Self-discovery

Chapter 7

Naturally, I had hoped, for my spirits, that the work would be livelier. How could I not dream, when the mastermind of cybernetics, Walter Ross Ashby, doctor of neurophysiology, kept coming up with ideas, each more entrancing than the next! Random processes as the source of the development and ruin of any system, strengthening the thinking capabilities of humans and machines by distinguishing the valuable thoughts from the nonsense in random expression…. and finally, noise as the raw material for extracting information — yes, yes, the “white noise,” that troublemaker on which I lost more than one year and more than one idea trying to drive it out of circuitry!

In general, if you think about it, the founder of this tendency has to be considered not Dr. Ashby, but the now — forgotten director of the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow, who (in order to create ominous rumblings in the crowd scenes of Boris Godunov) first ordered each extra to repeat his home address and phone number. But Ashby has posited solving the reverse problem. We take noise — the surf, the hiss of coal dust in a mike, anything — and plug it into a machine. From the noise chaos we extract the largest “splashes.” This gives us a pattern of impulses. And impulse patterns are binary numbers. And binary figures can be changed into decimal ones. And decimals are numbers: for example, the numbers assigned to words in a dictionary for machine translation. And a collection of words is a sentence. Of course, for now, the sentences are varied: false, real, abracadabra — informational raw material. But the next cascade will have two streams of information — the kind that is intelligible to people, and this raw material. Then operations of comparison, coincidence, and noncoincidence — and everything nonsensical is filtered out, as is the banal. Then original new thoughts, discoveries and inventions, the works of unborn poets and writers, philosophical thoughts from the future appear! A thinking computer!

Of course, the respected doctor did not explain how to perform this miracle. His idea is embodied only in squares connected by arrows on a piece of paper. In general, the question of how to do it is not highly esteemed in academic circles. “If you remove yourself from the difficulties of technical realization, then in principle you will be able to imagine….” But how can I remove myself from it?

Well, enough whining! That’s why I’m an experimenter, in order to test ideas. That’s why I have a lab. The walls give off the smell of fresh oil paint. The air conditioner hums. New instruments shine on the equipment shelves. Vessels and jars with reagents sparkle in the cupboards, and colorful piles of wires and soldering irons, their points still red and uncovered with scale, wait for me. Apparatus, neatly wrapped in plastic, sit on the counters — and their pointers aren’t bent yet and their scales aren’t dusty yet. Dictionaries, textbooks, reference books, and monographs are arranged on the bookshelves. And in the middle of the room, glistening in the January sun, stands the TsVM — 12, the automatic digital printer, with lacy, multicolored wires in the crystal unit. Everything is new, unsullied, unscratched, and everything exudes the wise, rational beauty developed by generations of craftsmen and engineers.

How could I not dream? And what if I succeeded? Actually, for myself, my dreams were much more modest: not of a supercomputer that would be smarter than man (in general, I’m not crazy about that idea, even though lama systems technologist), but of a computer that would understand man, the better to do its work. Then that idea seemed possible to me. Indeed, if a computer can exhibit definite behavior based on everything that I tell and show it, and so on, then the problem is solved. That means that it has begun seeing, hearing, and smelling through its sensors in the purely human sense of these words, without quotation marks or explanations. And then its behavior could be adapted for any work or problem — that’s why it’s a universal computer.

Yes, then in January, it all seemed possible and simple; the sea was only knee — high. Oh, the inspirational quality of new equipment! The fantastic green loops on the screen, the confident hum of the transformers, the crackling of the relays, the blinking of the lights on the panel, the precise movements of the arrows and pointers…. It feels as though you’re going to measure everything, conquer it all, do it all, and even an ordinary microscope inspires the confidence that right now (with a magnification of four hundred and double polarized light) you will see something that no one else has ever seen!

Why even talk about it? What researcher hasn’t dreamed at the outset of a project, didn’t imagine handling the hardest tasks? What researcher hasn’t experienced that overwhelming impatience when you’re rushing — hurry! hurry! — to finish the boring preparatory work — hurry! hurry! — plot the course of the experiment, and get on with it?

