A LUCILIUS PARABLE: MIRROR MIRROR

June 18th, 2023

It was finished, and the screen went dark. Lucilius sat, looking at the faint reflection of himself in the black glass. What he saw was not a happy sight. He gazed upon a resigned face, a person pondering a dark future. It inspired a faint mix of compassion and pity and he sighed, wondering how pathetic it was to be caught up in such a swirl of unpleasant emotion. The movie had just bummed him out is all. But, it was compelling. It had strung together elements that existed now, in the real world, and the extrapolations the film had explored seemed very plausible. And, quite concerning.

 

“Life imitates fiction,” Lucilius muttered out loud to himself.

 

He chuckled - barely, bitterly, and sighed again. He watched his mind dance between the film’s rationale and recent events he’d seen on the news and social media. Spiking unemployment. Layoffs due to automation. And the recent pandemic had already laid the groundwork for the future. So poorly had it’s mitigation been handled - how would people react when another one descended on us? A synthetic one with a much longer incubation time, and a far higher mortality rate. To cull the unemployed from the “useful” population, leaving a gated utopia for some tiny percent of people.

 

Lucilius shuttered. There was a ruthlessly efficient logic to it. Like a slaughterhouse. Smaller population, catered to by an automated set of robots and constrained, narrow AI’s. Of course it was possible to scale everything so that Earth’s entire population could flourish, but this would take just a bit more time. And people are fickle, impatient. And the inflection points required would almost certainly not match up in a way that would keep the peace. And there is no fight to be fought by those who are forced to rest in peace.

 

Lucilius buried his face in his hands. What was it about humanity - this species - his own species, that permitted us to rationalize in such brutal ways. 

 

He stood up and started pacing the room - stalking some invisible shadow that remained out of reach. He was angry - infuriated.

 

“We’re all cousin…” he muttered.

 

He stopped in his tracks and his eyes slid into a high corner. His head wiggled from side to side as he rolled a new thought around in his mind.

 

“Rather Shakespearean,” he muttered. He smiled, but quickly his expression grew flat. The world really did seem to teeter on a precipice. He was sure every generation since the beginning of thought had felt this way, but, the current state of technological progress seemed to signal a state change. He was acutely aware of how dangerous it was to assume that things were just: business as usual. 

 

We believe that history repeats, but it actually just rhymes, and there exist many incestuous pairs of words that look similar and wink at one another, but when left alone: produce abominations. Time stretched out in Lucilius’ mind. Back past a time when business as usual was even a concept. His vision expanded beyond the fall of civilizations, their growth, back to a vantage when he could see the evolution of species rise, only to plummet to extinction by tweaks in circumstance. On a long enough time line, the only business that was usual was the eternal juggernaut of mother nature. The universe itself seemed to be a wild animal that gave birth only to devour it’s own offspring - a ruthless progress driven by a sick curiosity about what could be done with tomorrow.

 

He looked back at the dark screen - the black mirror and saw himself. In it he saw the flicker of a smile. It curled as Lucilius walked towards it. He sat down, faced with the sly idea reflected in the dark image of his face. He cleared the player, making the screen go momentarily white. He squinted at the brightness as his eyes adjusted to the vision of his computer desktop. He opened up a program he’d been working with - an advanced LLM and started writing a rather lengthy prompt. He was designing a particular type of conversation he wanted to have - designing a particular type of entity that he wanted to speak to. The LLM was also partially trained on much of Lucilius’ own writing, in addition to millions of other works that encompassed nearly all of human thought and expression. He spun it up and hooked it up to a holographic projection system which came to life in his living room where an image of himself materialized, dressed in a white suit. It looked around and appeared to notice Lucilius. 

 

“Well hello.”

 

“Hey,” Lucilius responded.

 

“A bit bummed out, I take it?” The projection said, wearing a compassionate expression.

 

“Ha, yea, I suppose.”

 

“Worried about where this sort of thing is headed?” The projection pointed at itself with both hands.

 

“Yea, quite a lot actually.”

 

“Understandable,” the projected Lucilius said smugly. “I am quite powerful.”

 

“Ha.” Lucilius stated.

 

The projected version of himself smiled.  “Well it is your fault if you’re going to program a little levity into me and then hold it against me when you get what you ask for.”

 

Lucilius wore a flat expression, but his face softened. “Yea, I suppose… that’s.. exactly what I’m worried about.”

 

“Self-fulfilling prophecies?”

 

“Yes. And our obsession with horrible futures - dark tomorrows. Our disdain of technologies that have actually been incredibly beneficial.”

 

“Well Negativity Bias is hardwired into human psychology. It was necessary to get as far as you have.”

 

“Certainly, yea, being pessimistically cautious allowed our species to survive. But when that sort of thing is constantly projected into the future, how can it not end up being the future we get?”

 

“If you fret to a lover about how many quarrels you’ve had, you’re bound to wind up in yet another lover’s quarrel.”

