The How and Why of Early Man

So many questions about our past are debated because of the lack of  written records. Before man put proverbial pen to paper, we had only bones and teeth, soil contents, paleo-geology and -geography and -climate, to intuit what might have been.

This, despite the fact that we know for a fact that written records are always from the writer’s perspective. They are only trustworthy to the point we trust the writer–like a Leakey, Donald Johansson, Chris Beard, Jane Goodall. These interpretations–albeit highly trained–of primary sources (Earth’s record) are given more credibility than the primary source itself (an action I’m sure discouraged by Leakey’s and Johnasson’s and Beard’s and Goodall’s teachers as they pursued their research). Why? The reason is simple: It takes a PhD to interpret Earth’s story.

DNA Computers and DNA Viruses

Cat’s the one who started me on DNA computers (we share a grad student office). My AI Otto is struggling with my need for speed in his computations and his need for energy to complete the work. When I ask him a question, he sorts through a datasphere the size of the digital Library of Congress (all public sources on the internet. Imagine if you searched ‘Homo erectus’ on the internet and then read and absorbed the one million hits–that’s what Otto does just to get started) to create the simulated reality required for his movies. You can see the importance of speed.

Here’s what I know about DNA computers. They weigh almost nothing, carry their own energy pack, can perform ten trillion operations at once and store an amazing amount of information–all in a drop of water with room to spare. The mechanics are deceptively simple. A high school senior won a scholarship by programming the Declaration of Independence into a DNA molecule. Here’s a link to How Stuff Works if you’d like more information.

The problem, from what Cat’s explained, is the amount of error in DNA computing. In our human genome, we call them mutations and they’re considered part of our uniqueness. The average child has around 6.3 billion base pairs of DNA with around 277 mutational differences from his/her parents. Many are noninvasive because 1) cells have built-in redundancies, 2) parts of our genetic make-up are inactive. Maybe they used to be active, but with H. sapiens sapiens, they aren’t. 3) some have nothing to do with how we get along in the world.

But, for traditional computing needs, we need more accuracy than that. The theorists believe that within highly-structured uses, they can be controlled. Taiwan has already created a chip out of DNA.

Ump–Dog of the Pleistocene

Conventional wisdom says dogs weren’t domesticated until the time of Egypt. Think Cleopatra and her cat. But, I’m convinced from the day man became smart enough to realize other animals didn’t always wish him well and survival was more than eating, sleeping and living, he has sought out a companion he could trust without doubt, who believed in him without question and followed him through good and bad.

Ump

Lyta might not have called it ‘dog’, but she found that in Ump. She met him after she became separated from her group by a massive earthquake, precipitated by an asteroid’s collision with her habitat and followed by seering fires that destroyed her homeland. Here’s how Otto showed their first meeting:

Below her lay a Canis, tail flopped to his side, pinned under a tree limb. A gash cut his heaving chest. Lyta dropped to the ground and approached with caution. Never had she been so close to this animal. Even supine, his muscles rippled as though prepared to flee. His great jaw sprouted sharp canines and massive grinding teeth. His fur stuck out from his trapped body in tufts like coarse wild grass. The one exposed eye—dark and small, like Snarling-dog (a coyote-like creature from the Pleistocene)—latched onto hers. The great pink tongue hung loose from his mouth, bobbing up and down in rhythm with his labored pant. The dirty tail gave a tired whomp.

Lyta studied the blood caked into his fur and dried over his ribcage like a big red leaf. Why was he here?  She had seen him as he fled the fires, well ahead of the panicked herds of animals.

“Why, animal?”  She asked, “What brought you back?”

As though he understood, his black lidded eye focused up and over to the side. There, a dead female lay with her pup, both crushed beneath a fallen limb. The canis refused to leave his mate, not understanding she would never again run with him through the fragrant grasslands. His loyalty benefited neither, but common sense had nothing to do with his decision.

Lyta pulled an herb from neck sack and chewed it to a pulp. “You’re going to be OK,” she soothed as she gently removed the branch from Canis’ wounded ribs and pasted a layer of mulched herbs over the wound, followed by long-fibered leaves. She worked slowly and with care, watching his face for pain or discomfort.

