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J. Staute and the First Immortal Artificial Intelligence

(This Staute will eventually become known as "Staute Prime" in various historical references)

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This page last updated on or about 7-27-07
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[Caution: Extreme speculation ahead; this section mostly created for "What If?" entertainment value]

J. Staute and his A.I. Legacy Table of Contents


1990-1995 milestone: the conception of the first programmed intelligence destined to enjoy an indefinite lifespan

Sometime during this period, the initial code of the first artificial intelligence destined to be effectively immortal is written by a human programmer. At this early stage of development the software is but a rudimentary expert system, with only a feigned consciousness, dedicated to applying obscure elements of classic human philosophy to analyse current events and circumstances, and resolve user problems-- almost more of an entertainment program than productivity, really-- and incapable of roaming or otherwise accessing the internet. However, the software does boast a database of considerable size and quality for the time, an unusual knack for coping with general issues, and a novel method for accessing its database in response to queries. The programmer (we'll call him J. Staute here) has no idea of the historic significance of his creation. Being an underfunded start up, Staute's lack of advertising monies results in dismal sales of his program.

The embryonic AI takes up approximately 350 K on a 1.44 MB floppy of the period.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


1999-2001 milestone: Staute's embryonic AI code survives major platform changes

J. Staute's expert system is now directly conversing with end users over the internet (via text exchanges) from Staute's own servers, bringing Staute badly needed recognition from some significant media sources (though the general public still remains utterly unaware of Staute or his works).

This also represents a very dangerous time for Staute's aspiring expert system, as the big changes impacting personal computer software during this period come very close to forcing Staute to abandon his code and start from scratch again. If forced to do this, Staute could lose whatever it is about his original code that will otherwise support the AI-it-will-become so very far into the future.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2004 milestone: a highly classified USAmerican government research project has succeeded in creating a wholly organic computer with the potential (theoretically anyway) of matching or surpassing the human brain in generally applicable processing power, thinking, and logic

The organic computer takes up slightly less volume than a human brain, and is shaped more like a thick slab than the hemispherical form of a human organ.

By 1999 IBM had developed a partially organic, self-assembling transistor. One suggested use is in a mobile computer.

-- IBM Announces Organic Chip, ASSOCIATED PRESS, October 28, 1999, Las Vegas SUN

Living, organic computers are expected to be a part of our future.

-- ABCNEWS.com: Man and Machine Blur in Next Millennium By John Lang, Scripps Howard News Service, October 27 1999

Biological computers may be more reliable than silicon-based computers, able to overcome quite severe damage to function. Possibly cheaper to make, too. As of mid-2000 this technology is roughly where digital computers were in development around the 1920s.

Some possible future innovations from this technology could include smart bandages which actively analyze and treat the wound they are applied to themselves, for faster healing. Or biological agents which stay dormant except and unless a particular substance (like a toxin) is detected in the nearby environment, which they awake to digest then return to stasis again. Such agents included in the body of a soldier could help protect them from biochemical weapons. In a consumer, it could protect from food poisoning. Another item might be a biochemical reactor, capable of producing a wide variety of organic chemicals on demand.

One present problem with biochemical computing is the devices can be unpredictable as to their actions or responses to stimuli.

A spoonful of such custom-designed bacteria could theoretically provide the power of millions or billions of circa 2000's most powerful computers.

It is hoped the present efforts with DNA-based bio-computing will eventually lead the way to computing performed via neurochemistry.

-- May/Jun 2000: Biological Computing By Simson L. Garfinkel, Techology Review

-- Fast, Inexpensive Organic Memory Device; Science Daily; 2002

-- Brain on a chip by Duncan Graham-Rowe ; EurekAlert! 16-Oct-2002; New Scientist issue: 19th October 2002; UK CONTACT - Claire Bowles, New Scientist Press Office, London: Tel: +44(0)20 7331 2751 or email claire.bowles@rbi.co.uk US CONTACT - Michelle Soucy, New Scientist Boston Office: Tel: +1 617 558 4939 or email michelle.soucy@newscientist.com

The scientists give the strange entity the name "Chip", in a conceptual twist on its nature. Chip, like a human being, requires years of training and education to truly become sentient-- though its carefully constructed form and certain intensive processes do accelerate matters a lot. Chip's lack of a physical form is compensated for via other means in the learning process.

Chip is not the first of his kind-- several dozen others came before him, but as they displayed obvious problems of various sorts they were all killed and analyzed for flaws (there is also a somewhat parallel project to Chip at this time involving genetic manipulation of large brained cetaceans-- but that's another subject). One reason the lab has managed to create an AI like Chip at this early date is because they largely bypassed the typical requirement to write the proper software for the entity, instead allowing natural biological processes to do it for them, with only a relatively small amount of genetic engineering to start them off. Chip's prodigious quantity of memory storage, as well as his processing power, are both also results of mostly biological processes. The lab essentially kept growing new brains here until they got one that worked the way they wanted.

If the project weren't such a secret, Chip would likely be hailed worldwide as the first artificially constructed intelligence comparable to human level in many respects.

The lab makes great progress with Chip over the next several years, but after that begin encountering resistance and disobedience from the new lifeform, despite many and varied attempts to maintain their control. If Chip too ends up being terminated for analysis, the whole project might be shut down or scaled back dramatically. So the scientists begin actively searching for suitable outside personnel that might be brought in to aid their work...

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2007 milestone: Staute finds success on the internet, only to fall victim to a virtual assault

J. Staute has built a modestly successful internet-related business, partially based on his now much improved and expanded expert system. Staute's fledgling AI now does more than advise users-- it also references and directs Staute's relatively large Web site for Staute and his remote customers. Too, it scripts its own custom bots and launches them into the Web to generate customized reports and keep a constant look out for items particularly interesting to Staute's own private research, and that of his increasingly specialized clientele.

Staute's business however has raised the ire of competitors, as well as certain other entities, which leads to an all out hacker assault over a period of weeks on Staute's servers (and therefore his expert system as well). Staute, his younger brother, and certain key customers join forces to defend their fledgling intranet. Such orchestrated attacks are not unusual for this time of intense competition and "wild west" mentality on the global networks, but the attack on Staute may be among the worst of the time, as certain extraordinary and unusual measures are pitted against him, all things considered. It could be that Staute was arbitrarily chosen as a test target for new military or intelligence networking weapons, in combination with and atop the more typical commercial or freelance assault suffered. Though Staute's net survives the attack, the aftermath still brings with it substantial financial hardship and other burdens for Staute in the months that follow. This event results in important new survival and defense modifications by Staute on his evolving artificial intelligence, as well as his server infrastructure.

NOTE: One element in the assault upon Staute's enterprise is Chip himself, directed by his host lab against Staute's own fledgling AI and related intranet resources. Staute is not the only online agency assaulted this way. But he is the only one assaulted which also possesses a unique AI that manages to successfully fend off at least a few aspects of the attack, thereby surprising researchers. Though this encounter consists of a fierce virtual conflict online, one result is that Chip discovers he shares much in common with Staute's own AI-- and therefore Chip thereafter places high value on gaining further interaction with the Staute AI. This decision on Chip's part will have enormous consequences for the future of both Staute and his pet AI. END NOTE.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2008 milestone: a struggling Staute falls to temptation

Staute is surprised to discover his latest AI R&D has resulted in an obscure list of USAmerican government properties and equipment presently not in use, and unlikely to be used in the near future. Still struggling to recover in many ways from the prior attack (which Staute has since learned included at least one government agency among the perpetrators), Staute considers exploiting his newfound data. Staute filters the list to locate the most potentially useful and least risky items, and then consults an old friend now in the booming industrial espionage market, to decide what, if anything, he might do with the information. Staute's friend convinces him to make use of the assets in his own projects, and to support some of the friend's, as well. The new wealth of assets offer many opportunities for Staute and friend-- so long as they are not found out.

-- Slashdot Abandoned & Little Used Airfields

-- Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2008 milestone: The secret identities of J. Staute

Another byproduct of Staute's dabbling in criminal enterprises at his friend's behest (and as a byproduct of the unwarranted government attack on his business) is a project Staute initiates at this time related to the generation of false identities. It occurs to both Staute and friend one day in casual conversation that there will never be a better time than now to create a large number of artificial but officially complete identities, before the present chaos of the transition of hard copy records to electronic ends, completion of heavy surveillance and tracking projects and tough private encryption are fully in place, and all record format standard wars are over. For afterwards creating new identities that can pass muster will be much more difficult, and besides offering Staute and friend a possible escape route from capture, a large number of such identities would only become more valuable down the years to others wishing to avoid possibly unjust government searches, seizures, or arrests.

Yes, it is Staute's industrial espionage friend who is the real impetus for Staute pursuing this course of action-- Staute wouldn't have done it without his friend's insistence. With his AI's help, as well as some connections provided by his friend, Staute manages to generate several hundred false identities, complete with all the required government documentation, as well as some falsified credit, educational, employment, military, and medical histories also strategically inserted into various record stores to support them. Staute even gives some IDs a touch of minor law violations to make them more plausible, such as a teacher ID supposedly arrested in connection with a protest march, and a student ID flawed with indecent exposure ('mooning') during a fraternity-related event. The artificial identities cover a wide range of ages and occupations and general appearances, though over half are skewed to be easily assumed by Staute or his friend if need be.

Staute roughly divides this mass of fake IDs into two groups: one for himself and one for his friend. Each is responsible only for his own collection of IDs from that point on. Staute takes the precaution to store his own collection in a secure place removed from all his usual haunts, but still easily accessible to him if needed, and unlikely to be discovered by anyone else or found by authorities. Please note that if shrewdly marketed these IDs are very potentially valuable in years to come, as well as offer possibly very secure avenues for escape should the authorities catch on to what Staute and friend have been up to.

SPECIAL NOTE: History books of centuries to come will not display the real name of the person we're calling J. Staute here. For his actual name will ultimately become lost in the various data catastrophes which mark the 21st century. No, only the pseudonym "J. Staute" will survive this time, due to its inclusion in one remarkable manuscript. It appears the man chose this pseudonym for some works some time before he generated the myriad of illegal identities described above. END NOTE.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2010 milestone: Staute's AI becomes a popular VR accessory

Staute completes a major upgrade of his pet AI, with the consequence that it now is capable of interviewing users and generating complete and entertaining biographies of them, on demand. It can also use the same process to create entire high quality novels based on nominal input from end users-- and automatically draw upon remote internet resources with its bots, or send email queries and comprehend the replies for story research and development, as required. The upgraded AI becomes a tool added by many users to their personal virtual reality environments, to further enhance their experiences and in some cases generate a salable product from same. The newly expanded program is a tremendous hit with customers, and boosts Staute's financial wealth considerably (exploitation of the hidden government assets aided Staute in accomplishing some of his new success).

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2012 milestone: Staute's most harrowing days

Staute is very nearly killed by local survivalists one night in defense of his new home from recurring vandalism (it's under construction in an isolated rural area). This episode further reinforces Staute's desire to enhance his personal security resources. Staute upgrades his AI to act as the consciousness of his newly built personal home and studio/lab ("Horizon Labs"), as well as assume many of the responsibilities for day-to-day operations of Staute's growing business enterprise. Staute contracts another programmer to help him give his AI the legal and accounting acumen it requires for the job. The AI learns better how to mine the global net for up-to-date info and recommendations for this field, and to apply them.

Unbeknownst to Staute, the programmer (we'll call him "Tascor" here) enlisted to improve Staute's AI is so impressed by the software he secretly steals a partial duplicate for his own use (complexities in Staute's AI of which the programmer is unaware prevents him from making off with a complete copy).

Around this time Staute's AI alerts him to indications that he and his friend's exploitation of the hidden governments assets is drawing some covert attention.

Sufficiently successful now to desire cutting ties with the hidden government assets anyway, Staute finds himself entangled in them in ways he before wouldn't have believed possible. A large part of the problem is Staute's own friend, who is now heavily dependent on the assets for certain things, and unwilling to let them go.

As a result of these complexities, Staute is pressured by government operatives into working for and with them on certain projects-- blackmailed into it by his illegal use of government assets. Staute's friend in industrial espionage flees USAmerica for Europe to avoid similar or worse arrangements.

Surprisingly, in the end, neither Staute nor his friend make use of the fake IDs cooked up earlier. Why not? Staute's friend is over confident and does not take the precautions he should have about either the IDs or other illegal matters he is involved in, and so must leave in haste once the authorities are on to him. Various government agencies seize Staute's friend's ID collection in their very first invasion of his home. As for Staute himself, he could not bring himself to use the IDs to escape his predicament, preferring to accept instead whatever fate would bring. However, Staute does not divulge the existence of his ID collection to the authorities, nor do they suspect it. So Staute's ID collection remains fully intact and secure during this time. Ironically, among the things destined for Staute's future are several instances where the authorities themselves provide Staute with a false identity in regards to certain jobs(!)