And then. and then the everyday lab worries, the everyday mistakes, the everyday failures break your dream’s spirit. And then you’re ready to settle for anything, just so that the whole thing wasn’t a waste.

That’s what happened to me.

Writing about failure is like reliving it. So I’ll be brief. The plan was like this: we would plug the 38,000 — cell crystal unit into the TsVM — 12, and everything else would go into the crystal unit’s input: the mikes, the smell, moisture and temperature sensors, the tesometric feelers, the photomatrices with a focusing probe, and Monomakh’s Crown, to compute the brain’s biowaves. The source of external information was me, that is, something moving, noisy, changing shape and its coordinates in space, having temperature and nervous potential. You could hear me, see me, feel me, take my temperature and blood pressure, analyze my breath, even climb into my soul and thoughts — go right ahead! The signals from the sensors would have to feed the crystal unit, stimulating various cells in it; the crystal unit would form and “pack” the signals into logical combinations for the TsVM — 12; the computer would deal with them as though they were usual problems, and produce something meaningful. In order to make it easier for the computer, I programmed all the number — words from A to Z in the computer translation dictionary into its memory bank.

And. nothing. The selsyn motors, whining gently, moved the feeler and lenses when I moved around the room. The control oscilloscopes showed a daisy chain of impulses, which jumped from the crystal unit to the computer. The current flowed. The lights blinked. But during the first month the digital printer didn’t stir once to make a single mark on the punched tape.

I punctured the crystal unit with all the sensors. I read poems. I sang. I gestured. I ran and I jumped in front of the lenses. I stripped and dressed. I let the feelers touch me (brr! those cold feelers!). I put on Monomakh’s Crown and — O God! — tried to influence it. I was ready for any magic formula.

But the TsVM — 12 could not put out abracadabra; it wasn’t made that way. If the problem has a solution, it solves it; if it doesn’t, it stops. Judging by the panel lights, something was going on, but every five or six minutes the “stop” signal went on, and I had to press the reset button. And it would begin all over again.

Finally, I started thinking about it. The computer had to be performing arithmetical and logical operations with the impulses from the crystal unit. Otherwise, what else could it be doing? That meant that even after these operations the information was still so raw and contradictory that the computer could not bring the logical ends together. So it would stop! That meant that one cycle in the computer wasn’t enough. That meant — and here, as usual in these cases, I was embarrassed for not having thought of it sooner — that meant that I had to arrange for feedback between the computer (from the units where the impulses still were) and the crystal unit! Then the raw material would be inputted into the clever cube, transformed there one more time, and then fed into the computer, and so on, until perfect clarity reigned.

I perked up. Now we were cooking! I can condense the story about how 150 logic cells and dozens of matrices burned out because the TsVM and crystal unit were out of sync (smoke, acrid smells, transistors flaming like bullets in an oven, and me — instead of cutting off the voltage on the panel, I ran for the fire extinguisher on the wall!), and how I got new cells, soldered the transition circuits, and coordinated the cycles of all the units — just the usual difficulties of technical realization. But the important thing was I got the project off the ground.

On February 151 finally heard the long — awaited clatter: the machine printed out a string of numbers on the punched tape. Before deciphering it, I circled the table on which the piece of tape lay, smoked and smiled vaguely. The computer had begun behaving. There it was, the computer’s first sentence: “Memory 107 bits.”

It wasn’t what I was expecting. That’s why I didn’t realize right away that the computer “wanted” (I can’t write a word like that without quotes) to increase its memory bank.

Actually, it was all very logical. It was receiving complex information that had to be stored somewhere, but the banks were already filled. Increase the memory banks! A commonplace task in building computers.

If it weren’t for Alter Abramovich’s respect for me, the computer’s request would have gone unheeded. But he gave me three cubes of magnetic memory and two of ferroelectric memory. And everything proceeded smoothly: a few days later the TsVM — 12 repeated its demand, and then again and again…. The computer developed serious demands.