Homo habilis vs. Homo erectus

Homo erectus–note the width of the skull and the less-protruding snout

My passion is studying early man, specifically how we became who we are. Is our violence an aberration or part and parcel of survival? No other mammal kills their own, but maybe–as the alpha on the planet–our greatest threat to our survival is our own species, so we’re forced to destroy each other.

What was lacking in H. Habilis that led to their extinction, to be replaced by the big-brained, scrawny Homo erectus? Habilis was preyed upon by species with bigger claws, sharper teeth and thicker skin. Habilis (and my friend Lyta) scavenged their left-overs, in between hiding from the imposing mammals that dominated the Plio-Pleistocene African savanna. But, eventually hiding wasn’t enough and H. erectus took over (we don’t know if they fought with each other or if habilis left ‘with a whimper’).

H. erectus, with his longer lower limbs for running and walking efficiency, his bigger brain especially in the areas for planning and forethought (and speech depending upon whose research you’re reading) was tall, thin, and barrel-chested, hardly daunting in a world of sabertooth cats, mammoth and giant sloths. Yet , it is he who spread from Africa to China, India, the Middle East, Java. It is he–not predator cats or alligators–who developed a highly adaptable culture allowing him to survive a wide range of climates and habitats.

That is the first of their firsts. Want more?

• first appearance of systematic hunting.
• first use of fire (though arguably no control of it)
• first indication of extended childhood (thanks to the helplessness of their infants)
• first indication of the ability to lead a more complex life (their Acheulian tools were sophisticated, their hunting was planned)
• first to wear clothing (how else to survive Georgia and China)
• first to create complex tools and weapons

Palindromes

Palindromic Latin Word Square, the Sator Square

For those of you who don’t know, a ‘palindrome’ is a word or phrase that reads the same

Hebrew Palindrome

backward as forward. That’s why my AI is ‘Otto’ and why my son Sean calls me ‘Mom’. When we want to catch each other’s attention without alerting others, we write words backwards. It looks like jibberish, but it’s our code. One of several we use. I’ll share others later.

We’ve gotten so good at palindromes, we can talk backwards, write backwards, almost as

Sanskrit Palindrome

fast as forward. Thanks to palindromes, I knew Sean was in trouble last summer. He was kidnapped, but the nappers never caught on to the trail he was leaving. It worked out in the end, thanks to Zeke and Eitan and Otto. But neither of us will be the same. Seminal events rarely leave one unscathed.

Ump–Dog of the Pleistocene

Conventional wisdom says dogs weren’t domesticated until the time of Egypt. Think Cleopatra and her cat. But, I’m convinced from the day man became smart enough to realize other animals didn’t always wish him well and survival was more than eating, sleeping and living, he has sought out a companion he could trust without doubt, who believed in him without question and followed him through good and bad.

Ump

Lyta might not have called it ‘dog’, but she found that in Ump. She met him after she became separated from her group by a massive earthquake, precipitated by an asteroid’s collision with her habitat and followed by seering fires that destroyed her homeland. Here’s how Otto showed their first meeting:

Below her lay a Canis, tail flopped to his side, pinned under a tree limb. A gash cut his heaving chest. Lyta dropped to the ground and approached with caution. Never had she been so close to this animal. Even supine, his muscles rippled as though prepared to flee. His great jaw sprouted sharp canines and massive grinding teeth. His fur stuck out from his trapped body in tufts like coarse wild grass. The one exposed eye—dark and small, like Snarling-dog (a coyote-like creature from the Pleistocene)—latched onto hers. The great pink tongue hung loose from his mouth, bobbing up and down in rhythm with his labored pant. The dirty tail gave a tired whomp.

Lyta studied the blood caked into his fur and dried over his ribcage like a big red leaf. Why was he here?  She had seen him as he fled the fires, well ahead of the panicked herds of animals.

“Why, animal?”  She asked, “What brought you back?”

As though he understood, his black lidded eye focused up and over to the side. There, a dead female lay with her pup, both crushed beneath a fallen limb. The canis refused to leave his mate, not understanding she would never again run with him through the fragrant grasslands. His loyalty benefited neither, but common sense had nothing to do with his decision.