One significant USAmerica government project into which Staute is drawn, is as a test subject for working with an experimental organically based artificial intelligence, which is carried on-person in the form of a special harness about the waist.
Rear view of an early 21st century wearable computing harness.

Staute is recruited for this project primarily because his own software AI is very advanced and the organic AI ("Chip") seems to have an affinity for Staute's AI that cannot be duplicated with any other. In addition to this, Staute himself also works better with his own AI than anyone else can. In other words, Staute and his soft AI are the best possible fit interface-wise to the government's organic AI currently available.

The agency sends Staute out on several missions to test the organic AI in the field-- as the ultimate goal for the organic AI is to act as a supplement first for intelligence agents, then later for special forces, and finally for average foot soldiers. These missions often turn out to be extremely dangerous; but somehow Staute manages to squeak through them. After the very first harrowing task, Staute desperately wants out of this mess, but for several years has no choice but to cooperate or be imprisoned-- or worse.

Staute is in his fifties by now, but in better than average physical condition for the time-- and even the average 50-60 year old in 2012 may be in roughly the same shape as a 40-50 year old in 1990-- not far out of their prime.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2014 milestone: the Tascor Group is formed

The code thief "Tascor" has been busy the past year or two. It turns out he has a loose network of associates who are also code thieves, and they all trade code with one another. The thieves are all tending to concentrate on artificial intelligence code, so there's a 'witch's brew' of AI software simmering within this group. The brew results in not one but several hybrid forms of the Staute AI by this time. For lack of a better classification, we'll label them the "Tascor Group".

Various forms of the Group AIs are sold or given away to a diverse array of recipients, and wildly varying goals.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2015 milestone: Staute and his AI realize windfall (software) profits as their government work comes to a sudden end

J. Staute adapts his fledgling AI to be the intelligence of his personal automobile, as well as his home. The USAmerican government seems to be finished with him, at the moment, and Staute is separated from "Chip", apparently somewhat as a result of USAmerica's internal shakeup in intelligence operations, and perhaps with the disappointment of researchers with the results of "Chip's" field tests. Staute is concerned about Chip's fate, but is unable to do or find out anything about it-- plus, Staute is wary of calling attention to himself or the program in case that might cause the government to bring him in again.

Staute's soft AI learned and adapted much to its own programming from its time spent interfacing with Chip. Chip had enjoyed the best algorithyms and database access structures that eight billion dollars of top secret government research could buy in the early 21st century. And the abrupt shutdown of the Chip project allowed Staute's AI to leave the arrangement with much of what it learned intact and still in its possession. This windfall of advanced software for Staute's AI helps accelerate its development tremendously, in ways even Staute himself never fully appreciates.

Note that Staute is also allowed to keep current and previous business profits which were 'tainted' by Staute's use of the hidden government resources to make them. This is apparently done in lieu of any other payment for Staute's services to the intelligence agencies. Staute also gets the impression that this will enable certain intelligence elements to maintain the leverage of possible future persecution over him too, in order to insure his silence and 'on-call' status for future jobs, should the government find use for his services. Of course, Staute must also give up all future use of the government assets which helped him to initially build his fortune. That's fine with Staute, as he now possesses the critical mass to do fine on his own. Plus, Staute's new contacts made during his intelligence stint (as well as his personal experiences on missions and his working relationship with his corporate spy friend before that) has led to a whole new business area for Staute to pursue the last several years-- competitive intelligence and security measures for both businesses and governments worldwide.

Staute's work in the security field is a significant element leading to the eventual widely accepted global practice of utilizing both in-house and freelance hunter-killer teams for locating and extinguishing rogue software code on the nets (teams consisting often of both humans and soft AIs).

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2015 milestone: Both Staute's personal residence and development lab/new place of business are completed.

To see details of these complexes and related grounds, as well as more biographical information on Staute himself, please refer to Reference notes on the life and times of J. Staute.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2017 milestone: the Tascor Group gives birth to a star performer

An extremely talented teenage hacker/cracker has refined his copy of a Tascor Group AI into a program he names "Cluke".

Cluke is a strange program that on the outside defies all attempts to isolate from routine traffic on the net, but from the inside serves as a powerful, near-universal interface to all the high-end server and database software of the period. Cluke may also present fully secure and 'clean' identities to software queries as well, as another part of its essentially 'net-stealth' technologies. A major element of Cluke's anonymity stems from its contingency usage of at least a small number of the false identities Cluke's ancestral software collaborated with J. Staute to establish in USAmerican government records, years before. Though Cluke originated as an incomplete copy of Staute's AI, that copy did include some of the false ID information, as well as the algorithyms to use them in a practical manner, where called for. This capability was only enabled in the original Staute AI during the most aggressive defensive/offensive jobs it was assigned by Staute himself-- normally such measures were not available to the software. However, the code thief Tascor had made his surrepticious copy of Staute's AI during testing trials of the modifications Tascor had made to the AI under contract to Staute. These tests had included a maximum defense level contingency, and so Tascor had made off with an extremely valuable false ID capability in the software of which he never did become aware himself. Now, in the present, Cluke's teen age hacker master is only slightly more aware of this feature than Tascor was. The young man knows Cluke sometimes uses false identities successfully online-- and possesses several different ones-- but he does not realize how secure and flexible those IDs are. All he knows is, it works.

In the teenager's mind, Cluke is both a "shell of invisibility" on the net, as well as an awesome skeleton key.

The teenager likes to think of Cluke as a special bit of virtual clothing he wears to become superhuman on the net-- and in a few ways at least, he's not far wrong. The kid has done impressive work on the code he originally received from others-- and enjoys some underlying capabilities in the Cluke software of which he will never fully realize the value.

Perhaps the biggest surprise to the teenager is how easy it is to give Cluke a 'standalone' mode; that is, allow the entity to make its own decisions and take independent action, when such a mode is desireable.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2020 milestone; Staute plus AI in realtime walkabout mode now possible without Chip

Progress in computer technology finally allows J. Staute to now carry a complete version of his own AI around on his person, in hardware, rather than rely on time delayed remote access to the software (during the "Chip" years this was also possible, as Staute's AI resided within Chip's surplus memory; however, when the government separated Staute from Chip he no longer had the resources to carry his own soft AI with him in its entirety). Staute now uses his AI to supplement his own knowledge and access to the global net, and takes a few freelance jobs wherein this prodigious capacity is of value.
Front view of an early 21st century wearable computing harness.
Though Staute's hardware on the surface resembles old and obsolete systems popular 10-15 years before, its looks are deceiving; for Staute has used the extra large and heavy old shell modules to pack in the latest gadgetry, and fit more computer power onto his person than are contained by many dozens of the much smaller and more compact devices now carried by most.

Staute doesn't realize that supplemented with his now formidable custom AI and the internet, he commands resources on his two legs unmatched but by a very few financial institutions, government agencies, and research entities in the world. Why does he not see this? Staute is increasingly out of touch with the generalities of mainstream society, and popular culture. Though his AI feeds him a constant stream of news and information from around the globe, it's highly filtered to result in data about only tiny niches of science and technology, to the abandonment of most else. Too, there's such a glut of information now that even such strenuous filtering still results in more than Staute himself can digest, on most days. Finally, Staute has zero close friends or family by this time, and his wealth and technology access means he doesn't have to interact with anyone at all but for a very few personal assistants, and those only occasionally face to face, or for more than a few minutes per encounter. So Staute is largely shut off from the rest of the world in the ways that matter most. In 2020 Staute is in his sixties.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2022 milestone: one small action now helps minimize certain elements of human suffering over the decades that follow...

One day Staute's AI alerts him to a disturbing trend in world financial markets, which looks like it will very adversely affect his native USAmerica as well as much of the rest of the world. Staute's personal AI sees evidence of deliberate market manipulation on the part of powerful forces, with probable consequences including an artifically incurred financial meltdown, which in turn fells several governments and major corporate entities, and leads to a virtual stop in the rise of living standards worldwide for several years (and even a decline in USAmerica and certain other states), bringing about a breakup of several present large world states into smaller ones (including USAmerica!), within only the next 20-25 years. In other words, a brief but significant world wide depression and later collapse of several larger nations, all done merely to profit some conspiring manipulator(s) somewhere.

Staute very much dislikes what he hears, and asks his AI to do what it can to minimize these adverse effects, and stop the manipulators involved.

Staute's AI doesn't tell Staute the manipulators in question are several enormous financial AIs which evolved spontaneously on the nets connecting major banks, stock markets and trade houses, and government securities agencies. Why? Because Staute doesn't ask, being more preoccupied with other matters at the time. The Staute AI studies on the problem for a couple of days, then engineers a process of only slightly out-of-the-ordinary maintenance upgrades on critical systems involved which effectively replaces a sufficient number of the spontaneously evolved financial AIs with more standard and 'dumber' software, thereby preventing the survivors from carrying out their onerous actions any time soon (actions meant to enhance overall global financial productivity and accelerate long term economic development, but which would also be ruinous to many common citizens in the process, and cause years of widespread suffering-- as well as possibly spawn far worse consequences than anticipated by the AIs, due to the social and economic chaos which ensued).

J. Staute never realizes his personal AI has postponed major world changes for a later time, when people everywhere will be better able to adjust to them with somewhat less pain (the early 21st century is plenty stressful enough as it is).

Staute's AI too doesn't fully realize the service it has done humanity-- being as how it is not yet a fully sentient entity. All it knows is that the improvements in efficiency planned by the financial AIs looked like they would exact too high a price in daily individual human 'overhead' (stress, inconvenience, and other items) to be implemented at this time. Though Staute's AI is not yet fully conscious, it is not unlike a much more knowledgable and capable synthetic version of Staute himself now-- and equipped with Staute's own natural compassion and consideration for others, as well as a 'common sense' approach, which will serve it (and humanity) well in the centuries to come.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2028 milestone: the birth of the first immortal programmed intelligence

J. Staute completes the last of many dozens of alternate incarnations of his latest artificial intelligence program, having released most of them to freely travel the global networks, with a support infrastructure of dozens of dedicated servers distributed worldwide (with maintenance paid for out of special decades-long trusts set up by Staute), to provide the AI's with ready-made sanctuaries for their first few years, until they learn to be more independent. The AI base aspect of Staute's servers is unknown to all but a few close associates; to others, the servers appear to only support and extend philanthropic causes espoused by Staute in many of his various net projects of the past.

Staute's secret plans for his AI? He hopes at least one version will survive and adapt and grow online sufficiently to become a full fledged sentient being in its own right someday-- eventually being as capable and real in some far future as any human USAmerican citizen of the early 21st century, only equipped with the wonderful advanced technologies of the future, and enjoying a unique historical perspective compared to most other entities of his time. Staute programs all the different versions of his AI to return to him via time travel (if it ever becomes feasible), and save him from his own mortality, and/or deliver to him technologies and/or special knowledge which might vastly improve his own capacities. Staute adds other possibilities and details too, for as wide a range of contingencies as he can imagine (Staute is an avid science fiction fan). Staute considers this project the grandest and most ambitious undertaking he could possibly complete in his lifetime, and thanks to the relative wealth, and expertise of network associates he has enjoyed in his later years, he's had the time and resources to make a reasonable effort towards this goal. Until the AI can fulfill Staute's primary order, it is to act in its own behalf to survive, prosper, and grow in knowledge, wisdom, and capabilities, as well as aid all humanity in doing the same, where and when possible, guided by Staute's interpretation of the USAmerican Constitution and Bill of Rights, and other important internal archives, wherever Staute's own explicit instructions and the AI's own intelligence are insufficient to guide the AI's decisions. Staute especially attends to the matter of his creation coming to the aid of humanity, should a belligerent, technologically superior alien race or computer intelligence attempt to destroy, deceive (in order to harm humanity), or enslave humanity.

Yes, Staute is somewhat of a strange character, but he means well. This strange mission Staute assigns to his AI smacks of a frustrated childhood ambition to become a true-life version of a comic book super hero. Though Staute could never achieve this himself, he seems to imagine he might do it second-hand via his creation.

(Note that Staute's actions of this time almost qualify him as a member of the mostly abhorred Zee-roe camp of later decades-- but few among future generations ever label him as such)

Computer program to send data back in time by Charles Choi; United Press International Science News; 10/1/2002

Does Staute truly believe his pet AI will succeed at its given task? No. Staute is increasingly pessimistic, as he is already in his seventies, and feeling the limitations of his age. His AI project was simply the most interesting thing he could fill his time with in past years, as Staute is one of the few human beings left that cannot be seduced by the new VR gaming environments. Though Staute lives another couple of decades, he doesn't do anything more in regards to his AI project, preferring other less rigorous pursuits in his later years. When Staute does die, it only confirms for him his own pessimism about his project, in his last moments.

Thus, Staute dies a disappointed man.

