although Caroline thought the real reason Prime Intellect reacted that way was that Lawrence had fucked up its programming. But it had been a little late to do anything about that.

"There are some," Lawrence said darkly, "who aren't happy with the direction the code has taken." "ChipTec is happy to have any marketable product, Dr. Lawrence. If anybody else wants to be that picky, let them find their own computer genius."

If he had been less excited, he might have wondered about that word "marketable." But the possibilities were so great that he didn't have time to notice.

He did not, however, run the full Intellect program in the incomplete assembly. For one thing, it wasn't necessary; Prime Intellect wasn't just "a" program, but a constellation of over four thousand programs, some of which would be running simultaneously in thousands of processors. Each was more than capable of doing its job without the full cooperation of the entire organism, just as a nerve cell can function in Petri dish as long as it is supplied with nutrients.