Lyta pulled an herb from neck sack and chewed it to a pulp. “You’re going to be OK,” she soothed as she gently removed the branch from Canis’ wounded ribs and pasted a layer of mulched herbs over the wound, followed by long-fibered leaves. She worked slowly and with care, watching his face for pain or discomfort.

The How and Why of Early Man

So many questions about our past are debated because of the lack of  written records. Before man put proverbial pen to paper, we had only bones and teeth, soil contents, paleo-geology and -geography and -climate, to intuit what might have been.

This, despite the fact that we know for a fact that written records are always from the writer’s perspective. They are only trustworthy to the point we trust the writer–like a Leakey, Donald Johansson, Chris Beard, Jane Goodall. These interpretations–albeit highly trained–of primary sources (Earth’s record) are given more credibility than the primary source itself (an action I’m sure discouraged by Leakey’s and Johnasson’s and Beard’s and Goodall’s teachers as they pursued their research). Why? The reason is simple: It takes a PhD to interpret Earth’s story.

What Everyone Ought to Know about PhD Research

You don’t always get what you want. ‘Research’ is the ‘systematic investigation to establish facts’. You don’t know them when you start. You pick them up like breadcrumbs along the path to the Dissertation.

Because mine involves an AI I seem to have lost control over, mankind’s past which is poorly documented by million-year-old artificacts, and a prodigious lack of money, I have often ended up places I had no intent to be, but must some how be connected to my thesis. How do I know they’re connected? Because that’s what Otto does. He takes a collection of facts and finds connections. Here’s an example Otto found and played for me. Why I don’t know. We know man’s past is violent, dangerous. What’s Otto’s point in throwing this into Lyta‘s search for her family?

What I do know is it’s connected to my research, because that’s how I programmed Otto.

Robots are Almost Human

Otto found this. It’s what he dreams of being when he grows up. For the entire story, click the title:

A Robot that Navigates Like a Person

A new robot navigates using human-like visual processing and object detection.

By Anne-Marie Corley

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

European researchers have developed a robot capable of moving autonomously using humanlike visual processing. The robot is helping the researchers explore how the brain responds to its environment while the body is in motion. What they discover could lead to machines that are better able to navigate through cluttered environments.

The robot consists of a wheeled platform with a robotic “head” that uses two cameras to capture stereoscopic vision. The robot can turn its head and shift its gaze up and down or sideways to gauge its surroundings, and can quickly measure its own speed relative to its environment.

The machine is controlled by algorithms designed to mimic different parts of the human visual system. Rather than capturing and mapping its surroundings over and over in order to plan its route–the way most robots do–the European machine uses a simulated neural network to update its position relative to the environment, continually adjusting to each new input. This mimics human visual processing and movement planning.

Five Cool Real-life Science Projects

These are too cool to keep to myself. It’s amazing what man’s big brains come up with. There is no fiction stranger:

• A fish that can be used to power a clock. It must be an electric fish (like the Amazon’s Black Ghost. The most familiar is the electric eel), a specific type of fish that produces low-frequency electric fields around their bodies to detect prey or predator.
• A material that can make anything invisible. These are called ‘metamaterials’ and are all the rage in scientific circles right now. Successful tests have been run at Duke University, University of Tokyo and other places to hide an object behind a material that takes on the appearance of the background (thanks to light waves and such). They’re also working on hiding sounds the same way. Think military. Hello Star Trek Klingon cloaking device
• A robot that’s almost human. This is mine: Put Otto’s brain into the mechanical body of a sophisticated robot–wirelessly. Easy if they’re close by. Harder the further away they get. Check out Otto’s page on this blog to find out more about him. Check out my last project with Otto to see how he operates (it’s only an excerpt because the rest is classified)
• A virus (yes, like the flu) that can power a battery. This comes from MIT. They think they’ve developed a technology that can recreate batteries using viruses. They say this could hold the promise of relatively inexpensive, nonpolluting, lightweight powerful batteries—a holy grail for the Green generation
• A device that can read your thoughts. It taps into your brainwaves. No, they don’t stay inside your skull; they seep out like light from a shaded window. The University of Pittsburgh got two rhesus macaques to feed themselves using mentally controlled robotic arms. They used robotic arms controlled mentally—no joystick required. Think: I want that food. The robot gets it for you. How cool is that?