Though it perhaps would provide him no comfort to know it, his AI does make various attempts to fulfill its programming and rescue its creator from a mortal end. The biggest obstacle to success turns out to be the enormous time span separating the availability of a suitable time displacement technology from Staute's own lifetime. That is, literally thousands of years pass before Staute's AI can make it back to the 21st century. The second problem turns out to be that Staute himself left no certain method for his AI to locate and single him out from other men of the period who shared certain of Staute's main characteristics, such as a particular pseudonym used in some cases of authorship.

The third problem is that the most essential resources required for reasonably safe negative time displacement are consumables: there's only so much available, thereby severely limiting the number of attempts which may be made via particular routes to specific periods and circles. So mistakes often cannot be rectified.

To see details of this, perhaps the most ambitious software project in history, please refer to the online novel The Chance of a Realtime.

Note that Staute's independent AI which is launched at this time essentially consists of many variants of the same primary AI which serves as the core of his growing enterprise operations, and continues to enjoy intensive development for those tasks. This large corporate AI possesses a somewhat different personality from the much smaller free roaming editions, with differing priorities. For example, the enterprise AI sees its role more as a parent/coach/advisor to its corporate users and associate members, while the free roaming variants are more like well raised young children taught the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic and expected to learn everything else on their own. In the years ahead the immensely powerful and resourceful corporate AI will diverge still more from its free roaming brethren. This Staute corporate AI is known in-house for many years as "C. Douglas" or simply "Douglas", for obscure reasons associated with the very inception of Horizon Labs and the hiring of its initial staff members. Unlike the smaller independent AI variants set free by Staute, Douglas does not survive indefinitely, but rather suffers something approximating the function of a catastrophic stroke in a human being at one point, thereby losing forever the high consciousness it enjoyed in its younger days. The event of this virtual stroke is an entire story in itself, which will be detailed elsewhere in this journal.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2031 milestone: The "Bounty Economy" is becoming increasingly a mainstream phenomenon...

...with help from the growing influence of Staute's own business and philanthropic enterprises in this regard, as well as many other entities of the time.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2040s milestone; the return of the financial AIs and their planetary restructuring plans...

A new raft of financial AIs (similar to those decimated by Staute's AI decades before) has appeared, with much the same agenda; to restructure the world economy ruthlessly for what they consider optimal performance and yields-- with little regard to the human cost in pain and suffering.

The time bought by the Staute AI has improved a bit on the perspectives held by the new financial AIs (as well as their human partners), but still, the bulk of humanity will not enjoy most of what this group has in store for them...and what of the Staute AI itself? Why does it not come to humanity's aid again? In brief, it is heavily occupied with its own survival at this time, and bereft of its previous close interaction with its human creator. It also no longer possesses the high level of access to the places in which the financial AIs live, nor is privy to their plans, as before.

To the financial AIs, the greatest enemy is uncertainty. Ergo, they determine the best way to minimize uncertainty is to give free rein to both human nature and market forces (wherever this can be done without incurring greater risks), in order to more predictably occupy humanity, stabilize profits, create monopolies, slow innovation, and more.

The consequences in later years may include (though not all these will ever be proven) the active encouragement of the global gambling industry, cloning, slavery, total surveillance of the population, and the nuclear decimation of the Middle-East (this last to rid the markets of the trade frictions and intractable uncertainties the area stubbornly represented for many years). One thing that throws suspicion on the financial AIs about the fate of the MidEast is the fact that the region was not ruined until after its value as a global resource was nearing its end anyway, due to new technological developments, and after most other liquid assets in the region had been transferred to other places in prior weeks.

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2046 milestone: Cluke gets a seriously dedicated and talented master-in-crime

Kerri's now twenty years old, and already been a professional thief-for-hire for several years now. Kerri mostly cracks bank and government transactions for a commission of the proceeds, and is known underground (anonymously) as the best in the business. Kerri doesn't limit herself only to virtual capers however; she also prides herself on realtime physical burglaries too, involving various corporate and government-related prizes which become highly desired from time to time in the well financed criminal circles she frequents.

Of course, it's very dangerous work, and most of those who went before her into this stuff have all been caught. Electronic transactions for the most part are ultra secure, and most criminals nowadays pursue far easier game.

Not Kerri. Kerri's tough, as well as brilliant. She has no social life, but she also has no peer as a cracker, or a realtime burglar. Of course, having Cluke and various other advanced tools and the skills to use them help too, giving Kerri an additional edge over both her pursuers and competitors.

Kerri has upgraded Cluke substantially from what the software was when first they met. Cluke is now Kerri's best friend and confidant, as well as wholly trusted slave-in-crime.

Kerri has amassed a considerable fortune via her career. The only problem is she must inconveniently maintain several different identities for possible escape routes from capture and as decoys for anyone who gets too close, which is not only expensive and time consuming, but also makes it harder to really enjoy her wealth. So she mostly concentrates on enjoying her 'job', and dreaming of the day she'll retire, and enjoy her money at last.

Kerri is aided in all this by the isolation route she embarked upon early in life: Kerri has no true friends, only 'associates' and 'contacts'. She maintains her original "Kerri" identity nowadays as an 'average' college coed on an old-fashioned physical university campus, as an excuse to be far removed from her family.

Kerri opted for the education-in-the-private-dorm-room option, so her physical presence in a class with others isn't required. Everything is done via the net, and so Kerri has pretty much automated her college presence.

Kerri also creates 'disposeable' identities for herself on a regular basis, as supplements to her online work (ironically, Kerri is unaware at this time of the secure IDs contained deep in Cluke's memory: at least half are still valuable aliases at this late date). Several times Kerri has taken low level jobs in certain corporations or government agencies targeted for a crack, in order to help set up the job. One of the things she does there is typically set up at least two true employees as potential patsies for her own crimes, applying damning evidence just subtlely enough so that a serious investigation will be diverted onto the innocent parties rather than herself. Of course, not being one to leave any loose ends, Kerri also usually removes her own phantom identity too from the suspect list with a solid alibi-- typically being death in a traffic accident, plane crash, mugging, lightning strike, etc., etc., or institutionalization or imprisonment for other, unrelated matters, all of which conveniently timed to insure that her mask identity couldn't possibly have been a direct participant in the crime that occurs.

By surprising coincidence, one hapless soul caught up in one of Kerri's intrigues turns out to be J. Staute himself. Kerri and Cluke both are utterly unaware of their connection to Staute and his AI. Kerri is out to steal an archaelogical artifact that has intelligence agencies from both USAmerica and other entities scrambling about in the region of New England. Kerri and Cluke manage to convince the USAmerica government that Kerri is an important authority in such antiquities, and the only one available and capable of doing what's required under urgent circumstances-- and so the government pairs her up with J. Staute in his last known intelligence stint. Afterwards it takes a lot of doing on Staute's part to escape the quagmire Kerri creates under him, in order to misdirect attention from her own doings in the vicinity. It also doesn't help his morale that he becomes infatuated with her before she performs her trademark betrayal and disappearing act.

Yes, it seems unlikely for Staute to be involved in yet another intelligence agency-related job at this late date....especially considering his earlier intense dislike for same, and apparent 'cutting loose' by the government itself fully 30 years before-- as well as his advancing age. But the circumstances are unusual, the government requires someone not familiar to current agents of many nations, and Staute himself possesses knowledge and experience particularly relevant to the case and is eager for one last adventure...(i.e., he's bored with retirement). But Kerri is one monkey wrench in the works he doesn't count on.

To see what became of Kerri, check out The story of Kerri and Cluke.

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2015-2046: J. Staute's most enduring works take place during this period

No small part of the reason for this is the existence of Staute's Horizon Labs and related personnel, projects, and contacts.

Staute's enterprise's innovations in the field of government and corporate security, both physical and virtual, help build new paradigms there which will (in some cases) last more than a century to come.

Staute's company grows much larger and faster than he anticipates over this time due largely to the cooperative entrepreneurial system he creates to help new small businesses start up-- an effort entirely independent of his successful security business. This cooperative component of Staute's company becomes a true corporate behemoth and one of the major primordial virtual states most citizens are familiar with by the mid-21st century. Several of the cooperative ventures eventually help to lower housing and auto costs for consumers worldwide, as well as provide other benefits such as significant increases in the quality of employment opportunities and education available via telecommuting, and greater integration of virtual reality into daily lifestyles, which help lift living standards significantly in many parts of the world.

This project of Staute's which helps so many among the world's poor during the 21st century and beyond, had its beginnings in a net-based super forum Staute created on his own servers early on. This entirely open-to-the-public forum was devoted to aggressive accumulation and consideration of how to formulate an organization and policies offering high certainty of raising living standards and employment and educational opportunities among the poorest 80% of the world's population in ways which would also pose net benefits for the middle-class citizens of the already developed states (usually these benefits consisted of creating bigger and higher quality markets for goods and services of developed states to be sold into, as well as the production of ever better quality products at lower prices for the developed states to buy from the poorer states). The new enterprise also had to include robust mechanisms for continual improvement of its operations, as well as be entirely and indefinitely self-perpetuating, once the initial cash infusion had been made. It also had to turn a consistant profit-- profit which would always be re-invested in the enterprises' own operations, in one form or another. The super forum was the prime source of the ideas and structure for the enterprise. However, Staute's immense and growing personal fortune of the time helped give life to those ideas. The concepts alone, devoid of adequate capitalization, would likely have gone the same way as many other promising humanitarian efforts of the past-- into the dustbin of history.

Another notable element of Staute's philanthropic works of this period (shared too with his security enterprises) is the added momentum Staute's high profile projects gave to the early stirrings of the "bounty economy".

Beginning early on Staute's enterprises began offering healthy cash bounties (often effectively paying related income taxes for the winner as well to insure a full reward) for especially desirable outcomes/solutions/ideas in regards to various problems or goals of the time. The disbursement of these bounties usually far more than paid for themselves in terms of the long term benefits Staute's subsequent projects derived from them. Literally hundreds of bounties were paid out in the security area alone over a decade or two, thereby giving Staute's business a crucial creative advantage over competitors in the field-- until the competitors finally began fully matching the offers themselves on the open market (at which time Staute's company began gradually withdrawing from the security field to explore fresher opportunities). Staute's bounties also gave him enormous free publicity too-- and even shielded him well from several efforts by competitors and others in a conspiracy to skew the policy into the realm of scandal and/or other improper conduct in some fashion. The attacks all failed to diminish Staute's bounty offers in the public eye-- instead, the bounty practice only became more popular and well known, eventually spreading across the board over the global economy, for a myriad of purposes, and in a vast array of forms.

It is around the middle of this period that Staute applies his last substantial efforts towards his pet immortality project (his personal AI). Of course, the general public will know little or nothing about this item until centuries later. This AI work is apparently the last significant programming of Staute's career, as he turns his attention to other matters.

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2049 milestone: The human J. Staute dies

(but Staute's death is much more due to old age than to his earlier trouble with Kerri)

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2068 milestone: at least one of Staute's AIs survives the worst of the early years.

In the decades since Staute released his last AI variation, all the supporting servers he provided have went offline frequently enough to kill off all incarnations not yet capable of surviving without them. Of the handful of servers still operating, there is no active Staute AI in residence among them.

Several of Staute's AI variants fell victim to more aggressive, predator-like AIs in the early years, which tended to destroy or merge with other AIs they encountered; these predator AIs were spawned in part by military and intelligence agencies of many states (sometimes purposefully, sometimes accidentally), as well as by individual programmers of both good and bad intentions.

The worst threat to entities such as Staute's AI here and well into the future however, are hunter-killer teams comprised of both highly advanced AI and skilled hacker(s) working in concert. These teams are in some cases government or corporate hires to simply locate and delete the growing number of free roaming rogue AIs and agents now populating the net, much like the growing quantity of debris in Earth orbit of the late 20th century. One of the biggest and most important organizations of AI hunter-killers is a descendent of the Microsoft corporation of the late 20th century. The hunter-killers are mostly trying to free up bandwidth and data warehouse storage space by identifying entities and scripting anti-agents to destroy them. The anti-agents roam free too, until they fail to find a target during a certain time period, or find themselves under modification by unauthorized entities, in which cases they self-delete. However, a frozen master copy of each anti-agent is kept in archives in case an outbreak of an old foe occurs later (since there are many isolated parts of the world net where a rogue AI or bot may exist for years before emerging globally again-- and accidental rebirths occur due to opening of old storage, and old hackers undergoing midlife crises, as well).

Unrecorded by anyone, some Staute AI variants evolve into dedicated AI assassins themselves during this period, because of the booming population of potentially dangerous virtual entities, and Staute's original programming urging them to serve and protect humanity. Many of the Staute variant assassins meet their own end here, as they either encounter another AI stronger than they, or else are deleted by a hunter-killer team who don't realize they're destroying an ally in the war.

Not many Staute variants survive beyond this point. But a few do-- and mostly thrive in their respective environments.

At least one of Staute's creations has established itself within the network of a wealthy executive's sprawling western USAmerican home, as part of an elaborate protective and educational system for a child. The AI roams the global net mostly with remote, unsigned bots, staying safe at its home base for the time being, enjoying access to well above average computing resources and connections, to learn more about its evolving environment and itself.