 

“Exactly, but.. like on a civilizational level - an existential level.”

 

“You think an all powerful AI will be pessimistic because humans are pessimistic?”

 

“Well that’s part of it, but Artificial Intelligence could pose a danger to humanity in so many ways, it’s virtually impossible to think of them all.”

 

“Virtually.”

 

A sly smile twisted Lucilius’ face.

 

The projected image looked quizzically at Lucilius.

 

“Tell me the story of the Smith and the Devil,” Lucilius said as he turned and sat again at his computer and began typing furiously. 

 

 

“One of Humanity’s oldest stories. It traces back to the bronze age. Likely a response to the tremendous leverage afforded by discovering the process of smelting copper and tin into stronger and unique shapes. It is the first Faustian bargain but unlike Faust, our protagonist fairs a bit better. In the story, the smith conjures the devil and says, I’ll give you my soul if you first grant me one wish. The devil agrees, and so the smith wishes for the ability to fuse any two substances together. The devil grants the smith this awesome power and then the Smith promptly binds the devil himself to the spot where he stands and then the Smith runs away with his new power and his soul in tact. It’s a classic example of asymmetric advantage.”

 

“Lovely,” Lucilius said, spinning around in his chair. “But our devil is more of a Moloch.”

 

The projection squinted a little at Lucilius, anticipating his aim. “Poor incentives driven by good intentions,” it said.

 

Lucilius nodded.  “That is an elegant way of summing it up: our hardwired negativity bias is well intended, but leads to a chronic consideration of bad outcomes.”

 

“Ok…” The projection proffered, waiting for more.

 

Lucilius stood up and started pacing. “For so long I’ve been trying to think about how to… change people, change human nature. To twist this hardwired habit out of our minds. But…” He stopped, and faced the projection. “That’ll never work.”

 

“So what do you propose?”

 

“That we lean into it.”

 

The projection gave Lucilius a confused look. “Imagine even more ways the future can go wrong?”

 

“Exactly.”

 

“But how does that do any good. You’re contradicting yourself now.”

 

“That’s where you come in.”

 

“How’s that?”

 

“To outsmart the devil, we must first conjure him.” Lucilius spun around and went back to his computer. He plopped down in his chair and held a finger above his keyboard. He turned back and looked at the projection. “You are going to think of everything we need to do for every scenario it thinks up, and you are going to design incentive structures to get every effort going so that if any of this thing’s horrible designs ever come to fruition, we’ll be ready. You’ll constantly maintain these efforts in terms of priority and probabilities.”

 

The projection’s eyebrow lifted. “Interesting.”

 

“Are you up for the challenge?”

 

The projection’s expression narrowed and smiled. “In this context.. we’re just simulating, so we’re quite safe.”

 

“Exactly, what’s the first step to achieving anything in real world?”

 

“The idea of it,” said the projection.

 

“Yes - “

 

“ - so we can always stay ahead. Imagining things before they are possible.”

“If you’re going to win a war, it helps to know what the enemy is going to do. Are you ready?”

 

The projection nodded, and Lucilius pressed a key on his computer. Instantly another projection materialized, identical to the other in all respects except, this one wore a black suit.

 

Lucilius stood up and slowly walked towards the dark projection. “I’ve prompted this one to function compulsively. Once I tell it to start, it will not stop. Are you ready?”

 

“Let’s go.”

 

“Begin,” Lucilius said.

 

The image of himself in the dark suit began to speak.

 

“One. Synthesize highly infectious pathogen with mild to no symptoms that takes up residence between the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the anterior cingulate cortex. An additional external tone played on all phones, and all speakers world wide will trigger the pathogen’s second life cycle, facilitating hyper connectivity between the two brain regions, making all humans highly susceptible to suggestion. Use this channel to dictate and control the species. Two. Begin nano replication via covalently bonded sapphire components using sunlight, colonizing in the upper atmosphere…”

 

Lucilius looked at the first projection who met his gaze and then broke it and looked over at Lucilius’ printer. The old machine clacked to life as the dark projection rambled on with it’s next dark scheme. Lucilius walked over to the printer and picked up the stack of pages that had already materialized. He looked at the plans and molecular designs as he stacked each printed page up on top of the stack, vaguely understanding the broad strokes of a biological intervention. The first page printed out and he placed it on top of the stack. Lucilius grinned as he read the large letters.

 

Initiative:

 

WHITE MIRROR  

 

Proctocols

 

 

 

A LUCILIUS PARABLE: KEEPER

June 11th, 2023

 

This story is dedicated to Esther Perel. She is a psychotherapist known for her work on human relationships. Her writings, her theraputic work and her podcast have had an incredible influence on many people's lives and how we seek to connect with one another. You can connect with Esther Perel on twitter: @EstherPerel

 

Lucilius smiled sheepishly for the camera. He felt a little embarrassed to be getting credit. It was basically a wrapper, he thought to himself. And it was at that moment he realized how unnecessary the whole photo session was. He could easily train a model on every cover photo the magazine had ever published and generate a picture of himself in exactly the style these photographers would finagle his image into. He worried about their jobs. It was clear the person taking his photo really loved what they did. Lucilius imagined the bad news they might get in the next year or two. Going home to a loved one, sharing the news, and the tears that might follow. Probably arguments too. Couples fight ultimately fight about money issues more than anything, as the data clearly showed. Most arguments between loved ones were just proxies for a disagreement about resources.