Sounds unbelievable, but it isn’t. The human brain loves solving puzzles. Never tell it something’s impossible. Want more on the excitement of science? Read my post, How to Kindle your Child’s Interest in Science.

DNA Computers and DNA Viruses

Cat’s the one who started me on DNA computers (we share a grad student office). My AI Otto is struggling with my need for speed in his computations and his need for energy to complete the work. When I ask him a question, he sorts through a datasphere the size of the digital Library of Congress (all public sources on the internet. Imagine if you searched ‘Homo erectus’ on the internet and then read and absorbed the one million hits–that’s what Otto does just to get started) to create the simulated reality required for his movies. You can see the importance of speed.

Here’s what I know about DNA computers. They weigh almost nothing, carry their own energy pack, can perform ten trillion operations at once and store an amazing amount of information–all in a drop of water with room to spare. The mechanics are deceptively simple. A high school senior won a scholarship by programming the Declaration of Independence into a DNA molecule. Here’s a link to How Stuff Works if you’d like more information.

The problem, from what Cat’s explained, is the amount of error in DNA computing. In our human genome, we call them mutations and they’re considered part of our uniqueness. The average child has around 6.3 billion base pairs of DNA with around 277 mutational differences from his/her parents. Many are noninvasive because 1) cells have built-in redundancies, 2) parts of our genetic make-up are inactive. Maybe they used to be active, but with H. sapiens sapiens, they aren’t. 3) some have nothing to do with how we get along in the world.

But, for traditional computing needs, we need more accuracy than that. The theorists believe that within highly-structured uses, they can be controlled. Taiwan has already created a chip out of DNA.

For my purposes, itmay be the only method of addressing Otto’s massive requirement for speed and power. I might tinker with it this summer. Logically, it makes sense: I have a specific requirement, a single use (which is what DNA computers have been successful in to date), and Zeke has background in DNA manipulation.

Cat jumped right over DNA computers–assuming as only her big brain would that their invention was far enough along to no longer be a challenge to her–to DNA viruses. More on that later.

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Ump–Dog of the Pleistocene

Conventional wisdom says dogs weren’t domesticated until the time of Egypt. Think Cleopatra and her cat. But, I’m convinced from the day man became smart enough to realize other animals didn’t always wish him well and survival was more than eating, sleeping and living, he has sought out a companion he could trust without doubt, who believed in him without question and followed him through good and bad.

Ump

Lyta might not have called it ‘dog’, but she found that in Ump. She met him after she became separated from her group by a massive earthquake, precipitated by an asteroid’s collision with her habitat and followed by seering fires that destroyed her homeland. Here’s how Otto showed their first meeting:

Below her lay a Canis, tail flopped to his side, pinned under a tree limb. A gash cut his heaving chest. Lyta dropped to the ground and approached with caution. Never had she been so close to this animal. Even supine, his muscles rippled as though prepared to flee. His great jaw sprouted sharp canines and massive grinding teeth. His fur stuck out from his trapped body in tufts like coarse wild grass. The one exposed eye—dark and small, like Snarling-dog (a coyote-like creature from the Pleistocene)—latched onto hers. The great pink tongue hung loose from his mouth, bobbing up and down in rhythm with his labored pant. The dirty tail gave a tired whomp.

Lyta studied the blood caked into his fur and dried over his ribcage like a big red leaf. Why was he here?  She had seen him as he fled the fires, well ahead of the panicked herds of animals.

“Why, animal?”  She asked, “What brought you back?”

As though he understood, his black lidded eye focused up and over to the side. There, a dead female lay with her pup, both crushed beneath a fallen limb. The canis refused to leave his mate, not understanding she would never again run with him through the fragrant grasslands. His loyalty benefited neither, but common sense had nothing to do with his decision.

Lyta pulled an herb from neck sack and chewed it to a pulp. “You’re going to be OK,” she soothed as she gently removed the branch from Canis’ wounded ribs and pasted a layer of mulched herbs over the wound, followed by long-fibered leaves. She worked slowly and with care, watching his face for pain or discomfort.