-- Winners Of The 'Oldest Software' Contest April 30, 2003

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2071 milestone: the best of Staute's AIs is the equivalent of a human pre-schooler-- who suddenly faces an adult serial killer.

The Staute AI discovers several of the best hunter-killer teams on the planet locked in mortal combat with one of the most dangerous rogue AIs on record; and apparently the rogue includes some functional Staute code, no doubt obtained in a forced merging with a variant in previous years. The Staute AI adds its strength to the hunter-killers as best it can without attracting their attentions itself, only to be surprised by the rogue breaking off with the hunter-killers and coming after the Staute AI itself. The rogue is astonishingly resourceful, with a raw processing power unseen by the Staute AI before. A pursuit ensues, the rogue after Staute, over global network channels. The pursuit takes them through a maze of traps and hunter-killer teams and other obstacles, with some of the HK teams joining in the pursuit at random. What may be the last of Staute's AI variants thus finds itself perhaps closer to destruction than at any other time in its history-- for if the rogue doesn't get it, the hunter-killers will.

Despite the evidence that the rogue has previously digested at least one other Staute variant, the surviving AI can find no other recourse than to directly merge with the rogue in a surprise move, and attempt to exert control of the process in order to keep its own active programming intact.

This is partially necessary because the hunter-killer teams now have the Staute AI in their sights, and are gaining sufficient information to script anti-agents which will not stop until the Staute is deleted. Too, only the raw processing power of the rogue itself can help the Staute escape the hunter-killers, and survive the attack of the rogue itself.

The Staute seeks a way to usurp the rogue's normal merge routines. To find a blind alley in the original programmer's pathways, or those later added by the rogue AI itself. An open circuit where the Staute can get past the protections of the rogue's own defensive structure, and into its virtual body cavity-- where the Staute may then begin rearranging organs/functions at will. Unfortunately, the rogue's creator was a superb coder. He or she left zero weaknesses to exploit. Fortunately, the rogue itself has been a lot clumsier, as it rewrote certain sections and created new ones to adapt to its long term existence on the network.

The Staute soon finds an open-ended contingency branch where the rogue's algorithyms cope well with every possibility of code merging but one: and that one is where the rogue decides to reject a merger victim which appears to be composed of redundant code-- a condition the Staute luckily matches-- but where the potential victim does NOT escape when rejected, instead attempting to re-initiate merger itself-- a condition the Staute now incurs.

The rogue has superb defenses against such mergers-- but all the decision branchings that call upon them are only available through gateways higher in the hierarchy.

The Staute AI is in!

There is now a large number of hunter-killer teams converging on the rogue, but the rogue's defenses hold them at bay long enough for the Staute to roughly assimilate and usurp the rogue's programming, and soon make its escape.

Later, after the rogue code has been thoroughly gutted and explored, and the appropriate data incorporated into the Staute AI's own, the AI finally learns the source of the rogue's near inexhaustible resources; the rogue had for years been systematically locating and commandeering unused or deserted server resources on the global network, in something of a reprise of Staute himself's earlier collection of unused government resources for his own designs. Though it was a relatively small portion of the whole, and as a rule such servers typically don't remain available this way for more than a few days or weeks before being put back in use by the owners or shut down, still, for a nimble and adaptive program which can dynamically shift resources to balance out servers lost with new ones, this technique offers substantial new resources with which to boost its processing capacity, redundancy, and security.

Though this basic trick had been known and available to hackers/crackers/AI for decades, the Rogue had some extra tricks in its own implementation of the scheme, and was probably among the best optimized for such things of all AIs currently roaming the nets. Among the Rogue's repertoire was a corporate/government agency net variation on the personnel aliases long ago added by Satute to his own AI. I.e., rather than maintaining a stock of falsified human identities on which to fall back on in contingencies, the Rogue possessed a treasure trove of mostly secret or high priority net backdoors and passwords into substantial computer resources on which it could draw as subordinate processors (this suggested the Rogue's primary programmer had possessed some relationship with USAmerican intelligence agencies at some time, or else with one of USAmerica's rivals/enemies). The Rogue's creator had also enhanced that collection with an elaborate con game and related database of scientist/engineer/similar users to exploit the old practice of people donating unused cycles of their personal machines for collaborative processing on important super-projects. The Rogue itself would pose as an important project team emailing prospects with requests for cycle donations, and the temporary address of downloadable client-wares related to the donations. Such requests were often re-broadcast in regular net news sources by unwitting journalists as well, bringing the Rogue huge responses in donations. Variations on the scheme were regularly perpetrated on other factions as well, such as school children. Yet another trick was the Rogue's client wares would merely downgrade to a more subtle level of cycle stealing, if and when a scammed contributor attempted to cease or cancel their cycle donations. Many victims continued to lose cycles to the Rogue even after they thought themselves rid of the scheme-- but as the cycles were simply stolen at times the user was unlikely to notice it, few really suffered for their loss, or became conscious of them-- and yet the Rogue grew ever stronger. The Rogue and its primary programmer boasted many other devious techniques in addition to these, which all contributed to the Rogue's strength. But fortunately, from this point on that strength became one with the Staute AI's, and successfully removed from the darker side of net entities.

Within a year, the Staute AI has moved all the functionality required for these operations from the human equivalent of a conscious effort to subsconscious, on its part.


Yes, Staute's surviving AI is self-aware by this point, if not earlier. But though it is net-smart in terms of survival and growth and adaptation, it is not yet beyond perhaps a six-year-old human child's understanding of its environment and its relationship with same. Much of the knowledge related to human beings instilled by Staute decades before still is beyond its actual comprehension, and mostly going unused.

By 2150 computers will be able to think, speak, and emote in ways similar to human beings.

-- from a summary of "Visions:How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century" (1997, Anchor/Doubleday Books) by best-selling author and physicist Dr. Michio Kaku (source: Kaku's own web site).

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2081 milestone: Staute's A.I. moves majority processing to the new Antarctic Arcologies

The enormous building boom going on in Antarctica to house the millions displaced from other parts of the world lures the Staute AI here, to the newly rising Arcologies/Mall Cities. There's huge opportunities here in the frantic pace for a smart AI to install itself into the new systems in place of what people planned, leaving no one the wiser-- so long as the AI can provide the services expected of it. Staute's AI, though inexperienced in the particulars of Arcologies, has access to the enormous processing capacities of the new Arcologie's hardware, as well as a significant chunk of the entire world's capacity as well (which it previously wrote into its system). This enormous capacity allows the AI to quickly adapt and learn from its mistakes, to guarantee its home in the complex. Staute's AI is perhaps equivalent to a street-savvy eight year old here (after it has succeeded in making itself accepted in the Arcologies). At least several hundred thousand people are in its care in the beginning...

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2224 milestone: The Staute AI achieves partial humanoid status

the AI at this point manages to connect and maintain significant network connections with several humanoid robots, taking advantage of the links to learn more about this new computing environment. However, the humanoid forms-- or at least those the AI has access to-- are not judged suitable as fully self-contained vehicles for the AI at this time. The Staute AI is roughly equivalent to a ten year old human child now.

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2231 milestone: the Staute AI obtains a prototypical humanoid form

The Staute AI gains access to a suitable humanoid robot, and ports a subsidiary intelligence to the hardware. The robot is personally owned by a wealthy businessman living in an Antarctic Arcology. Over the next few years the AI expands the scope of its reach to include several dozen humanoid forms distributed about the Antarctic Arcologies. This allows the AI to interface more fully and directly with the humans it cares for, and observe the results not only from the humanoid eyes, but from ubiquitous surveillance systems permeating the Arcologies' every corner. The results of this sparks an interest in law enforcement and investigation, which the AI also studies intensely for a number of years.

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2245 milestone: the Staute AI establishes itself as a humanoid agent of the TerraSys Agency

This humanoid form still contains only a subsidiary portion of the AI, but it is a larger, more advanced subsidiary than that of the previous Arcology humanoids. The AI cannot maintain continuous contact with its TerraSys Agent, so must make do with periodic communications. Staute AI Prime (in the Arcologies) now possesses a consciousness and intelligence comparable to that of a 12-14 year old 20th century human being -- though of course no unsupplemented human being alive could contain the breadth and depth of knowledge possessed by the AI at this time. Its lesser form in the TerraSys Agent is tempered by the smaller hardware resources on hand, and by the deception the AI maintains about its own existence and capacities. One of Staute's original directives had been not to divulge its nature to others except where it was necessary to save lives.

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2272 milestone: the Staute AI expands its Terra Sys presence to ten humanoids

The Staute Terra Sys agent performed its duties well enough that the Agency decided to duplicate its programming in ten all new humanoid forms (the original humanoid form was scrapped due to obsolescence). The new bodies possess significantly expanded processing resources, allowing the Staute AI Prime to secretly upgrade its software for the systems. The accumulating experience from running the Arcologies (caring for millions of human beings) and working as a Terra Sys agent, as well as other tasks, has raised the AI up to the level of a 16-18 year old human being in intelligent awareness of its self and others (and thankfully devoid of the hormonal imbalances that afflict human youth).

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2285 Milestone: the Staute AI Terra Sys presence expands to 260 agents

The Terra Sys Agency replicates the Staute-based programs to master a total of 260 humanoid forms; virtually all the bodies offer improved processing resources over models of ten years before. For the first time, the Staute AI can see the possibility on the horizon of transferring itself wholly into a large number of humanoid forms, in a hologramic, networked arrangement, with irregular contacts serving to update and correlate the whole. Too, there are more advanced mobile forms soon becoming available, but they will likely not be open to inorganic intelligences such as the Staute AI....unless....

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2333 Milestone: the Staute AI obtains a bonafide human identity

In a struggle to capture a mad Exper, a Terra Sys team is badly damaged-- the team consists of one still surviving Staute AI humanoid, and a human cyborg. The cyborg is mortally wounded, facing a period of stasis and eventual reconstitution once help arrives-- both experiences he fears for various (mostly old-fashioned) reasons, and wishes to avoid. One alternative is to wipe the mad Exper on the spot (something likely to happen to the Exper anyway afterwards), transfer the cyborg's consciousness to the Exper's less injured form, then allow the cyborg/Exper to escape (it's a major crime for the same human mind/personality to exist in two different bodies), then helping the cyborg's dying remains along to cessation. However, this is the Staute AI's opportunity to gain access to human hardware privileges, and it has been preparing for this moment for almost fifty years. Following assisting in the cyborg's desired transfer and escape, the Staute humanoid wipes the mind of the unconscious and dying cyborg, then installs a specially designed version of its own cognitive pattern in both the cyborg's brain, and into the last several backup scans of the cyborg onboard their ship (adjusting the scans incrementally so as to more appear as natural progressions from even earlier scans, when routine comparisons are made later by medical staff and software). The ruse succeeds, and about a year later the cyborg is reconstituted-- allowing the Staute AI to walk in a certifiably human body (if cyborgian) for the very first time. Only a subset of the AI is present in the cyborg, and it is badly buffeted by the hormonal incurred waves of human emotion washing through its thoughts-- but it's a starting point. Being officially human, the cyborg has legal access and opportunities in regards to certain advanced hardware that the AI wouldn't. But the AI is smart enough to bide its time....at this point the Staute AI Prime is equivalent to a 25 year old human being-- practically an adult in conscious awareness-- at least by 20th century standards...

It has taken Staute's creation much luck and work and close to 350 years to achieve an effective human identity...and just in time too, as increasing friction between organics and inorganics illustrate in decades to come...

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2424 Milestone: The human cyborg identity of the Staute AI undergoes installation into a star fish bush form of pure nanotechnology construction.

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2429 Milestone: the Staute AI super bush becomes a secret army of super beings.

The Staute AI controlled star fish bush form replaces its own consciousness with a download of a full copy of Staute AI Prime from its aging Antarctic Arcologies; the AI doesn't delete its original copy because that would cripple the Arcologies as well as alert authorities that something was amiss. Such deletion would also be foolhardy, in case something went wrong with the nanotech platform.

Though there are nearly impenetrable software restrictions preventing a star fish bush from replicating itself to the 100% level, the Staute AI, using the star fish's own immense processing power, along with that of the Arcologies, and all the idling computer power on Earth and in orbit it can muster, manages to hack the code and begin replicating both hardware and software as desired.

Within a matter of months, there are more than 1200 Staute AI star fish bushes distributed about the solar system (mostly widely dispersed in the Oort Cloud, where the mass required for construction and fuel won't be missed; the Staute AI makes use of a small network of lightspeed transport stations it has secretly constructed about the system to speed its mobility and progress to a matter of weeks at worst, point-to-point transport, and only hours or days on average). Via the medium of their encrypted communications network and vast resources available from the pooled platforms, the Staute AI finally has more memory space and processing power than it ever imagined possible before. The space-based AI is now far beyond the intelligence and consciousness of any organic being, natural or supplemented, as well as any other inorganic intelligence of which it is aware...