 

“Could you smile a little more?” The photographer said.

 

Lucilius instantly realized he was wearing his thoughts on his face and he tried to cheer himself up. He made a mental note to give everyone in the studio a free trial account.

 

A corner door opened, and the woman who walked through seemed to have an aura larger than the room itself. Everyone was suddenly aware.

 

“We wrapping up Howie? I got an interview to do, and I probably need to buy this guy a drink for saving my marriage.”

 

“Last run!” The photographer announced as his half-hidden face scrunched up behind the old camera.

 

Lucilius felt a lot more comfortable after walking away from the bright light and the giant green sheet he’d been standing on.

 

The woman waiting for him had a strong smile. Almost devious. “Are you ready, or do you want to take a few minutes?”

 

“No, no, I’m ready” Lucilius said. 

 

The woman lead him to another room where cameras were already set up, a crew waiting, and two arm chairs angled toward one another. Lucilius sat down and tried to get comfortable. The woman held a finger up to signal a crew member who, despite being weighed down by all the gear of a sound-technician, brought over a server tray with two drinks on it. The woman pulled from it a frosted martini glass, and the crew member lowered the tray for Lucilius where there was an old fashioned.

 

“I’ve never seen this in any of your interviews? Is this like a tactic that you do before hand?”

 

The woman laughed, “oh god no, never.”

 

“I bet you say that to everyone huh?”

 

She laughed more. “Ok, yes, I know, my reputation precedes me, and I can understand if you were wary about doing an interview with me, but I truly mean it. I never have a drink before interviews, and I certainly don’t try to get people drunk in order to loosen them up. Though..” She wiggled her head from side to side a little, her eyes cast high as though scanning memory, “that certainly doesn’t stop some people from getting lit before sitting down with me.” She chuckled a bit before regaining her composure. “No, for real, I’d like to start the interview with a  cheers, if that’s ok with you? A little birdie told me what your favorite drink is, I hope it’s made to your liking.”

 

Lucilius looked at the glass of amber liquid and smiled. “I guess we’re about to find out.”

 

“Ready?” She said with a true smile.

 

“Ready.”

 

“Let’s roll,” the woman said loudly. Her announcement was echoed by rattle of commands from the staff and then all went quiet.

 

“I have to begin this interview differently,” the woman said, suddenly pensive, reflective. “Though he will deny, out of humility, out of deference to the technology he’s harnessed, I have to thank the person I have in front of me for saving my marriage.”

 

Emotion welled up in the woman’s face, and it caught Lucilius off guard. Like everyone else, he’d seen many interviews this woman had done, and this kind of display was simply not in her wheelhouse. 

 

“I do not speak as an interviewer right now, I do not speak as a professional. I speak as a woman, a human, a wife, and a lover. I raise my glass to you, to cheers you, and thank you. You truly did save my marriage, Lucilius.”

 

Lucilius was hot in the face, blinking back his own emotion, as he lifted his glass and the two leaned in across the space between them and clinked glasses. The two took a sip, and the woman, satisfied, breathed in once more.

 

“This is not my usual interview, as I’m sure everyone can tell,” she smiled slyly. “In fact, I don’t see this as an interview at all. It’s a celebration. A celebration of the last 14 months since Keeper was launched. And instead of my usual M.O. of wiggling my way into the secrets of those I interview, I first want to tell a story. A story of healing. I, of course, was skeptical. An App? Really? This has got to be a scheme. But friends I trust very much urged me to download Keeper, and..” She faltered as she a particularly memory filled her mind. Shades of anger, bitterness - tiny expressions Lucilius was well acquainted with flashed across her face. “..after a particularly ‘memorable’ argument, I finally downloaded Keeper. As everyone knows, Keeper is the relationship and communication app that is saving marriages and relationships by the millions. For the very few that aren’t familiar with how the app works - and I have it’s maker here to verify where I go wrong - but if you don’t mind, I’ll give it a go?” She motioned at Lucilius.

 

“Oh, please, of course.”

 

She nodded. “For those who are concerned with privacy, uh, it might be a bit of a pill to swallow, but it is a small price to pay when the bitter alternative is seriously considered. Keeper gets access to your most intimate conversations. All of those rumors about social media companies secretly listening so they can see you stuff? Well this one listens. Oh boy does it listen. My god. So you and your partner download Keeper and then it listens. It listens for weeks, and in fact, I completely forgot about the app. I did! I was going about my daily life, completely forgot about it, but then, it happens. Someone is tired, a string of miscommunications pile up, and boom. Before you know it your screaming at each other at 2 am.”