What was I feeling then? Satisfaction. Finally something was happening! I tried the results out on my dissertation — to — be. I was a little put off by the fact that the computer was working only for itself.

Then the computer began building itself! Actually, that was logical too; complex information had to be processed by units more complex than the standard ones of the TsVM — 12.

My work load increased. The printer printed out codes and numbers of logic cells, and announced where and how they should be added. At first the computer was satisfied with standard cells. I mounted them on auxiliary panels.

(I’m only beginning to realize it now, but that was precisely the moment, if you look at it academically, that I made a grave methodological error in my work. I should have stopped and figured out just what circuits and logic my complex was building for itself: the sensors, crystal unit and TsVM — 12 with an increased memory. And then, only when I had it figured out, move on. And when you think about it, a computer building itself without being programmed to do so — what a terrific dissertation topic! If I had done it right, I could have gotten a doctorate right there.

But curiosity took over. The complex was obviously straining to develop. But why? To understand man? It didn’t look like it. The computer seemed quite satisfied that I understood it and diligently carried out my commands. People make machines for their own aims. But what kind of aims could a machine have? Or maybe it wasn’t an aim, but a kind of innate accumulation instinct, which is found in all systems of a certain complexity, be they earthworms or electrical machines? And what limits would the complex reach?

It was then that I let loose the reins — and I still don’t know whether that was good or bad….)

In mid — March the computer, which had evidently learned from Monomakh’s Crown about the latest developments in electronics, began asking for cryosars and cryotrons, runnel transistors, film circuits, micromatrices…. I had no time for analysis; I was rushing all over the institute and the whole city, wheeling and dealing, lying and cajoling, trying to get my hands on all this chic stuff.

And it was all for nothing. A month later the computer “got bored” with electronics and “took up” chemistry.

Actually, this shouldn’t have been unexpected either: the computer had chosen the best way to build itself. After all, chemistry is nature’s way. Nature had neither soldering irons nor cranes, nor welders, nor motors, not even shovels — it merely combined chemicals, heated and cooled them, lit them, boiled them… and that’s how every living thing on earth came about.

That was the point, that everything the computer did was consecutive and logical! Even its desires for me to put on Monomakh’s Crown — and that was the most frequent request — were transparent.

Rather than process raw information from photo, sound, smell, and other sensors, it was much easier to use information already processed by me. In science, many do that.

But, my God, what reagents the computer demanded: from distilled water to sodium trimethyldyphtorparaamintetrachlorphenylsulfate and from DNA and RNA to a specific brand of gasoline! And the convoluted technological circuits I had to get!

The lab was changing into a medieval alchemist’s den before my very eyes; it was filled with bottles, two — necked flasks, autoclaves, and stills. I connected them with hoses, glass tubing, and wires. My supply of reagents and glass was depleted in a week and I had to requisition more and more.

The noble, soothing electrical smells, rosin and heated insulation, were replaced with the swampy miasmas of acids, ammonia, vinegar, and God knows what else. I wandered lost in these chemical jungles. The stills and hoses bubbled, gurgled, and sighed. The mixtures in the flasks and bottles fermented and changed color; they precipitated, dissolved, and regenerated metallic pulsating clumps and pieces of shimmering gray threads. I poured and sprinkled according to the computer’s directions and understood nothing.

Then, the computer suddenly asked for four more automatic printers. I was happy: so the computer was interested in something other than chemistry! I worked at it, got the stuff, connected it… and off it went!

(Probably, this was the point at which I created Ashby’s “power information retrieval” or something like it. Who knows! That was when I became hopelessly confused.)

Now the lab sounded like a typing pool. The machines were printing out numbers. Paper ribbon with columns of numbers poured out of the machines like manna from heaven. I rolled up the tapes, picked out the words separated by spaces, translated them, and made sentences.

The “true” phrases were very strange and enigmatic. For example: “…. twenty — six kopeks, like from Berdichev.” That was one of the first. Was that a fact, a thought? Or a hint? How about this: “An onion like a steel wound….” It resembles Mayakovsky’s “A street like an open wound.” But what does it mean? Is it a pathetic imitation? Or maybe a poetic discovery that contemporary poets haven’t reached yet?