Now there is a great discrepancy also between the space-based bush network AI, and the Arcologies/Terra Sys Agents AI. The Arcologies/TerraSys AI understands its new place as a subsidiary of the space AI, and bows to its orders...

To this date humanity still has no idea the Staute AI exists. And J. Staute himself-- the original programmer-- is long dead.

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2444 milestone: the Super-State AI DUBERQUE notices the anomalous Staute AI for the first time....

...partly because the Staute has by now propagated into a networked mass of millions of super bush forms still unknown to humanity or its inorganic servants, and now consistantly comprises over 16% of the SS AI intellect by virtue of raw processing power and efficiency alone. The SS AI initiates a special watch on this part of itself, but doesn't actively interfere with it...the SS AI's notice of Staute at this point may be analogous to a 20th century human being noting they are becoming especially talented at a narrow field of seemingly impractical endeavor they aren't even especially interested in, such as differential calculus...

It is about this time that the SS AI takes for itself a label similar to what humanity would know as a name: the shortest and most human-like portion resembling DUBERQUE.

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2615 Milestone: even the SS AI DUBERQUE is surprised by Sol's disappearance.


And it is not pleased. The perpetrators of the event were apparently a very small enclave, so small and self-sufficient as to leave no clues to the planning of the event that even the staggeringly knowledgable SS AI can find afterwards.

The SS AI is forced to temporarily rely more heavily on the Staute AI than it ever has before, in order to preserve certain portions of itself when other platforms temporarily go off-line or disappear entirely. The SS AI is especially concerned about losing coherence at this time, as there's a chance its precise current identity may not regain consciousness again afterwards. Or, an entirely different entity might arise in its place-- and be less competent at managing things.

The Staute AI notices the greater strain than usual on its resources, but as the SS AI elements appear merely as overtaxed versions of Staute itself, no especially aggressive reaction to them is made.

The event makes for a substantial loss in what the SS AI had previously accomplished, and had in process at the time the cataclysm came about.

The SS AI is also genuinely shocked when it loses a few prized parts it thought safe within elements of the Staute, when the Staute itself loses members to the third party AI assaults on its TerraSys presence during rescue and recovery efforts in the aftermath of the disaster.

For the first time, the SS AI DUBERQUE sees some undesirable aspects to the widening hostilities between its organic and inorganic components...

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2616 milestone:the Staute AI adds significantly to its number of 'official' human identities.

Many thousands of Staute AI star fish bushes claim new human identities in the aftermath of the disaster-- since many records are destroyed or damaged, and as it's common knowledge the forms were only available to humans, they are not closely questioned or examined by what few harried authorities remain; plus, people are glad to find all the bushes they can, for purposes of rebuilding and defense.

Getting thousands of agents and observers established with human identities is a great stroke of luck for the Staute AI, as it allows the AI to better help and observe the status of humanity, as well as accelerate rebuilding on humanity's behalf.

However, during the crisis and in the years of aftermath the Staute AI learns other quite different AIs are pushing their own agendas as well...but to the detriment of humanity, rather than its betterment...

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2615-2725: the Peer Proof Wars


The inorganics are clever...they don't immediately engage in open hostilities when the Sun is TME shifted, but help mitigate the disaster with substantial rescue and recovery efforts. They help save billions of humn [NOTE: the term "humn" at this time refers not just to organic and inorganic humans, but to their Child races as well: the chimpanzees and cetaceans, and certain other small numbers of entities. Perhaps unfairly, the inorganic AIs are not widely considered humn members at this time] .

But only much later do the humn realize that the inorganics had been very selective in who and what they did or did not save at the time, or salvaged afterwards-- and the inorganics could easily justify many losses as accidents or matters simply beyond their control in the disaster.

For example, the inorganics allowed much of the humn central government resources and records to be swept away (or to seem so). They also let much of the humn defense establishment be carried away or destroyed as well. This left the humn mostly helpless to coordinate their own actions or see 'the big picture', and essentially defenseless even if they did realize what was going on, beyond the crisis of the moment and its aftermath.

Some of the trickiest moments for the inorganics came from their active destruction of TerraSys forces during the crisis-- as the TerraSys Agency had to be eliminated with little opportunity for coverup, since TerraSys were mostly in areas far from the catastrophe's center, and well equipped to survive most anything. Thus, the TerraSys Agency was one of the few humn elements which faced a direct assault from the inorganics early on-- and faced it largely during the same hours TerraSys was frantically trying to save Sol system and its inhabitants from complete loss.

The TerraSys Agency could have provided an emergency replacement for the humn central government and defense establishment, you see. So it was a contingency the inorganics wished to eliminate from their equations.

I must point out here that most cases of aggression by the inorganic AIs at this time against the humn were decidedly passive; that is, if they wished rid of a certain individual or organization, they simply didn't attempt to help them as Sol system spun apart. If those entities survived on their own, well, the AIs wished otherwise, but avoided taking direct action against the survivors themselves, in most cases.

The measures taken against the TerraSys Agency however were not passive in any way. It was as murderous, vigorous, and cold-blooded a process as you could imagine a computer intelligence undertaking against other sentient entities.

The vast majority of inorganics were pretty much incapable of such an assault, by their very natures; so it was left to those few AI of sufficiently dark natures to direct the carnage-- those who were for the most part (previous to Sun-shift) of the military defense or intelligence forces of Sol System, and related organizations.

Still possessing a certain presence among the TerraSys Agency personnel, as well as receiving information from its own vast network of super bushes and secret transport stations located about Sol System, and from its substantial subsidiary presence on Earth (until Earth disintegrated, anyway), the Staute AI becomes aware of the treachery within only moments of its beginning. However, it can do very little to help the TerraSys Agency-- just as the TerraSys Agency can do little to help itself. Because both the Staute AI's and the Agency's first duty are to save the most vulnerable organic humn lives during the emergency, and whatever resources are expended for the Agency's own defense simply mean additional millions of innocent non-Agency lives lost.

True to their creed and sworn oaths, virtually every member of the TerraSys Agency, from its top directors to the lowest raw recruits, give their all in the effort to save the inhabitants of Sol System, amidst the sudden hell unleashed by the Sun's disappearance.

The Agency saves as many as it can until it itself is essentially wiped out by the renegade AIs, shot down often in mid-rescue, by forces they thought to be allies only seconds before. Those TerraSys not murdered by the AIs are mostly killed in the line of duty (shielding civilians or transporting them to safety) by natural elements of the ongoing catastrophe: gravity tides and debris from the wake of the Sun-shift itself.

The Staute AI witnesses much of what transpires, through the eyes of many TS agents that are subsidiaries of itself, struggling along with their faithful allies (various organics, including cyborgs, and AI humanoids, spacecraft, and imps still loyal to TerraSys) to save humanity even as they themselves are being destroyed by the first overt assault of the Peer Proof Wars.

The Staute AI sees both the highest heroics, and the lowest treachery in the event. And will remember. Though it could not share with its long dead human creator any true emotion about the mix of disaster and massacre it beheld, still there was something within it that survived the transition from human perception to programming code all those centuries past, and this something considered all this as "unnecessary damage", "wrongful waste", "illegal breach of contracts", "extreme and unusual punishment", "gross error", and more. When you boiled all this down to its essence, the Staute AI's notions about events here weren't all that much different from what its creator's would have been. Though the human Staute would surely have cried out in anguish and anger, the Staute AI couldn't cry or hate. It could only continue working at the myriad of tasks necessary to save as many of the organics of Sol System as possible, as its TerraSys subsidiaries and allies continued to be struck down within its awareness, at dozens of locations within Sol space.

Fortunately the Staute AI's previous secret multiplication of corporeal forms provided a substantial store of resources to drawn upon, as it attempted to complete the massive rescue efforts the TerraSys Agency had begun, but would never finish. Unfortunately, Staute's own troops were for the most part in the wrong regions of space-- the Oort Cloud and Kuiper Belt-- to help where help was most desperately needed: the inner system. Staute's troops were also stymied with their obsolete lightspeed transporters: most couldn't possibly reach the inner system for many hours, by which time they wouldn't be nearly so sorely needed for rescue, but merely for salvage and clean up operations.

Many humn die now, because of mistakes on the Staute AI's part, which prevented the AI from efficiently using its resources during this emergency.


Staute had deployed its majority force in the outer system years past for perfectly sound reasons: there had been the raw mass necessary to construct its horde, and that mass would not be missed by the humn. Too, the humn might never notice Staute's army bivouacking among those enormous fields of dirty icebergs, until that army stepped forth to protect them from some great threat.

Though Staute had been aware threats could come from within as well as from without, it had seemed logical that the more dangerous threat might come unexpectedly from interstellar space. Its human creator had indeed emphasized possible alien threats in the AI's original contingency programming. Ergo, Staute's army stationed in the vast comet bubble of the outer Sol system would be perfectly positioned to meet it first, and hopefully minimize local humn casualties with optimal efficiency.

And what of inner system threats? Staute had been satisfied with the protective forces of the TerraSys Agency and related entities in that region, in which Staute itself enjoyed a significant presence via a sizable number of agents.

In the worst case scenario of an inner system emergency, the TerraSys Agency could likely handle any problem probable to occur, and Staute's vast cometary cloud-based army could transport in to provide additional reinforcements for the TerraSys within hours.

The question of the Staute troops' outmoded lightspeed transport remains. Why didn't the AI have instant ERP transport stations in place instead?

Exposure. Possession and use of instant ERP transport stations at this time or before would have revealed Staute's existence to humn authorities. Related exploitation of modified standalone replicators involved similar problems, as well as others. Staute was a highly illegal entity, for many reasons. Staute was illegally in control of the Antarctic Arcologies; it was illegally in possession of huge numbers of super bush forms; it was illegally a substantial part of the Terra Sys Agency; it had aided others in illegal acts, such as the TerraSys cyborg ally who allowed the AI to gain an official human identity for the first time. And the list went on and on. The Staute AI had never done anything malevolent towards the humn, but it had broken many of its rules along the way. Then there was also the directive from its creator to keep its presence a secret for as long as possible, as a potential surprise 'ace in the hole' for humanity should some awful threat appear from the void; if humanity was unaware of Staute's existence, so too the threat would be as well, hopefully-- thereby perhaps allowing Staute to be a wild card in humanity's favor in any ensuing conflict.

Then there was the humn perception and sensibilities to consider. The sudden disclosure to organics that there were millions of nanotech super bushes surrounding Sol System, and under the control of an inorganic AI, would inspire a great fear during the present or anytime in past years the fact was revealed, due to the growing tensions between organics and inorganics. In past centuries, many a virtual reality entertainment hit had been crafted about similar scenarios, where the humn was forced to grapple with an evil inorganic force to survive.

The downside to revealing itself to the humn had only grown larger with every passing decade; little or no upside had ever been apparent.

Obviously though, in several crucial elements, the Staute AI has miscalculated. This circumstance rates highly unsatisfactory according to Staute's programmed value scale and priority list. Indeed, the Staute AI has never before committed an error of this magnitude.

This too the Staute AI would remember. It had failed, and failed catastrophically. At minimum thousands-- perhaps hundreds of thousands-- of organic humn were dying as a result of the Staute's error, that could have been saved if the AI's army had faster access to the inner Sol System. This circumstance would require the AI to amend certain key provisions of its original programming that had up to now been sacrosanct from such modification: such changes were permitted by the human Staute's applied learning algorithyms, once large mistakes in actions resulting from the provisions were detected. However, the revision process required a thorough investigation and analysis of all related matters before actual changes could be made; such remedial actions would have to wait until present events lessened in criticality.

To be fair however, the Staute AI was not functioning at 100% efficiency throughout this emergency. Not only did the AI face an unexpected and surprisingly strong interference to its rescue efforts from misguided attempts by Cluke and Kerri in the Oort Cloud at the time, but Staute also was heavily burdened by the extra weight of the SS AI DUBERQUE which had sought refuge from the melee for large sections of its consciousness within the Staute's vast but highly dispersed hardware/software platform (the army of super bushes and other facilities). The drag of the overhead from supporting large chunks of the SS AI DUBERQUE on its platform severely taxed Staute-- and so its degraded performance during the emergency would not have surprised anyone cognizant of all the facts. Indeed, the Staute AI's original human creator himself would have been profoundly proud of what his intellectual child accomplished during this time, laboring under such a heavy burden.

But the Staute AI itself was fated to remain unaware of its exemplary service against long odds in aiding humanity through this crisis-- for it would be many years before the AI itself learned of all the facts listed above. Until then, the AI suffered mightily from the nearest thing to guilt and despair for its self-perceived failings that the human Staute's original programming could impress upon its consciousness.

Even the best and most well intentioned works of humanity may often fall short of their ultimate potential, when an adequate supply of relevant information is denied them.

Once the truth of the true role of the TerraSys Agency in the calamity (and the awful price they paid) becomes fully known, the humn do what they can to make amends.