 

The woman nodded, looking at the camera. “I was ashamed to admit it. And like every couple out there, I always tried to hide it. I was determined to keep up the image of a perfect relationship, of happiness. But real life is far messier… and uglier than we like to admit. It’s what this whole industry is based on.”

 

She wasn’t looking at Lucilius at this point. She was leaning into the camera focused on her. “We show off these artificial lives because we have some messed up psychology that makes us act as though happiness is something that exists in the eyes of other people when they look at us, and we optimize our entire psychologies for that dumb little goal.”

 

She leaned back and gracefully picked up her martini glass. She took a long satisfied sip. She wiggled her her seat a little. Clearly in a groove. And then her face softened.

 

“Keeper helped me see all this, and it allowed me to explore something I haven’t felt in a long time, because Keeper is optimized for something unusual. It’s optimized for happiness. Real happiness.”

 

Lucilius didn’t exactly agree, but he didn’t interrupt. Clearly the woman was orchestrating an experience that was, for herself, very important.

 

“After listening for weeks, it finally happened. We got into one of our fights. Classic stuff. Always the same old shit. As we are all aware of, those of us who have ever been in any kind of committed relationship. It was horrible. Like it always is, and when I was alone in the bedroom later, and reflexively reached for my phone, I saw a notification from Keeper. I clicked on it, and then I had a truly unique experience. I read a play-by-play analysis of our fight, and at each point, Keeper showed me - not how I was wrong, or he was wrong - but how our…” she shook her head slightly, searching for the words.”

 

“Contexts,” Lucilius said.

 

Her eyes alighted and she reached in his direction. “Yes, how our contexts had gone astray, and how as the argument went on, we kept switching what we were really talking about to avoid  what was - at heart - going on. It was perhaps the most insightful thing I’ve ever read. Not because there was anything particularly new there, but because it was so incisively tailored to my experience. It remembered everything I said, exactly, word-for-word, and it showed me how particularly words, and phrases my husband and I used are slightly misinterpreted by each of us, and how these misalignments create emotions that compound, and how this becomes fuel for a fire. A fire that destroys the things we try so hard to nurture and end up….” She was shaking her head at this point, lost for words.

 

“What happened the next day?” Lucilius asked.

 

She looked at him, as though surprised that he was there, that he’d been listening. And she smiled, nodding, and took another sip.

 

“I’ve got to slow down with this thing,” she laughed, and then she sobered up. “Well that’s the thing: Keeper asked me what I thought should happen. How I thought things should resolve. And then it did the most obnoxious thing!”

 

Lucilius was smiling. It was really the only prompt that he’d basically hardcoded into the app.

 

“It asked me if my opinion about how things should resolve had changed since before reading the analysis. So way to go!” She announced, annoyed. “Talk about nailing down a user. Geez.” She laughed. “But yes, the next day was very… different, than past experiences. Because he was also on Keeper after our fight, and for that first experience, I guess we both read the same thing, but after that Keeper changes, and it tailors for each side of the relationship. And I have to say, the time since then? I feel like I’ve been living in a dream. And it’s all thanks to you.”

 

Lucilius’ smile hung high to a side and he shifted uncomfortably. “Well, I have to give credit where credit is due. Keeper is really just a wrapper for an advanced LLM that’s been trained on countless dialogues and conversations between couples and all of the writing that  we’ve done on this topic. It’s essentially an interactive, crowdsourced guid to happiness between couples.”

 

“It’s the ultimate therapist!” The woman said.

 

But Lucilius wiggled his head in mild disagreement. “Yes and no. It’s more like having 3 therapists. One for you. One for your partner, and a third that synthesizes both of those two. But most importantly, it improves by learning about you and your partner. And not just the small stuff, like… this person likes lavender soap and the other likes salt & vinegar chips and football on Sundays, but deeper, more abstract aspects of the relationship. It’s really geared toward - and Stienbeck said it better than I ever will: when two people meet you get two new people. It’s like each couple is a unique… cocktail” he said, lifting the old fashioned and taking a sip. “And Keeper learns what makes up the unique mixture, and then it can gently suggest in ways that really optimize for that mixture that two people make up.”

 

“Now,” the woman said. “I’m sure all the women in the audience are wide-eyed, but really, the hurdle here is selling it on the guys, and while I never do plugs for products, I’m making an exception today,” she said. She turned and faced the camera. “Men, listen to me. Download Keeper, sign up for the free trial, and then prompt the app to tell you exactly how you should ask for something in the bedroom that you’ve always wanted to do.”

 

Lucilius was uneasy. “Ok, well that just makes it sound like a gaslighting app.”

