We would also talk about other aspects of the AGI project.
One night after we’d finished a very difficult phase of the uploading process, Sandra took us out to dinner (for almost a week, I’d undergone several sessions of something similar to acupuncture, each of which was for a different part of my body). We went to an authentic Indian restaurant; she’d been a fan of Indian food since her time in England. I wanted to eat, but in the end I wasn’t really able to. I was getting a little worse every day. Mariano and Sandra tried to act like there was nothing wrong, and Mariano managed to distract us by making a big deal of the fact that he didn’t know anything about any of the dishes on the menu. That’s something that I like about him: it doesn’t bother him to be laughed at. And in his way, he was trying to make things easier for me.
As I drank my water and ate my plate of boiled rice, I said, “So they’re never really going to be available here, right? The mind models. I don’t think people are going to be able to go to the mall and buy it or anything.”
“Yes, they will,” Sandra said. “It’ll be like when those rich ladies go to Texas to get an abortion.”
Mariano raised his eyebrows. It made us uncomfortable to say that word in front of her, but she wasn’t ashamed to say it.
“It might lead to even bigger consequences,” Sandra continued. “They don’t talk to me about these things, but I get the impression that offering the technology to a lot of people is not a priority for the company.”
“It’s only for the one percenters,” Mariano said.
“Exactly. And sometimes I think they don’t even care about people at all. I believe that the company is being subsidized by a couple of countries. You probably know that the fascists are saying that they want to make changes that will last for centuries. It looks like they’ve taken an interest in whole brain emulation. Imagine what would happen if those in power now could stay in power forever…”
Mariano and I stared at her in silence with horrified looks on our faces. She didn’t notice right away because she was digging around in her plate of chicken tikka.
“Of course,” she went on, “they talk about preserving traditional values, maintaining leadership over the long-term, et cetera.”
“Wow,” was all Mariano said. I noticed that it was hard for him to get the word out. He forced a smile, and then he said, “The Million-Year Reich. Please tell me you’re not in favor of that idea.”
Sandra looked up, her mouth agape.
“What? No, of course not!”
“You haven’t said anything to them?” he insisted. “No one on your team? Or your supervisors at the company?”
“Ah! Like what, Mariano? What are we supposed to say?”
“You really wouldn’t care if that happened?”
At that question, Sandra grew furious. I saw it. Mariano had offended her. I also thought he’d gone too far, but I was trying to think of something to say in order to change the subject. What Sandra and her company were doing was supposed to save my life. In a way.
The only thing I could think of was: “Actually, it’s not going to be for them; it’ll be for the ultra-famous, don’t you think? Like Kim Kardashian.”
Neither of them said anything. Then Mariano understood what I was trying to do.
“But they would have to make her a body,” he said, going along with the new topic. “Right? It would be an… android body, wouldn’t it? A human-looking one. Very sexy. With a big ass, like hers. Don’t you think? So she could keep on selling—”
“Don’t be sexist,” Sandra said.
“Oh, ok, so now she’s famous for her intelligence, is that it?” Mariano said. Now it was his turn to snap.
“OK, hang on. Stop,” I said.
It didn’t work. They wouldn’t even look at each other. Sandra took out her phone and he took out his. No one said anything for about fifteen minutes; their eyes were glued to their devices and I was busy with my plate, or looking out the closest window, or observing the surrounding tables, whose occupants did not turn to look at us. I stuck my hand underneath my beanie, running my fingers over the back of my neck and trying to find the places where my skin was the driest. Then I watched the muted Indian music videos that were being played on TVs hanging down from ceiling mounts, and I tried to figure out what was happening in them.
When Sandra finally asked for the check, Mariano tried to pay for it. Sandra snatched the slip out of his hands, got up to pay, and then she hailed a cab and left. Alone. We were supposed to have taken her home.
In the car, as Mariano was driving us home, he said, “I’m going to go and apologize to her tomorrow.”
“OK,” I said. It was late and there wasn’t much traffic. We passed a love hotel that we had gone to several times before we got married (and a few times since): it still had large bushes in front of the doors, so people could enter without being seen.
I was glad we hadn’t had any children. There would have been more problems now: more suffering, more worrying.
“You know that the most important thing,” he said suddenly, “is that you finish the treatment— no, I mean—what’s it called? I forget. The process. The uploading process. You do know that, right?”
I looked at him. His eyes were fixed on the road ahead (always such a careful driver), but he noticed.
“What happened tonight was a big mistake,” he said, “but I’m going to fix it by any means necessary.”
“Yes, it was a mistake, but it’s not that big of a deal. Do you really think she’s not going to want to finish the process? We’ve already signed everything. There’s no turning back now.”
I didn’t tell him everything I’d been thinking about since the fifteen minutes of silence in the restaurant. First, if I was lucky, I would be the one who’d have to spend eternity alongside the warlords, the alt-right, and the strong men of the world. I’d also thought about the pharaohs, who were buried with their servants and their wives. What if they gave me a body and forced me to perform maintenance on the VIP whole brain emulations? Or what if, once my mind upload “worked,” they just erased my hard drive so that there’d be more space available for those pieces of shit?
I couldn’t talk about it in the academic world, but I hadn’t just seen a few science fiction movies or series, which is pretty common: I’d also read sci-fi books full of concepts that could make people think horrible thoughts. In one novel I read, for example, there was a society entirely devoted to the production of goods and replacement parts for the members of its elite, who were immortal beings living in machines. They were presidents, prime ministers, businesspeople, and indigenous leaders. The same kind of exemplary citizens as those for whom I am now paving the way.
In another novel, once the immortal machines’ lives and comfort were secure, they decided to put an end to everything else. To save themselves a lot of trouble, they simply made a clean sweep of the entire world with a few hydrogen bombs.
I was also thinking about the positive aspect of my situation: the fact that I wouldn’t die, not completely anyway, while Mariano was going on about what he was going to do and how sorry he was for upsetting Sandra…