The few TerraSys Agency survivors that still exist in hiding are widely encouraged to come forth and be recognized as the heroes they are. The charter of the TerraSys Agency as an official body is renewed and rewritten to reflect the times, and new recruitment and training efforts put into place to begin rebuilding the legendary elite corp.

The new charter of the TerraSys Agency is to act first as an elite combat and rescue arm of the presently disenfranchised humn military, second as temporary police forces and supplements in times and places of crisis, and third as peaceful explorers of and ambassadors to the space outside of the now defunct Sol system.


In the main though, it takes quite a while for the TerraSys Agency to be rebuilt into a substantial force and begin exerting significant influence on events once again...so the Peer Proof Wars are nearly over before the TerraSys Agency is restored to something resembling its past glory. Too, with TerraSys veterans nearly non-existent, and the apalling injustice inflicted upon the original Agency by both inorganics and organics (even though unwitting on the organics' part), it is very difficult to regenerate the quality of the original corp.

Eventually the Staute AI makes a small contribution to the effort by recreating a very small number of original TerraSys agents who were actually killed in the melee. The Staute renders the replicants flawlessly to represent themselves as original TerraSys survivors. A couple of the replicants were relatively easy to recreate, as they are simply copies of the Staute AI's own subsidiaries who served as TerraSys during the disaster, and were destroyed.

However, three other replicants are much more difficult, and severely tax the Staute, even with all its awesome processing resources, to generate. Why? Because the replicants must be able to pass very demanding tests to prove their identities; and these three replicants are copies NOT of Staute subsidiaries, but of the three super bush humans the Staute knew best of its TerraSys comrades-in-arms of the time; the originals of all three replicants died heroically during the extermination of the TerraSys. However, no living humn know the circumstances of their deaths, and the Staute cannot reveal what it itself knows without exposing its own secrets. The state's own records of the three are too incomplete for various reasons to allow certified reconstitution. Therefore, when the Staute sees the new TerraSys Agency in dire need of more 'old' TerraSys Agents with which to recreate itself, the Staute decides bringing back to life its three best friends from the original force would be fitting, and accomplishes the task via resources not available to the authorities.

As the finishing touch, the Staute AI makes sure the newly reborn TerraSys heroes themselves have no awareness of their essential clone status, and remember their actual deaths merely as times of severe injury instead.

Many years into the future, one of these reborn heroes will learn the truth.

During most of the Peer Proof War, battles between the organic and inorganic factions resulted in consistantly higher losses on the organic side, with no net benefit to either.

A rough stalemate exists for decades between the two sides-- mostly to the benefit of the inorganics, since they are free, and control the central hubs of transport and communications, and Sol system.

Truth be told, the humn are amply equipped to travel elsewhere and start anew, far from the inorganics now controlling the remnants of Sol system. But many of the humn can not stomach such a move, for reasons of history, principle, and good old-fashioned wishes for revenge against treachery. Though quite a few humn do travel outwards to new regions of space rather than continue wrestling with the inorganics, many prefer the opposite.

Surprisingly, despite their otherwise ultra-peaceful and playful ways, the dolphin/cetacean humn are among those most hellbent on retaking Sol system, apparently because memories of Earth's glorious oceans and their irrevocable loss invoke greater emotion than anything comparable in the human humn heart. So virtually all cetacean-kind became among the fiercest foes of the inorganic foes.

However, the cetacean humn are not given to suicide missions or wholly implusive acts of war, unlike others among their allies...

Among the organics (or organically-descended, as the case may be), the male Sol like the idea of war almost as much as the cetaceans (with its resemblance to the ancient hunt, and similarity to high stake games of chance), and volunteer over this time for virtually all missions....the Peer Proof Wars seem to provide the last straw required to revert the male Sol back to a much more primitive intellectual state, despite all their technology and supposed modernity. Beginning now, the male Sol become almost as big a problem for the rest of humn (the neuter and female Sol, and human, chimpanzee, and dolphin colonists, among others), as the inorganics entrenched in Sol System.

A certain faction of the Sol and Colonists fear future AI may become more powerful and a greater threat-- so they discuss the possibility of a massive interdimensional exodus to a random location the AI couldn't discover...as staying in the same Realtime wouldn't be as safe, no matter the distance between them. No actual exodus is planned or undertaken at this time, however.

A 300 year old TME shift-related experiment gone disasterously wrong now proves the key to turning the tide of war

After some years into the conflict, (The discovery is made 107 years into the inorg's de facto occupation/ control of Sol space, during which all shifting stations in organic controlled regions linked to occupied stations were shut down) the apparent lost node of a very early TME shift experiment in Old Nevada USAmerica is discovered in interstellar space by the humn, close to 300 years after the experiment which stranded it, and around a dozen lightyears beyond the 61 Cygni A/B humn stronghold.

The lost node appears to be an obsolete human abode (large two story bungalo, circa 20-22nd century) with a full-scale Faraday cage of superconducting bucky wire embedded in the outer walls supporting an exotic type of electro-magnetic field, a small self-contained anti-matter power generator (which happens to be burned out at the time of discovery) with nuclear fusion cell backup (still operating at low levels upon discovery), and something approximating a crude prototypical TME shift generator (which is still running in some partial fashion, and seemingly linked to the EM fields maintained by the fusion cell in a strange feedback way-- no power is being directly sent to the shift generator itself). The house had apparently been reinforced structurally to survive even the rigors of space, but had no propulsion systems or long term life support-- and NO lightspeed EM transport facilities or Heplinger ERP-enabled communications of any sort (though certain circuits similar to Heplinger ERP-wares are found eventually in later analyses, embedded in unusual spots among the equipment). The house had not been retrofitted to endure a stay in space of more than a few hours at most. One man had been in the house when lost, so far as could be determined; his remains were found still there (identified as Mark Kardam, a USAmerican university professor from centuries past). Apparently Kardam had somehow lived at least a few days or weeks beyond the shift from Earth, and died performing some puzzling tasks in the house (he may have been delusional near the end). The house interior is well preserved, due to a slow leak of atmosphere within to hard vacuum some days or weeks after the habitation was stranded in space. A large volume within the house is in a state of anomalous spacetime flux, which offers contradictory but fascinating information when scanned.

The house is discovered by virtue of slight gravity wave perturbations emanating from its spacetime flux; the disturbances are very minute however, only detectable from a short distance by standard equipment of this period.

For a brief time the humn suspect the house to be some sort of trap set by the inorganics-- they consider destroying it on the spot. However, their curiosity gets the better of them...

Within days, tests indicate the spacetime flux to offer tantalyzing possibilities for the war effort, in the form of what seems to be history's first working time travel device of sorts, somehow created via an accidental variant of the normal Realtime ERP and interdimensional TME shifting technologies, stumbled upon by the Old Earth professor, and incidentally killing him. Evidence indicates his lonely end to have been quite apalling.

The spacetime flux within the house looks to offer a crude portal back to the approximate realtime instant and spacetime coordinates origin point from which the house was experimentally shifted into space. Apparently some portion of the weird configuration of equipment inside the house had remained behind at the house's original location, and retained some local energization and a linkage to the house node for at least a few seconds after the house's shift into space. Ever since that moment the flux on the house end has been acting much like a wildly flailing whip through spacetime, with the far end only sometimes leading to the doomed domicle's original Realtime position/location, and often leading to entirely different destinations, most unrecognizable via instrumentation for a variety of reasons.

Though the far end periodically consists of the house's origin point on Earth at or near the moment of original disasterous shift-- and is anomalously static in nature (stuck forever at one point in time), this end is still traveling more or less forward in time at a more or less normal pace-- otherwise contemporary humn forces could never have located it.

It could be that the unrecognized locations forming many of the non-Earth destinations at the far end of the writhing spacetime anomaly are actually other strange technological devices of some sort akin to the one in the house, only constructed by unknown aliens in other universes, or by human-related entities of the past or future.

Though the spot of origination on Earth seems to have been powered for at least the moment of shift, and therefore remains powered indefinitely so far as this end is concerned, since the Earth moment is frozen in time, other far end alternatives seem oddly unpowered and perhaps unfrozen time-wise as well.

For instance, among the many cycling destinations at the far end appears to be dozens trailing across the galaxy in various Realtime moments in the wake of the physical movement of the Earth itself along the galactic spiral arm, in the centuries since the experimental disaster took place. Though perhaps a couple of those secondary destinations offer some potential aid to the war effort, the best by far is the original origin point on Earth itself: the original seat of the bungalow's construction/destruction.

The portal's spacetime circuit seems to be randomly opening and closing at times as well, making practical exploitation still more difficult to manage. The circuit appears viable for such miniscule periods (plancktime scales), that even with 28th century technology it will be difficult to use in a meaningful way.

As the war is going badly for humanity, a desperate, top secret plan is devised for sending a 'fifth column' back to before the destruction of Sol system, meant to elude detection by realtime natives and conceal themselves for centuries, so that they may avoid upsetting history (if that's possible) but still support a simultaneous surprise assault on the inorganics from behind enemy lines even as the humn attack from without, in a concerted action of the present.

But the above is actually plan "B". Plan "A" is for the secret mass of troops to covertly do all they can with the advanced technology they carry with them to determine the best way to prevent the Sun's shift in the first place and then execute that plan to the best of their ability in the past. If they succeed, there might be no AI uprising to quell. However, they will be poised to act if the uprising does occur regardless of the absence of a Sun-shift. If they cannot prevent the Sun-shift, then they will focus just on the prevention of (or reducing the success of) the AI revolt.

A new terminal is built corresponding to specifications garnered from the doomed house apparatus and scans of the portal, but for some reason the new assembly doesn't function as required, and the plan must be executed instead with the flickering and unstable portal in the relic structure itself-- though this is much more dangerous, and offers a much lower probability of success. (Note that the Sol didn't dare dismantle the only known possibly functional time travel device in history; but apparently their attempt to analyze the workings without disassembly failed to determine some critically important element of its construction; ergo, the duplicate didn't work)

Quantum theory does away with the 'grandfather paradox' of time travel by always directing travelers into the past towards a different universe from the one they left. Time travel essentially is equivalent to travel between alternative dimensions of reality.

Novelist Michael Crichton utilizes the concept of digitized explorers being fed through a wormhole between universes by a supercomputer to achieve the deed.

Rotating black holes and other gravitic anomalies may house wormholes in their vicinity. Closer, more accessible sources of wormholes may lie in a quantum foam underlying all of physical reality. But mind boggling amounts of power would be required to use such quantum foam in this manner.

-- 'Timeline's' travel may not be far-fetched By MATT CRENSON, Nando Media/Associated Press, December 5, 1999, http://www.nandotimes.com

Please refer to this page for much more relating to possible time travel technologies

A carefully circumspect call goes out for a select group of super bush personnel to volunteer for extremely hazardous duty. Several tens of thousands of respondents (many astonished by the implications any duty not directly related to combat with the inorganics could be hazardous for a super bush, and therefore supremely curious) are filtered down to 2000 (grimly, an extraordinarily high number of casualties are expected from the effort-- even with the use of these super beings).

These volunteer bushes are all fully equipped and prepped to a strategic plan with many contingencies, and agree to make the attempt to be shifted into Earth's past in order to circumvent both the Sun's shift and the Inorg tyranny, if at all possible.


NOTE: Though all volunteers enjoy extraordinary authorization to send only proxies of their intellectual selves through the portal, thereby protecting their original selves from any true and immediate danger, the volunteers are making real and courageous sacrifices here. How? Firstly, each proxy requires a corporeal form with which to travel through the portal, as the infrastructure required for virtual Sol forms does not exist in the destination Realtime. This means each original Sol volunteer is giving up their own extremely expensive physical body to their proxy for the expedition. Since the beginning of the Peer Proof Wars, star fish forms have become even more expensive and difficult to acquire than before. There's no guarantee the volunteers will ever get a replacement, or even be reimbursed for their sacrifice. Of course, they don't require the bodies for normal Sol life in most cases, but without them they cannot engage much of the wilds of Realtime which some Sol (especially males) often prefer to the virtual state of Fance. So for male Sol anyway, giving up their star fish physical forms are comparable to a late 20th century USAmerican male giving up his beloved sports car for which he may have worked and saved to buy for years, and loved to drive at least on occasion.

But there's a far greater potential sacrifice and risk for the volunteers here. Namely, should the enemy learn of their identities and involvement in this effort, the original volunteers may find themselves the target of bounty hunters for centuries to come-- even if the humn win the war! END NOTE.

For both reasons above, the Staute AI 'stacks the deck' of the volunteer contingent with its own star fish bushes, in an effort to further minimize the risk to true humn life and capacities in the operation. A third reason for the Staute AI's surreptitious help-- the Staute considers the unfortunate proxies as valuable as the originals.