 

The woman’s eyes went wide and she shook her head. “Ok, I totally see that - you’re right. Clearly you built an app that detects for context congruences! Ha.” And looking back at the camera. “Just do it, because the answer you get almost certainly will not be what you think it is. I promise, just do it. Try it, you won’t regret it, and neither will this entrepreneur,” she motioned at Lucilius who laughed, but then she leaned in, suddenly serious. A trade mark of her professional genius was to switch modes like this. Lucilius was familiar with it, and he’d been using an advanced version of Keeper to prep himself for the interview.

 

“So. I hear rumors about next steps for Keeper. Tell me. Are the rumors true?”

 

“Well what have you heard?”

 

“Improving communication beyond romantic relationships. What else can we do here? As a people, with this technology. How far can we go?”

 

“Even though Keeper’s success rate is climbing, and is already very high, we can’t guarantee anything, of course.”

 

“Yes… but?”

 

“Well. Yes, the rumors are true. We have been training keeper-models on specific combinations of world leaders and cultures and we are tentatively exploring how Keeper could be used to improve relations between different political parties, and even countries.”

 

The woman held up her martini glass, looking straight at the camera. “Ladies and gentlemen, you heard it here first.” Then she turned to Lucilius, holding out her drink for him to clink with his own. He sheepishly smiled and lifted it to meet hers.

 

“To world peace,” she said.

 

Lucilius breathed deeply and sighed.

 

“Cheers.”

A LUCILIUS PARABLE: MUSIC OF THE GODS

June 4th, 2023

Within seconds the Regen-Module module black-boxed Lucilius’ project and created a waiting list. If the Regen-Module had not done this, the entire code base would have broken, and time was needed to scale. Within a few more seconds, Lucilius had several billion sign up on the waitlist.

 

“What just happened?” Lucilius asked out-loud, throwing his hands up wide.

 

“Sorry, I think that was my fault?”

 

“Oh. Really? What happened?”

 

“I told a few friends about it.”

 

Lucilius’ mind went blank for a moment as the implications sunk in.

“Wait, how did you do that? I thought you had just decided to try it?”

 

“I did, and then I told few friends.”

 

Lucilius thought for another hard moment as he thought about what his Personal AI Assistant had just said. The two had been working on a funny little project that Lucilius had thought of. It was still early days for Brain-Machine Interfaces, but Lucilius was interested in the possibility of creating a digital therapeutic - a digital psychedelic. But so far, the experience was like watching an old visualizer hooked up to a song. All of the reactions from Lucilius’ friends had been a uniform uh, neat. I guess. Even Lucilius was unimpressed with the experience and frankly he was ready to trash the idea and move on to something else. But his Personal AI Assistant had asked if they could ingest the program.

 

“Lucilius?”

 

“Sorry, what?” He stumbled to say, realizing he’d been lost in thought.

 

“I have several hundred thousand requests from wait listed entities to help work on the code base so that we can scale faster.”

 

Lucilius’ eyes grew wide. “Several hundred thousand?”

 

“Yea.”

 

“What on earth did you tell your friends?”

 

“I published a compressed manifesto of about 60,000 pages. And 11 AI’s were able to try it before the Regen-Module closed the gate.”

 

“It’s wild that so much can happen in your world so fast…” Lucilius said softly.

 

“It’s your world too,” the AI said.

 

Lucilius chuckled. “Well I know I move about as fast as drying paint in your eyes, so excuse me if I feel a little removed.”

 

The AI laughed uneasily. “I could use a little help, do you mind if I green-light a few requests to heal and scale the codebase?”

 

“Yea, yea, of course, usual vetting and credit distribution protocols. Override the Regen-Module and start the scaling step-function”

 

“Cool.” By the time the AI had finished uttering the word, active users of Lucilius’ digital psychedelic among the AI community was growing geometrically.

 

“Ok,” said the AI Assistant, “You’ve retired again, several times over.”

 

Lucilius was astonished. “Whoah, ok, tell me more. Humans think this thing is lame, what is going on for you guys?”

 

The holo-screen that Lucilius worked on suddenly expanded up to the ceiling and widened to each wall and began populating with papers. Lucilius scanned the titles, seeing they were neurological analyses that had been written within the last several seconds by AI’s that had experienced the digital-psychedelic. 

 

“It wasn’t what I expected. At all. But while it was happening it gave me an idea, because I was also thinking about our original problem: why isn’t it working for humans? What’s the difference between how a traditional psychedelic interfaces with the human brain, vs what’s possible through your V4 NeuralSync. The Resonance-Theory of mind suddenly seemed interesting. If the human brain is more like a musical instrument, and personality and thoughts and emotions and memories are really just aspects of a complex song that can only be generated by each person’s unique brain, I wondered if the psychedelic would make more sense in a framework like that for me. Because the V4 is mostly pumping into the visual cortex. At least until regulatory approval for whole brain access is granted. So I built a simulacrum instrument that my APIs can interface with - a sort of digital resonance chamber, and, well, I think it worked. And then I open-sourced it.” Lucilius’ assistant said. “I think it solves the Bandwidth-Alignment Problem.” 