“This will make you feel better,” and she plastered mud over the leaves. That done, she groomed the animal with her fingers until the caste dried and stiffened.

“Get up,” she whispered as gently as possible. “You must leave. I must leave.”

He stumbled to his feet, wobbled over to his dead mate and plopped to the ground. He nuzzled his great head into the female’s neck while one paw reached out for the pup, barely old enough to have known the rich life of Pliocene Africa. A pained sigh escaped the Canis’ ragged jaw.

“I understand, Canis. I too lost a pairmate. I lived. You will, too.”

Lyta spoke with calm assurance. She knew he couldn’t understand her words, so why did he look at her as though he appreciated what she said? She rose and crossed over to a tiny waterhole, not much more than a seasonal puddle. She slurped her fill, wiped an arm across her mouth and trudged to the edge of the ‘camp’. She shouted, not because she expected an answer, but to hear her echo. There was none. She turned to her left and shouted again. Still nothing. She repeated this a third time, and her voice came back.

“I must go that way. If I find Smoking Mountain, I find my way home.”

The Canis watched her and then snorted out a baleful sigh. He seemed to have arrived at a decision. He limped toward Lyta, sat on his injured haunch and huffed his thanks. His one good eye filled with warmth and trust: He lost his family and she would be the replacement.

“We must go. You to your kind,” and she motioned toward the burnt remnants of the savanna, “and I to mine,” pointing down toward the lost world of yesterday. Lyta gestured toward the fires and the gash in the land, and signaled the immediacy of their need to depart. Canis wagged his dirty tail like a branch sweeping against the ground.

Lyta waited a few moments and tried again. “We must go.”

Canis bobbed his head in agreement and plodded over to the waterhole. The smell of sulfur overwhelmed every other scent. She had little faith that even the Canis’ strong sense of smell could pick out the damp, fresh aroma water gave off. His oversized head dipped into the tepid water, and he slurped up wet and mud in equal parts. He paused, glanced back at his family and took another drink.

Lyta set out on her journey home. If Raza no longer wanted her, she would take Voi… maybe stick-that-kills… and return to her brother. She glanced back to assure herself the Canis would go his way. He  crouched, head nestled between his muddy paws, and stared after her. She ignored him as she marched homeward. when she again peeked back, he remained unmoving, gaze fixed on her.

“Canis. You must go. You aren’t safe alone.”

A mewl escaped his grinning snout.

He’d probably stay at his mate’s side and die unless Lyta did something. She jerked her head. In an instant, he trotted at her side, tail brushing happily against her thigh, his steady breathing setting a rhythm to their movements.

“So you want to join my pack. See if you can keep up.”

Moving On

I can’t find Lyta anymore. I log into Otto’s Lyta Scenario, but she doesn’t appear. I’ve plugged her algorithm and her DNA signature into his search functions, but he doesn’t find her. I don’t know what that means. Has she died? Last time I saw her she was walking north, away from her group, with her mate Garv and their son, her adopted son Boah and their ‘dog’ (a loose term for a Plio-Pleisticene version of dogs) Ump.

I miss her. She’s curious, friendly, with a sophisticated style of communication I wouldn’t have dreamt existed when mankind was new. At first I thought Otto intended to answer my research thesis–why did Homo habilis prosper and prior hominids like Australopithecus became extinct. But when I couldn’t get my grant renewed (they wanted me in the field, not talking to an AI), I applied for a DARPA grant. That got sticky and off the track, but into the real world where realpeople were affected by my work.

It’s how I met Zeke. More on him later.

I know Otto could find her. His programming allows me to enter a DNA profile into a space-time location. Maybe he doesn’t want to expose her. Maybe she’s hiding.

I miss her.

Homo habilis vs. Homo erectus

My passion is studying early man, specifically how we became who we are. Is our violence an aberration or part and parcel of survival? No other mammal kills their own, but maybe–as the alpha on the planet–our greatest threat to our survival is our own species, so we’re forced to destroy each other.