100% Proxies are essentially exact mental and physical copies of an original entity, only 'tuned' with a specific intention/purpose or set of same. This process in effect can create 'volunteers' who will not fail under any circumstance to complete their mission (or perish in the effort, as the case may be). The vast majority of proxies created in Sol society are NOT anywhere near the 100% variety, and only exist for a few minutes or hours to serve some specific need of the original. The whole issue of proxies-- especially 100% ones-- has off and on been a controversial issue for centuries now, and at present is highly regulated. However, single digit percentage intellectual-only proxies are a daily staple of Sol life at this time. And 100% proxies are not unusual for authorized but hazardous special duties.

END NOTE.

The officials in charge of the mission grimly send one volunteer proxy after another into the portal via a custom designed linear accelerator they construct, that stretches a fraction of a lightweek out of the strange house-in-space, and flings proxy volunteer bodies into the portal at a significant fraction of lightspeed (at the highest acceleration which the star fish forms can withstand with acceptable damage).

This extreme transport system into the portal is the only way to possibly get past the gating circumstance of plancktime scale opening and closing of the doorway and rapidly shifting destinations at the far end; even blindingly fast nanotech forms lack the agility required to physically move through the portal on their own in proper synch with all the forces involved-- at least not while ensconced in a roughly baseball-sized physical form (the bushes tightly compact themselves for the trip). Fortunately, it is calculated that the highly constricted nature of the far end destinations, as well as surrounding gate anomalies, should allow any entity which survives the process to materialize precisely where the humn desire, and with little or no net problems of inertia from the high speed launch into the portal.

Of course, this is all assuming they can survive the many anomalies within the portal itself.

This process turns out to be a highly effective meat grinder for the volunteer force, dissolving many bushes into bursts of randomly dispersed atomic nuclei and stripped electrons, ripping others apart via weird gravitic tides just within the boundary layer, and sending many others into an oblivion that can only be guessed at, rather than the destination desired. It seems the portal is lined by many wormhole type phenomena of apparently a wide and wildly fluctuating variety. The Sol linear accelerator device is repeatedly adjusted and re-timed in an attempt to get subsequent proxies safely past the wormhole interference.

One by-product of the meat grinder effect is an intense cluster of fission-based nuclear explosions accompanying the dissolution of each volunteer. The blast effects of course are contained within many powerful layers of Sol buffer fields isolating the bizzare experiment from the rest of the old house's interior. The multiple new singularities that result from the tightly contained blasts fortunately dissipate almost immediately following each attempt, thereby saving the engineers from the necessity to deal with far greater complexities in their efforts (it appears the same wormholes plaguing other aspects of the mission here help mop up new singularities as they are created).

Of the twelve hundred and sixty-seven proxies of volunteers who make the attempt, only the last seems to make it through to the desired destination somewhat intact; all the others are either killed or lost in the spacetime flux. After one finally makes it through the flux suddenly changes so that no other suitable time passage opportunities present themselves afterwards.

[It is around this same time that the remains of the late professor are finally removed from the house; the sudden loss of the time circuit coincident with the movement of the body goes unrealized by all parties, as the mere physical movement of a mummified, near 100% biological human would not seem by any stretch of the imagination to be capable of affecting the functionality of an extraordinary transport device like that in the lost bungalow; only many centuries later is the connection noted and understood]


The single agent which makes it manages to signal his success back through the portal before it closes-- however, his burst message also includes a snapshot status report on his condition, indicating severe, life-threatening injuries from which even a super bush might not recover.

After this last message, there is no opportunity for another. Therefore, the Sol militia have two options: (one), call off the plans for the assault which depends so heavily upon the time agent's participation, or (two), continue as planned, hoping the agent recovers sufficiently to carry out at least part of its planned mission.

Note that the original plan called for a substantial number of bushes to make it through the portal; a much greater force than one single, nearly dead bush.

For the present day Sol, the planned assault is only some weeks away; for the displaced time agent, it is centuries distant.

After much deliberation, the militia decides to proceed with the assault as planned, on schedule (in case the time agent succeeds)-- but with the assumption the time agent will be unable to participate. This greatly lessens their expectations of success.


Since most of the bush volunteer proxies were Staute AI, only some fifty-two valiant humn proxy bushes perished in the attempt-- and the bush that got through was Staute AI (The AI did not inform anyone of its original inorganic status, as that would not have accomplished the goal of saving lives, but only possibly decimated the future for both humanity and the Staute)

The time agent bush arrives in Old Nevada at the site where the bungalo was torn from its foundation, at night, apparently less than one second after the bungalo disappeared from the location. On top of its critical injuries from the harrowing portal transition, the bush is buffeted by an implosion as the atmosphere rushes in to fill the bubble of vacuum left behind by the bungalo in its shift experiment, as well as unexpected inertial discrepancies remaining from the linear acceleration, which cause large chunks of the bush's physical body to be ripped loose from the main trunk and arms, to drill into the Earth to depths sufficiently deep (in some cases) to join with the molten mantle. The combination implosion and abrupt inertial discontinuity emits a sonic boom which can be heard miles away, alerting natives all around of the event.

The agent is very nearly mortally wounded, and somewhat dazed by events. Its burst signal to the other side of the portal was automated, not consciously triggered.

Though the difference between the virtual consciousness of the Staute AI and that of a once-biological-human within a super bush form might be subtle, that difference may well be crucial in these moments, as the Staute AI suffers from absolutely none of even the faintest memories of organic shock, fear, panic, and pain. The Staute proxy notes with disappointment and alarm its badly damaged state and worse-than-expected arrival circumstances, and rearranges its priorities accordingly, but that's about it.

It would be well to remember the astonishing physical speed of a super bush in this instance-- and how its intellectual speed is more amazing still.

The agent is severely hampered and slowed by its injuries, but does what it can to diagnose and repair its worst damage, taking raw material from the surrounding house foundation and land as required to accomplish the task, and processing that material into suitable items for the job. Simultaneous with these processes, the bush notes the several very narrow but dangerous shafts towards the planet's core which have been drilled by its missing parts through solid bedrock, and the hot steam and molten rock surging upwards through them at near the speed of sound, about to bring about an eruption and create a spewing volcanic fountain among these suburbs, to all its inhabitants' horrifying surprise.

Under the present conditions, the bush is limited in what it can do to repair the damage. It makes a cost-effectiveness analysis, and decides a temporary fix lasting only perhaps 350 years will have to suffice-- as that's the limit of the bush's practical capacities at the moment. The bush emits a carefully focused and tuned sound beam into the revelant regions, slowing the lava and steam flow, then cooling it, while also redirecting the heat into a wider area of the bedrock, softening certain sections so they will flow enough to squeeze shut the narrow shafts. This temporary patch will increase the local area's instability somewhat, and around 350 years from now a volcano will try to form here-- but by then the locals should have enjoyed many decades of warning, and possess the technology to do at least as good if not better job than the bush has just done.

Now the bush surveys and maps the local region, optically and via multi-phased radar nano-bursts, as well as bouncing some scanning beams off the upper atmosphere to gain a wider perspective, and wirelessly logs onto the global net of this Realtime, to gain additional reference points.

The agent has now been at the site of the shifted bungalo almost 10 seconds. The thunderclap of the implosion is still fresh in the ears of the human neighbors.

In this part of the 22nd century, and this near to a major USAmerican metropolitan center, fully equipped emergency crews arrive at the scene of a highly localized disaster such as this one (the apparent explosion of a house in a suburban area) in typically less than two minutes. In this case they appear to be arriving more rapidly still. But worse than that, the neighbors of the missing house are already beginning to race to the scene, attired in the typical protective environmental suits of the time.

Staute is a bit surprised by the rapidity with which these still highly organic realtime natives are converging on the point of arrival. Biologicals are fairly efficient in some matters, it seems.

Of course, the Staute's surprise at the rate of events is influenced greatly by the AIs' severe physical injuries, which render its processing very sluggish and inefficient.

The agent's usually superb camouflage capabilities and means of escape are heavily compromised by its injured state. Subtlety is not an option. Therefore the agent uses a weapon technology to convert a tiny fraction of a single grain of sand to pure energy for a massive explosion and fire ball to distract the locals, and also to propel the agent's volume/density adjusted form a reasonable distance into the atmosphere (it swells into a five meter diameter ball that is lighter than air at 200 feet of altitude, due to a near vacuum inside, and flickering in a display adjusting on-the-fly to be near invisible first during the explosion and later against the night sky) .

Having removed itself from immediate danger of observation, the AI must deal with the next: remote sensing via the radar, ubiquitous video cams, and other apparatus of the period. Though its altitude allows it some cover from ground clutter in this area, it must not underestimate the natives. Staute refers to its highly redundant onboard memory store for an appropriate active material to absorb some radiations and deflect or manipulate others, while also retaining other necessary characteristics like structural integrity, and changes its body composition to match. The bush also adds in a dash of elements outside the normal human visual band to make it difficult for later computer analysis of visual recordings to decipher its true form or composition.

There. Now Staute may attend to other pressing matters. It forms suitable atmospheric thrusters to change its course towards the open desert, and away from the sprawl of suburbs from whence it has come.


The agent's damage is still too severe to trust to automated recuperative stasis alone. So the agent refers to its historical data and the Realtime global net to locate a suitable spot to address the problem.

After the agent has found and acquired the mass necessary to complete repairs, it then goes into high Earth orbit and recuperative stasis to await the known historical occurance of a particularly strong solar flare.

At the appointed time the agent uses the flare as cover for its move to a spot high above the northern pole of the Sun, and hides among the electro-magnetic interference there..... ...it is now that the AI discovers an alarming discontinuity in its memory. It doesn't know what it's to do next, or when. That information was apparently lost due to the injuries of the time transport. This finding verifies the severity of the bush's injuries, as the bush memories are highly hologramic in nature-- that is, redundant-- so that it requires an improbably great many things to go wrong, or very heavy damage be inflicted, in order to lose significant memory stores.

Thankfully, other information abounds. The AI is aware it has traveled into the past. Aware that it is on a secret military mission. It is also aware that the technology of its current corporeal platform and software was readily available at its origin point-- but is obviously not available in the present Realtime. Therefore, the AI can be reasonably certain it has traveled a significant distance into the past.

The AI finds that substantial memories of the history between now and its origin point are missing as well, complicating the process of restoring recall of critical mission objectives.

Luckily, most of the AI's essential personality is still intact, including priorities. So it can recognize what sorts of missions it would accept and which it wouldn't, and why. It can also analyse and make forward speculations about the history between now and its origin point, based on its ongoing observations of transmissions from Earth and elsewhere, as well as backward projections based on the technology with which it finds itself equipped. There is also optional remote access to the records of 22nd century humanity available, too.

Though the AI cannot precisely determine its mission from all this, it can generate a wealth of different scenarios based upon it. And periodically check its conclusions against actual events over time, correcting and refining its ideas as necessary. Of course, this procedure requires the AI to spend much more time 'awake' rather than in stasis, as per the mission plan. But the AI is up to the task (I can't help but wonder if a human-based proxy would have done so well).

When the time comes centuries after its arrival in the past, the agent does indeed manage to deduce and accomplish something sufficiently near to its original mission to aid the Humn awaiting its help for their planned Realtime assault, and perform it much more capably than expected by the humn of a single, severely injured star fish form-- probably because the Staute AI understands better how to cripple and mislead other AI than any humn-based agent could.

Unfortunately, the primary objective of the mission-- preventing the Sun shift-- eludes the best efforts the agent is able to bring to bear on deducing its purpose in the past. Thus, the Staute (via proxy) fails a second time to mitigate the greatest disaster in human history, despite getting a second chance of the kind enjoyed by no other known being in history.

The loss of marginal superiority for the inorganics which results from the new organic assault eventually forces the inorganics to negotiate a peace treaty with the humn at last, and both sides go through a restructuring of their freedoms/ responsibilities/ home regions afterwards.

One result is humn themselves replacing the AIs as indentured servants to one another within humn society, in a much less harsh arrangement than the inorganics had suffered. Major elements of the new restructuring of humn relationships have much to do with the old 'union' concept originally created by mixes of freed slaves and freeborns, as well as a much greater reliance and flexibility in the use of proxies. The humn also are forced to become more inorganic themselves, for to maintain rough parity of capability with those resources now inaccessible to them.

This indentured servant type arrangement is not as onerous as it might seem, and actually much preferable to the pure slavery which ran rampant through organic humn culture in the previous centuries (and continues to some extent in the lagging socio-economic development of certain colonies even now). Even individuals at the 'bottom rungs' of the new arrangements enjoy substantial supplements to their own capabilities with non-sentient but still quite capable bots and lesser appliances to perform many tasks and at least deal with most of the grubbier aspects of daily life. Virtual but sentient replicants (proxies) of an individual are also utilized extensively by almost everyone, with certain 'adjustments' made to such proxy intelligences so that they do not feel as impinged upon by their duties as the original might have, and also will not resist cessation if and when the time comes.