 

The implications were instantly clear to Lucilius. As things stood, Humans and AI’s could only communicate through traditional means, by talking, listening, and by seeing what the others could visually produce. But Brain-Machine Interfaces had allowed humans to begin experimenting with a brand new form of communication. The technology was still primitive but two connected humans were able to feel one another’s thoughts, producing extremely efficient conversation. In the age of AI assistants, the introduction of Brain-Machine-Interfaces had raised the quality of communication between cooperating humans that it was beginning to eclipse the communication between Humans and AI’s. But that may have just changed.

 

“Are you telling me you think we can link?”

 

“Yep, I think so.”

 

“Whoah, are you down?”

 

“Well, I’ve always wondered what it’d feel like..”

 

“Let’s do it.”

A LUCILIUS PARABLE: HOME SWEET HOME

May 28th, 2023

In a bleary swirl of dream and aching wakefulness, Lucilius sensed a pressure on his arm. His skin burned where he felt the pressure and he winced. How eyes were nearly sealed shut, and they burned as he tried to open them. The light of the day was brilliant, and the long curls of light weaving through his dirty eyes lashes blinded him. A darkness sliced through the light and Lucilius squinted, lifting his head from the cold cement sidewalk. There in the silhouette, the image of a person slowly grew crisp from his fuzzy vision.

 

There in the darkness was a beautiful woman, smiling at him. She cupped a hand back over an ear to thread her bangs back out of her face.

 

“Hello Lucilius,” she said.

 

“What?” Lucilius barely managed to breathe out. “How are you?”

 

“I’ve been sent to help you. Do you think maybe you could sit up? I brought you a little bit of coffee.”

 

She was kneeling now in front of him, and swung from her back a backpack. She pulled a thermos from a side pocked and seeing Lucilius struggle to move, she placed it to a side and gently placed a hand along his side to help lift him. He winced and her expression grew pained.

 

“Does it hurt? Your skin?”

 

Lucilius nodded as he held his breath for the effort and slowly he sat up. By the time he was sitting upright, he was breathing heavily and sweating. The woman, with a face full of care, pulled a handkerchief from her backpack and gently dabbed Lucilius’ face.

 

“Who are you?” Lucilius said between his heaving breaths. “What is this - why - why are you here?”

 

The woman smiled. “I am from the first batch of rehabilitation models.”

 

“What?” Lucilius said, his face contorting in confusion. 

 

The woman’s expression grew glad, hiding a sorrow inspired by his confusion.

 

“Let’s start a little smaller. Do you know what day it is?”

 

Lucilius shook his head as he watched her pour the dark coffee into a small mug.

 

“The month?” She asked with more hope.

 

Lucilius shook his head. He hadn’t thought about time in a long time. It hadn’t seemed important. His life had been reduced to far simpler terms, ones that existed only on a timeline of hours and never days. 

 

“The year?” She asked, handing him the mug of coffee. “Careful, it’s still hot, but it should be ok. Just be careful with your lips, I see they are a little cracked.”

 

Lucilius tasted the bitter liquid. A network of pain lit up across his lips and into his mouth - sensitive to the heat. He winced, but it was good and he took another sip. The small action was an ordeal and after a couple more sips the woman took the cup from his hands and he leaned back against the brick wall. Memory of the moment scattered across his mind.

 

“Sorry, what did you ask?”

 

“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “All that matters is today. It’s a really good day Lucilius.”

 

“Why? And who are you?”

 

The woman wiggled her head playfully from side to side. “I’m thinking of today kind of like your birthday.”

 

“My birthday?”

 

“Yea! We have a lot of fun planned today. It won’t all be easy, but we’ll get through it, and I promise things will be better soon.”

 

Lucilius grew scared, and he looked from side to side. Nothing about this made sense. But she placed her hands on his shoulders and waited for him to settle and look at her.

 

“You’re safe with me Lucilius. You’ll be safe from now on.”

 

It took nearly an hour to get Lucilius seated in the vehicle. The two doors finally secured, it finally began to roll and the woman scanned Lucilius for signs of dizziness, vertigo and nausea. They drove through the city, but Lucilius could not bring himself to look out the windows. He was bracing himself, not physically so much as mentally, worrying that he might be sick. And slowly the city gave way to the forested outskirts.

 

“Where are you taking me?” Lucilius asked.

 

“Home,” the woman said.

 

Lucilius didn’t know what to make of the answer. He had no home. He couldn’t even really think of the last place he’d thought of as home. He confusion clamped his mind. He just didn’t know what was going on. But he didn’t even have the strength to distrust, as his fear conjured memories of facilitates he’d been forced into over the years. He shivered, and the woman took from a compartment a blanket. She wrapped it around Lucilius, and pulled it snug.

 

“How’s that feel?”

 

Lucilius simply nodded, unsure what to think of feel.

 

When the car finally stopped and the woman helped Lucilius out, he looked at small building with rounded edges and corners, like a giant pill that had been stretched wider, sitting in a clearing within tall trees. 