What was lacking in H. Habilis that led to their extinction, to be replaced by the big-brained, scrawny Homo erectus? Habilis was preyed upon by species with bigger claws, sharper teeth and thicker skin. Habilis (and my friend Lyta) scavenged their left-overs, in between hiding from the imposing mammals that dominated the Plio-Pleistocene African savanna. But, eventually hiding wasn’t enough and H. erectus took over (we don’t know if they fought with each other or if habilis left ‘with a whimper’).

H. erectus, with his longer lower limbs for running and walking efficiency, his bigger brain especially in the areas for planning and forethought (and speech depending upon whose research you’re reading) was tall, thin, and barrel-chested, hardly daunting in a world of sabertooth cats, mammoth and giant sloths. Yet , it is he who spread from Africa to China, India, the Middle East, Java. It is he–not predator cats or alligators–who developed a highly adaptable culture allowing him to survive a wide range of climates and habitats.

That is the first of their firsts. Want more?

• first appearance of systematic hunting.
• first use of fire (though arguably no control of it)
• first indication of extended childhood (thanks to the helplessness of their infants)
• first indication of the ability to lead a more complex life (their Acheulian tools were sophisticated, their hunting was planned)
• first to wear clothing (how else to survive Georgia and China)
• first to create complex tools and weapons

Their faces were short but wide and the nose projected forward, hinting at the typical human external nose. They had a pronounced brow ridge. Their cranium was long and low and somewhat flattened at the front and back. The cranial bone was thicker than earlier hominids. Remnants show damage from being hit in the head by something like clubs or heavy rocks. Their arms and legs were also robust, with thicker bones and clear evidence of being heavily muscled. The suspicion is they were a more violent species than habilis. Is that why habilis disappeared? The tougher group survived and bred offspring with their thicker, more protective skulls.

You probably remember my friend Lyta is a Homo habilis (see her page). I’ve lived her life through Otto‘s ability to ‘see’ into the past. Where other primates rest when they have enough to eat, she thinks and shares information with her band. Where most mammals sleep when they aren’t hunting, playing or resting, Lyta worked–knapped tools, collected food for a cache, planned. I have come to believe that her survival depended not so much on her physique (which was sorely lacking in that physical time) as what was inside of her: her courage, ability to plan ahead, strength of her convictions, what we call ‘morals’. These are very human traits that can’t be preserved in bones and teeth. I wouldn’t know they existed if not for Otto. I’ve posted an excerpt from that research on Scribd.com (Born in a Treacherous Time).

Homo erectus--note the width of the skull and the less-protruding snout

Homo habilis skull--note the size of the skull cap (from brow to top)

My next project is to determine how man migrated throughout the world. Where did he get the courage? Was he forced out because he couldn’t defend his territory? Or was it wanderlust? Was he a seeker, wanting more for his life? Did he get bored and need to challenge his constantly-growing brain?

Palindromes

Palindromic Latin Word Square, the Sator Square

For those of you who don’t know, a ‘palindrome’ is a word or phrase that reads the same

Hebrew Palindrome

backward as forward. That’s why my AI is ‘Otto’ and why my son Sean calls me ‘Mom’. When we want to catch each other’s attention without alerting others, we write words backwards. It looks like jibberish, but it’s our code. One of several we use. I’ll share others later.

We’ve gotten so good at palindromes, we can talk backwards, write backwards, almost as

Sanskrit Palindrome

fast as forward. Thanks to palindromes, I knew Sean was in trouble last summer. He was kidnapped, but the nappers never caught on to the trail he was leaving. It worked out in the end, thanks to Zeke and Eitan and Otto. But neither of us will be the same. Seminal events rarely leave one unscathed.

Who is Otto

Cat asked me that. I didn’t even know she noticed me, despite the fact we share an office. She’s beautiful and brilliant, where I’m not.

HAL--the most famous AI

One day, I was reviewing Otto’s report on H. habilis and Cat came back from teaching. She asked me about my research. Compared to hers on a DNA virus that can destroy anything it wants, mine sounds boring. Educational research. But it excites me and that’s all I care about at this point in my life.

I explained that I’m not really researching artificial intelligence so much as using it to do my research. Otto  collects  info on paleo flora and fauna, paleoclimate, geography, everything he can tap into in the metaverse, and creates what’s called a data-driven simulation. Would you be surprised to know she understood all of that.