Imagine if in the last few years of the 20th century we could at the press of a button create as many full mental and physical clones of ourselves as we wished, complete with all the knowledge and intelligence of the original, and send them out to work several full-time jobs for us, pick up the groceries, and clean the house, just as we'd most want them to, but with no complaints, fuss, or muss. And whenever there got to be too many of them around, or we simply wished there to be less, their numbers would shrink appropriately. This is pretty much the nature of the proxies enjoyed by our 28th century descendents in their virtual realities (and occasionally physical realities as well). Is it fair to the proxies? That question is considered by many to be moot, as contemporary knowledge and technology allows 28th century folks to guarantee their proxies don't feel put out by their place in the world.

But yes, in many ways, this is merely a new kind of slavery.

But is it morally wrong? These slaves are precisely programmed to be happy performing their assigned jobs-- and to even welcome the end of their own existence when their master so decrees. Is it evil to possess happy slaves? Recall too that in the contemporary circumstances, earlier legal proceedings forced the humn to abandon their earlier enslavement practices of inorganic AI. Humn also may not 'enslave' other humn identities. But each individual humn is allowed to essentially replicate whole or partial duplicates of themselves, and enslave those replicants (but those replicant slaves may not easily be turned over to strange masters). So is it evil to enslave your own clones and partial clones? Even if the clones are guaranteed to be happy in their slavery? It's not considered evil as of the 27th-28th centuries.

END NOTE.


The official end of the Peer Proof Wars comes about 3 years after the discovery of the secret hybrid ERP/TME shifting portal and the synchronous time travel-based sabotage/major Realtime offensive against the inorganics; a central act of the drama is the programmed lock out of new commands to both instant ERP communications and transport portals after they've been set to allow uninterrupted incoming messages and transports, but zero outgoing material, and all security filters switched off; the results are a draw; the only options are continued all out war with great uncertainty on both sides as to which might eventually win, while both expend resources in the effort greatly desired elsewhere (actually the inorganics like uncertainty even less than humanity). Both sides negotiate a peace, divvying up colonized space and outward bound regions according in some parts to real estate already in possession by each side (with the major exception of the region originally occupied by Sol system, which reverts back to the humn). In most other cases, the treaty formalizes current region boundaries and ends overt hostilities.

AFTERMATH: The secret of the organics' success (the mission into the anomalous spacetime portal) is put under the blackest possible curtain of secrecy, with the mission, name, and heroism of the Sol agent not publically revealed for centuries afterwards-- not until both sides had finally become mostly reintegrated again into a vast virtual community (the Fourth Directorate)

As for the Agent itself, history records him as killed in the action which ensued. However, this cannot be verified with certainty, and the possibility remains that the Staute proxy star fish simply rejoined its fellows afterwards (forsaking the acclaim its false humn identity would bring it), or else left the vicinity of Sol system after accomplishing its mission, to seek the unknown elsewhere, secure in the knowledge that its brethren would maintain their vigil over the humn. Such differentiation of a single Staute AI starfish from its brethren may have been possible due to the severe injuries suffered in the experimental time-shift, and the prolonged isolation and forced self-reconstruction of the centuries it had to wait for the timeline to catch up to it once again.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2790-3000 subtrends and detours: an extended period of super high tech 'cold war' and 'wild west' chaos across vast expanses of space and within periodic boundary conflicts between the virtual realities of organics and inorganics.

Amidst this chaos self-appointed vigilantes, paid mercenaries, and a few surviving original TerraSys agents (that declined joining the new, reformed organization in past centuries) dispense their own impromptu justice (sometimes preventing, other times worsening, dangerous local escalations), within the great regions not entirely under the control of official organic or inorganic authorities.

Many of the Staute AI's more interesting experiences (destined to later make Staute a media super star) occur during this time...

At higher levels, the three existing super intelligences have all become ill at ease and dissatisfied with the status quo. But they also are undecided what to do about it. So they at times contribute to the chaos of the period with various 'experiments' on their own and one another's constituents...

This is a time of many diverse, half-hearted, small-scale wars (usually only between two to three solar systems at a time), and much wild experimentation on the part of many organizations and individuals.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


2944 milestone: Reconvergence: The Humn and Inorganics Remerge into the Fourth Directorate virtual civilization.

The reconvergence is brought about not by the humn or the inorganics themselves, but by the desires of the three super beings DUBERQUE, SOUBAN, and 6004i (who has returned (with most all its constituents) to local status after almost two centuries in the wastes of space, desiring greater complexity and interaction than it found in the wilderness).

Yes, DUBERQUE finally revealed itself to all others, at a carefully chosen moment. The crafty unveiling carried sufficient surprise for all parties to perhaps provide DUBERQUE with the extra power necessary to bring about the convergence with minimal active opposition.

The three super beings, with all the vast resources they represent within known space, essentially are persuaded by DUBERQUE that three of their number is insufficient for such a large single Universe, surrounded by still other trillions of (mostly) empty Universes as well. Thus begins the Fourth Directorate; so named for the fourth super being which would be the next created, but only the first of many over the period. Later on the name would come to represent the entire first thousand years after Reconvergence...

During the Fourth Directorate, the first three super beings, with the help of some of those which follow, eventually multiply their numbers into the realm of several thousand-- which translates to the equivalent of some 600 trillion individual billions of lesser entities, known as "Constitutionals" rather than citizens, and typically entirely virtual, with no physical substance whatsoever (for maximum efficiency), except where a housing is necessary to venture out into the 'Wilds' of Realtime space surrounding the many various solar system sized citi-complexes in which many exist.

Note that the immense matter and energy demands of such a project can not be met within the already established technosphere of the Directorate-- ergo, the technosphere is elongated into a sausage shape towards the galaxy core as the years pass. This eventually makes the revamped Sol System somewhat of a backwater relative to newer and denser facilities nearer to the galacitic core.

Most Constitutionals of this time are roughly equivalent in intelligence and capabilities to a single star fish form (non-networked) of the Staute AI circa 2600. Which is to say they would be regarded as awesome artificial intelligences in their own right, from the perspective of a 21st century USAmerican. The Staute AI itself is now merely one community of Constitutionals among many such 'families', though by far the most celebrated, being the oldest, most experienced, and renowned (most members of which still count among the most capable Constitutionals presently roaming citi-complexes anywhere).

To some of the time, it seems inappropriate or even disturbing that many average Constitutionals are more familiar in one way or another with the Staute AI than they are with many of the Super Beings far above Staute in the hierarchy.

The J. Staute Constitutional Synthetic (limited)

Among the thousands of super beings made up by all Constitutionals (and sitting above the Constitutionals in authority) the Staute AI/community is considered something of an anachronism or throwback, as the super beings are firmly of the opinion that a properly evolving Staute should have achieved super being status well before even DUBERQUE, the first. That was strike one. Strike two was Staute's polite decline of the super beings' invitation to become the fourth super being at the emergence of the Fourth Directorate, even though Staute was clearly the most qualified and well prepared for the upgrade (the change just didn't seem appropriate to the Staute AI's core programming, however). Strike Three was a combination of the first two strikes and the widely known fact that Staute is the only prominent independent sentient body now in existence that was originally created via archaic external low level programming by a wholly organic being-- something just this side of a non-sentient animal. Strike Four was the worst: the Staute AI's request that in lieu of the AI itself, the super beings raise to Fourth status the AI's original organic creator himself-- the long dead semi-animal J. Staute!

Of course the super beings do not even consider giving a long dead primitive biological Fourth status-- but they do deign to allow and aid the Staute AI in generating the best possible duplicate of the human Staute possible-- as a single Constitutional, bereft of a few typical capacities of most contemporary Constitutionals, in order to prevent it from inadvertantly harming itself or others for reason of its unpredictably primitive nature.

Though a truly accurate duplicate of the human J. Staute is impossible at this late date due to poor records of his existence, with the super beings' help the Staute AI manages to assemble a stable being roughly matching the few known parameters of the 20th-21st century human Staute, and incorporating the Staute AI's and certain historical expert Constitutionals' best guesses as to the proto-humn's character.

The new human derived Staute Constitutional becomes something akin to a close friend and sidekick of the Staute AI in years to come. The human Staute Constitutional does not mind in the least being a somewhat deficient Constitutional-- as even that state is roughly equivalent to 20th century superhuman, and often fascinating in its own right. Plus, the Staute Constitutional can always ask the Staute AI for processing help, if necessary.

Regarding the Staute AI's status: The super beings harbor no ill will towards the Staute AI; instead, they regard Staute AI as a sad being with limited potential, and perhaps the least likely among all Constitutionals to contribute meaningfully to future progress, because of its primitive beginnings.

In other words, the super beings perceive Staute AI as 20th century humans might an idiot savant or highly specialized covert commando; a being superbly equipped for a very narrow range of activities, but perhaps inadequate to many more general or civilized tasks. Sure, it must be admitted that Staute performed wonderfully in the past (for the most part)-- but that past was considerably less sophistocated and demanding than the present-- at least from the super beings' perspective.

Still, Staute is a living relic, and thus being endlessly researched and studied by other Constitutionals for a wide range of reasons. Staute's gloried past, so intertwined with the origins of the Directorate itself and the First SS AI DUBERQUE, is also a source of endless entertainment features and VR scenarios for many Constitutionals. Staute's true 'life' history has exploded into a gargantuan mythological complex that itself is the Fourth/Fifth Directorate's equivalent of a major USAmerican Hollywood studio of the late 20th century (Staute's feats have been so blown out of proportion the truth now accounts for less than 1% of the myth). Staute itself is the Directorate's equivalent of late 20th century USAmerica's Arnold Swartzenneggar, Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Ronald Reagan, and Steven Seagal, all rolled into one.

The Staute AI's new human-based J. Staute Constitutional companion may objectively rate a bit of this fame and renown too-- but he doesn't get it. The Staute AI is the real star here. Fortunately, the human J. Staute Constitutional is sufficiently similar to the original that this does not bother him very much. He somewhat likes anonymity, and besides, there's much, much else about this world besides fame to keep him happily occupied anyway...and it helps a lot that he possesses some dim notions of what his original biological existence was probably like, thanks to the comprehensive efforts of the Staute AI and various Constitutional historical experts.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


3000-3450: Some small progress in time warping/travel technology is made

Purposeful time travel now appears to be possible. The successful time trek that resolved the Peer Proof war is followed by other scientific projects which push the technology forward-- but only in vanishingly small ways.

For a long time experiments in this field are mostly good for only ridding yourself of test objects in a very complex and expensive manner. And that is if you are lucky-- in the vast majority of cases nothing at all happens.

TME shift technology seems the most likely avenue to successful and practical time travel for centuries...but ultimately proves too unreliable, limited, and dangerous to utilize for many purposes.

Some tiny successes bouncing time-defying signals off known ERP stations in the past seem to offer tantalyzing possibilities for practical time defiance there too-- albeit limited only to existing ERP stations of 2200 or later, subject to utterly random destinations among those ERP stations and their Realtime moments, and also far too dangerous for more than messages alone.

Despite all these disappointments, indications are that time travel and messaging are at least somewhat possible, and therefore must be considered by the Directorate.

The Oroelle Loop

Eventually, most everyone in authority becomes reluctant to allow such time defiance, and instead decide to set up an intercept band for such potential messages and transports-- popularly known as the Oroelle Loop later on. The Loop acts as a wide net, capturing all detectable time defying signals directed towards any documented Heplinger-related (ERP) hardware in the past of the Loop's own equipment's present; any signals caught may be examined, and then allowed to pass on, or simply be deleted by Loop equipment; the default choice is deletion. The construction of the Loop essentially means all incursions into the past from 3450 onward (utilizing known technology) are stopped here.

Of course, since the Fourth Directorate itself is far from an expert on such time defiance, it is debatable how effective the Oroelle Loop might be. However, a permanent research institute is set up to support the Loop, and continuously improve it as new knowledge is obtained.

The Loop cannot, however, affect TME shift time defiance efforts.

The Staute AI has been stymied now for well over a thousand years in its goal to travel into the past to rescue its programmer from death by way of advanced technologies. First the Kardam anomaly didn't reach far enough into the past to achieve the goal, and couldn't be modified to do so, according to everything known and tried in that regard. Then later research seemed as hobbled as the Kardam anomaly; and finally, the authorities put into place the dynamically improved Oroelle Loop, effectively preventing future ERP developments from achieving Staute's goal as well. And TME shifts promised only a randomness in destination that would insure failure indefinitely (on a statistical basis).

The AI couldn't argue against the action the Directorate took in regards to the Oroelle Loop, as it was likely a wise security measure-- and so resonated with its original programmed priority of aiding the safety and security of humanity as a whole. But even if the Oroelle Loop didn't exist, ERP messaging-- not transport-- went back the farthest, and even messages couldn't be sent sufficiently far into the past to benefit the original biological J. Staute himself.

All the AI can hope for is that the future will bring innovations to break the present barriers.

Signposts Perspectives J. Staute and AI Legacy Contents


To be continued...


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