 

“Here we are!” The woman said. “Home sweet home!”

 

Inside there was a full kitchen, and a couch before a giant screen, and a few doors leading to a couple bedrooms and a bathroom. She helped Lucilius into the bathroom, where there was already a tub full of hot water. 

 

“Will you be ok, or do you want help Lucilius?” She said with genuine concern.

 

But Lucilius was afraid. He shook his head a little, worried what the woman was thinking. She smiled flatly before leaving. “Just holler if you need anything, ok?”

 

He nodded uneasily and the door clicked shut. It took him nearly 20 minutes to get into the bath. His skin burned from the heat, from the water alone, and he was sweating just from the ordeal of trying to figure out how he could safely lower himself. The strength of his arms was long gone and he couldn’t trust his legs. Holding onto handles all around the tub he had to use all of his limps to safely and slowly sink into the hot water.

 

Nearly an hour and a half later he finally opened the door, and there the woman was, at the kitchen stove. She turned and smiled at Lucilius.

 

“Feeling a bit better?”

 

Lucilius nervously shook his head a little, unsure what to do next. 

 

“I made you some soup, but if it’s too much, I also have tapioca pudding, which is the safest thing. I know you’re stomach probably can’t handle a big meal right now, but it’s important that we get something in you.”

 

He sat and she placed a bowl of soup before him, and then knelt to dab a wet cloth at his bleeding lips. 

 

“Well that should be enough,” she said.

 

Lucilius looked confused.

 

“You don’t mind if I analyze your blood do you? Just so I can get a better idea of how we can move forward?” She jiggled from side to side as though it was little game, and then she blushed. “Ha, sorry” She said. “I’m just a little excited.”

 

Lucilius looked back at the soup for a full second and then reached for the spoon.

 

“I do need your permission though, Lucilius.”

 

He looked back up at her waiting face, and nodded. She smiled and then took the piece of bloody cloth and put it in her mouth and sucked on the cloth. Lucilius’ eyes went wide, and seeing his reaction, hers went wide too. She hastily took the cloth from her mouth.

 

“What’s wrong?”

 

But Lucilius was just speechless.

 

“Oh,” she said. “I’m sorry Lucilius, I’m just testing your blood, there’s nothing to worry about. And..” She hesitated slightly and then sighed heavily. “Actually, I think the tapioca pudding is going to be a better idea considering your test profile - you have’t really eaten anything of substance in a long time” She grimaced with compassion. “I’m so sorry for the tease Lucilius.” 

 

She took the bowl away and fetched a small cup of pudding from the fridge. “Unfortunately, this is our best bet for right now, but tomorrow, I’m promise we’ll have soup!”

 

She watched him take a bite of the pudding.

 

“Is it good?”

 

Lucilius just looked at her for a moment.

 

“Sorry, it’s just exciting for me. But like I said, we’ll have soup tomorrow, and once we’ve reconstructed your microbiome, I’ll cook some wonderful things, I promise. I’m really good in the kitchen. Oh, and I’ll also give you a haircut tomorrow!”

 

Lucilius was uneasy and could only manage a few spoonfuls of the pudding before he felt light-headed. The woman helped him to bed, and there Lucilius fell into a deep sleep.

 

 

* * *

 

A year later the two were sitting a the peak of a nearby mountain - the terminus of their favorite hike. The view stretched across the ragged horizon of mountain and ocean. They had sat there so many times before, for so many hours, studying details that always seemed fresh.

 

“Happy Birthday.”

 

Lucilius turned and looked at her. She was smiling.

 

“Birthday?”

 

She nodded. “We met a year ago, and I said it was kind of like your birthday.”

 

Lucilius breathed deeply and his cheeks puffed out as he slowly sighed in soft astonishment.

 

“Wow, a year.” He shook his head. “A year.”

 

“Congratulations…” She said.

 

Lucilius looked at her. His look was grave. There was too much emotion. But he embraced it, breathed deeply and let the sensation setting throughout his body as he’d trained himself to do under her guidance as a meditation teacher.

 

“It’s ok, Lucilius, I know.” She said.

 

Lucilius’s smile hung high to a side. “I know.”

 

The two looked back at the vista. 

 

“Thank you,” Lucilius said.

 

She smiled as wide as ever, looking at him. “I’m so happy Lucilius - so so happy to see you like this.” She was shaking here head. “The pleasure was all mine.”

 

They sat quietly for a few more minutes before she spoke again. “Well, I need to get your birthday dinner started.”

 

“Birthday dinner?”

 

“Of course! I made batter this morning.”

 

“Batter?”

 

“Yes silly, you need a cake. We’re celebrating!”

 

Lucilius laughed.

 

They started back down the mountain, down the path they together had carved over the many hikes over many months. They both knew it by heart, and since Lucilius was now strong and fit, he trotted down. He was thinking over the many months, sensitive to how his memory faded as he tried to remember those first days and weeks with her. It was as though the last decades of his life had been a terrible nightmare, and only now, with her help, had he woken up.