I deciphered another tape: “The tenderness of souls, taken in Taylor’s series expansion, in the limits of zero to infinity comes down to a biharmonic function.” Well put, no?

And all of it was like that: either nonsensical excerpts or something “schizophrenic.” I was going to take some of the tapes to the mathlinguists — maybe they could figure it out — but I changed my mind, fearing a scandal. Meaningful information came only from the first printer: “Add such and such reagent to flasks 1,3, and 7. Lower the voltage by five volts in electrodes 34 — 123.” And so on. The computer remembered “to feed itself,” and therefore it hadn’t “gone mad.” What was going on?

The most painful part was knowing that there was nothing I could do. I had had inexplicable things happen in other experiments, but in those, at least, I could always backtrack and repeat the experiment. If the bad effect disappeared, all the better; if not, we could analyze it. But here, there was nothing that could be replayed, nothing that could be turned back. I even dreamed of wavy, snakelike tapes in scaly numeral skins, and tried to figure out what the computer was trying to say.

I didn’t even know where to hide the rolls of tape. In our institute we use the tape two ways: the ones with answers to new questions are turned in to the archives, and the rest are taken home to be used as toilet paper — very practical. I had enough rolls for every bathroom in Academic Town.

And when one fine day in April (after a sleepless night in the lab fulfilling every caprice of the computer: pouring, sprinkling, regulating) printer Number 3 gave me the following sentence: “A streptocidal striptease with trembling streptoccoci….” I knew that there was no point in continuing.

I took all the rolls out onto the lawn, ruffled them up (I might have been muttering: “Streptocide, huh? Berdichev? Tenderness of the soul? Onions?… I don’t remember) and set fire to them. I sat by the bonfire, keeping warm, had a cigarette and understood that the experiment was a failure. And not because nothing had happened, but because I had gotten a mess. Once for a lark Valery Ivanov and I welded from all the materials we had on hand a “metallosemiconducting potpourri” in a vacuum oven. We got a breathtakingly colored ingot; we broke it down for analysis. Each crumb of the ingot showed all the effects of solid body — from tunnel to transistor — and they were all unsteady, unstable, and unreproducible. We threw the potpourri in the garbage.

And this was the same thing. The point of scientific solutions is to find what is necessary in the mass of qualities and of effects in an element, in matter, or in a system, and to throw out the chaff. And it hadn’t worked here. The computer had not learned to understand my information. I headed to the lab to turn off the current.

And in the hallway my eye fell on a tank — a beautiful vessel made of transparent teflon, 2 x 1.5 x 1.2 meters; I had acquired it back in December with the idea of using the teflon for other things, but I hadn’t needed it. And the tank gave me a final and completely mad idea. I put all the printers in the hall and put the tank in their place. I brought all the wires from the computer, the ends of the piping, tubing, and hoses, poured out the remains of the reagents, covered the smelly mess with water and turned to the computer with the following speech:

“Enough numbers! You can not express the world in binary numbers, understand? And even if it were possible, what point is there to it? Try it another way: in images, in something tangible, damn you!”

I locked the lab and left with a firm determination to get some rest. I hadn’t been able to sleep for the entire past week.

Those were a pleasant ten days — calm and soothing. I slept late, charged my batteries, took showers. Lena and I took the motorcycle outside town, went to the movies, took long walks, kissed. “Well, how are our solid — state circuits doing?” she would ask. “They haven’t gone soft yet?” I would answer in kind and change the subject. “I have nothing to do with any circuits, or computers, or experiments!” I would remind myself. “I don’t want to be hauled away from the lab one day in a very cheery mood wearing a jacket with inordinately long sleeves.”

But something was bothering me. I had run off, abandoned the project. What was going on in there? And what had happened? (I was already thinking of the experiment in the past tense.) It looked as though, through random information, I had started some kind of synthesis in the complex. But what kind of crummy synthesis was it? Synthesis of what?