Titan

Titan Alpha

Following the dictates of its master program, Titan Alpha trundled across the frozen terrain, gathering data that would have made its human creators ecstatic with wonder and exultation.

The biology program was busily storing data from its observations into Alpha’s main memory core. The motile particles on the surface of the slushy methane-covered ice were most likely living organisms, carbon-based units that metabolized the abundant hydrocarbons in the ice and the ethane-laced streams that fed into the distant seas. They were similar to the organisms detected in the seas by earlier probes, but there were significant differences as well.

Using entirely passive observations, since active examinations were prohibited by the primary restriction, the biology program had deduced that the motile particles represented a low-temperature psychrophile form of organism. Their internal metabolism was so slow, due to the low-temperature environment, that compared to Earth-normal biology they could hardly be considered to be alive. Yet they were demonstrably ingesting nutrients from the hydrocarbons in the ice in which they lived. Their internal temperatures were noticeably higher than their external environment, and they gave off heat and waste matter—mostly gaseous methane that quickly froze onto the ground.

The very slowness of their metabolism was of significance, the biology program deduced. It could follow the organisms’ internal metabolic paths in exquisite detail, if only the primary restriction could be lifted. Where terrestrial organisms’ basic metabolic reactions took place in hundreds of nanoseconds or less, these psychrophiles’ reactions took tens of millions of nanoseconds to run to completion. A living slow-motion laboratory for the study of biology.

Yet this promising avenue of study could not be pursued. The master program’s primary restriction prohibited it. If the same conflict had existed among two human researchers, furious arguments and even violent struggle might have ensued. For Alpha’s conflicting computer programs, however, there was no dispute, no quarrel. The program could not even feel regret that such a rich opportunity was being passed up.

Indeed, the master program was examining another problem that it considered more important. The memory core was reaching its saturation point. Data was accumulating but not being uplinked. The master program realized that once saturation had been reached, it must shut down all systems and enter hibernation mode until new commands were downlinked.

The master program reviewed its options.

It could uplink the stored data. But that was prohibited by the primary restriction.

It could enter hibernation mode until new commands were downlinked. But the downlink antennas had been disabled to prevent any contradictions that would impinge on the primary restriction.

It could erase all the accumulated data and continue to gather fresh data.

Of the three options, only the third did not result in violating the primary restriction.