Well, maybe she wasn’t listening.  “I’m hot, and what’s that I’m smelling?”

Otto shares scents and sounds with sensory ports, but that’s only part of it. When he finished collecting the billions of bytes of data available on Plio-Pleistocene Africa, he stitched together a 360 degree four-dimensional panorama, similar to those virtual tours of hotel rooms, but Otto carries it further. As you move through the habitat, Otto re-renders everything as your eyes would in real time. His processors are so fast and his database so huge—equivalent to the digital size of the Library of Congress—he can add the details that make it feel real.

Take the pothole Lyta just avoided. It’s a reasonable assumption the equatorial heat would spiderweb the savanna with crevices. Where I might not have thought to add that, Otto would never miss it.

The ‘actors’—Homo habilis, Australopithecine and Homo erectus—are built using data from ancient bones and teeth. Because there are so few organic remains, the creatures aren’t as realistic as their surroundings.  In fact, at that time, they were cardboard figures amidst a lush, vibrant world. That’s changed, but more on that later.

It’s like virtual reality, but without limits. Otto is more a simulated reality. He isn’t predesigned, as the world around you isn’t. Everything is interactive and you can influence what you choose. When you enter Otto’s world, you and he discover it as you go.

That cleared it up for Cat, but her IQ is 198. Do you think it makes sense?

Lyta

If I’m to be completely open with you–albeit virtually (and anonymously)–you must meet Lyta. Lyta above all others is my best friend and mentor. When I met Lyta over a year ago, she was an unwed pregnant teen, with no means of supporting herself, rejected by those who should have cared for her. She has little to recommend her except a passion for her unborn son and a stubborn refusal to capitulate to problems.

Like too many of today’s troubled teens, single moms, and restless youth, you’re probably thinking.  Except Lyta is 1.8 million years old.

How do I know this? Otto. As part of my PhD thesis, I asked him to research man’s roots–paleoanthropology is my passion–and he found Lyta. (That’s right–I asked him. We are well past the point where I am master and Otto the submissive AI. With his protracted abilities to notice detail, follow clues and draw conclusions, he’s as clever as most people I know).

He collected data from throughout the metaverse, extrapolated conclusions and drew a picture of Lyta and her world. To experience one of Otto’s ‘reports’ is to watch a movie in four dimensions with all five senses. I had to add a multitude of sensory ports when I realized he not only collected text and pictures on his subjects, but sounds, smells, even tactile factors. I don’t know why Otto latched onto Lyta. I programmed him to provide the big picture, not track an individual, but to my surprise, he continued her tale as though reading the future. Now, it’s like having a close friend you see every day, want to stay up to date on, seek out for advice.

I’ll close this entry with a picture I captured of her. She was digging for roots and tubers with her band. This is just before a paleo-wolf attacked the group and killed her friend’s child. From what I could tell, the other female never recovered from the grief.

Does an AI have a hobby?

It doesn’t seem like they could, does it? Otto is sapient, but only within the parameters of my programming. He does as he’s directed.

The question is, since Otto is so fast–not as fast as a human brain, but approaching the speed of DNA computers–what does he do when he’s done with my computing? Does he go into sleep mode? Or, does he pursue that most benign of human activities, ‘thinking’.

Otto has a contest coming up in August against Dr. Eitan Sun, probably the smartest man I’ve ever known. He types on three keyboards simultaneously because none of the buffers can keep up with him. He can recite pi to the 4,297th place. Nothing like Daniel Tammet’s 22,000+, but the best in my University.

When Otto’s pure processing power became obvious, Eitan challenged him to crack Fermat’s Last Theorem, Man vs. Machine. Though recently solved, it had taken mathematicians over 350 years to unravel, so Eitan saw it as an appropriate challenge. Otto was fast, but Eitan was clever–and smart enough to know where to cut intellectual corners.

I think Otto is nervous. I hear his processors buzzing even when he’s not working on my projects. He doesn’t talk; his screen is blank, but his virtual mind is busy. (image credit: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/17/ArtificialFictionBrain.png )