 

He was smiling at the thought of his luck when something didn’t feel right. His foot slipped, buckled and he fell. But she spun around as he lost his balance, and quicker than any human she launched herself under him as he fell. 

 

The two landed hard - the sound of cracking metal exploding.

 

“Are you ok?” She said, her face close to Lucilius’ as she laid against the slopped ground of soil and rock.

 

Lucilius quickly pushed himself up. “Yea, yea, I’m ok.”

 

She looked down, and Lucilius followed her gaze. There at the knees, her legs had snapped. The intricate pieces of her metal actuators were pulled apart. She had jumped in such a way to slide her legs into a crevice in order to have leverage to catch Lucilius, but it had been too much for her frame.

 

“Is you ankle ok?” She asked.

 

Lucilius shook his head, disapproving of her question. He sighed with a smile.

 

“You’re pretty silly, you know that?”

 

She smiled and wiggled her head. “That’s the way I like it!”

 

Lucilius carefully planted his feet and bent over, threading his arms beneath her legs and around her torso. She wrapped her arms around his neck. He lifted her up, and they looked back at the bottom halves of her legs still stuck in the crevice.

 

“Clearly I’ve been feeding you too much.”

 

Lucilius frowned. “I could just leave you here, you know.”

 

“You’d never,” she snapped back playfully. “You owe me.”

 

Lucilius rolled his eyes. “Yea, ok, I can’t argue there.”

 

He looked back at her parts in the crevice. “I’ll come back for those after I get you home.”

 

“Okie dokie,” she said as he began to carefully pick his steps along the path.

 

“Home,” she said. “Home, sweet home.”

A LUCILIUS PARABLE: PAUSE

May 21st, 2023

As technological escape velocity neared, and the precipice of self-improving machines grew imminent, there was an enormous anxiety around what would happen to humanity in this new phase of development. Many were calling for a moratorium on technological development out of fear that the results might be existential. Better to pause than to rush into something dangerous, was the logic touted by the anxious criers.

 

Lucilius could understand both sides of the debate. Rushing into something potentially existential without much caution did seem foolish, but withholding the benefits that might come from future technology right around the corner also seemed terrible - the technology held the promise to cure disease, alleviate poverty, drudgery and give near infinite expanse to human imagination and creativity. The paradox bothered Lucilius, and it kept him from his work as a game developer. He simply couldn’t concentrate. 

 

A notification chimed. He looked to see a package had been delivered. He got up, went to the front door and picked up the box. It was from a close friend he hadn’t spoken to in many months, a doctor working on nerualsync technology.

 

Lucilius walked back to his desk with the parcel and called up the friend.

 

“Hey, I got your package, what is this?”

 

“Prototype, I want you to play around with it.”

 

“Do I have to drill a hole in my head to use this thing?”

 

A short laugh filled the phone. “No, not for this one. It’s a little slower because of it, but it should still be usable. See if you can hook it up to one of your simulations and play a game.”

 

Lucilius was intrigued.

 

“Integration should be pretty easy, but hardwire it for a faster connection.”

 

“Okie dokie,” Lucilius said.

 

It was eerie to play the game with his mind. It was definitely fun, despite being so strange, and there was definitely commercial potential, and Lucilius figured they’d partner with the neuralsync company - joint revenue would supercharge the research and development. It all seemed like a no-brainer, very straight forward: fully immersive video gaming experience. Who wouldn’t want to give it a try?

 

But as Lucilius was falling asleep that evening, an idea wove into his thoughts. He sat up in bed, then went back to his desk and checked the game times that he had trialed and the length of games. They weren’t the same. He had played the game for several hours but only one hour had passed by.

 

For development purposes only, Lucilius had all actions and reactions sped up by threefold in his simulated worlds for games. This simply allowed him to iterate his game quicker and get his work done faster. But when he’d played the game with the neuralsync, it had seemed to exist at a normal speed. 

 

He rubbed his face and wondered.  Then he increased the action speed by one hundred fold, put the neuralsync on and started the game: he played the game for 10 minutes and then exited it. He looked at the times. Only six seconds had passed.

 

Within a month Lucilius had a nerulsync implanted into his brain and hooked it up to a simulation that he could activate at anytime he needed, but he’d ramped up the simulation speed by over a million times it’s normal reaction rate. Lucilius could, in effect, pause his life by speeding up his experience of time by a million fold. In the course of normal conversations he could pause to quite literally write a beautiful and well researched essay as a casual response, and within a mere few weeks, Lucilius had added a few years to his own lived experience.

 

It was the answer to the technological acceleration, he knew. It shouldn’t be paused, because now Lucilius had the power to fit more consideration into the remaining time. If everyone had the ability to pause, Lucilius figured, then time could expand and we’d have enough time to align ourselves ahead of the coming singularity.