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By Daniel D. W. Raasch
The streets of Akihabara are steaming today: supersaturated, engorged with people. Gasoline rainbows on wet asphalt reflect the expensive footwear of Japanese salarymen. So far, Father Cooper is nowhere in sight.
I don't know whether he's taken the Rinkai Fukutoshin Line like I did (seven minutes flat from Shin Ki to Tokyo Teleport Station, a five-minute jog from here), or whether he's taken the Yurikamome Line, which has a shorter travel time but is a longer walk from where I am. Or maybe, like most first-time gaijin trying to decipher the national cryptohaiku of a Japanese train schedule, he's on some bullet train moving 300 kilometers per hour away from here, and he won't discover it until the last stop in some rural prefecture surrounded by rice and Shinto shrines. For some reason this scenario makes me laugh. Maybe God doesn't know his way around, either.
I don't mind waiting. The Turita isn't until tomorrow. I'm in no hurry. A ripple of laughter runs through me when I realize this may be the first time a tech journalist for Futurica News has ever thought that phrase. I'm looking forward to finally shaking hands with Father Cooper, who is somewhat of a celebrity where I come from. A telegenic 68-year-old Jesuit priest with a doctorate in computer science, he first earned his reputation when the Journal of Games Theory published his classic "On Iterated Prisoner's Dilemmas and Faith-Based Strategies" nearly four decades ago. A quirky, mathematically rigorous examination of the role of faith in zero-sum games, it also turned out to be the first scientific sermon. Father Cooper solved the Prisoner's Dilemma by proving mathematically that faith and reason did not merely co-exist but depended upon each other for evolutionary success. In other words, faith and reason were not antagonists, but in fact old chums who had each other over for tea now and again. To say that this proof shocked the scientific world would be like describing Newton as a fairly clever fellow.
Since then, Father Cooper has been published in dozens of academic journals, written several popular bestsellers, and is often trotted out for articles like the one I'm writing. Recently he was appointed by the Pope to chair the Vatican Council on Technology. It's in that capacity that he's here for the Turita, the Japanese loanword for what English speakers call the Turing Test: an examination to see whether or not a computer program can pass as a human. Denkikon Digital Industries is sponsoring the Turita tomorrow for its seventh-generation project, a program known as Ii-ko. Both Father Cooper and I are here because of our jobs, me to report on it and he to judge it.
Despite the fact that he is obviously much brighter than I am, I find myself worrying about him. The Japanese sun is sweltering, and the weather is mushi-atsui: insect-hot. I'll be sunburned before long, and I hate to imagine trying to explain to my editor how a beloved old man died of heatstroke because I gave him lousy directions. It occurs to me that trying to spot one person in an Akihabara crowd is like trying to pick out one black dot in a newsprint photo.
Suddenly, I get an idea. Like a lad peering through a knothole in a neighbor's fence, I raise a coin to my eye and squint through the hole in the center of a 10-yen piece. I frame and pan across the stream of brightly-colored kimono-clad housewives zipping by on motor scooters, the octogenarian merchants hawking just-born video equipment, the kanji kaleidoscopes of neon light. It's the perfect change for me. I'd been covering the Mars Terraforming Project for the past six years, drawn to it by a schoolboy fancy that now was wearing thin. In the beginning, there was such romance to the idea of adding heat and life to a cold, dead world and making Mars a place where families could spread out, breathe, and play. Every day brought a new story, another miracle in the cascade of miracles that's become everyday life in the 21st century. The public, too, loved reading about Mars. In the newsroom, we call them Redheads.
But somewhere between new Martian crops and advances in geologic oxygen extraction, I'd become an insomniac. Food obscured its taste. I couldn't tell whether it was because I longed to be with the colonists and watch Mars bloom into life, or because I felt some dim foreboding about what they were doing. My world was changing, and somehow I felt as if all these miracles were eating away at the Mars of my childhood: the Mars Galileo saw, the inspired unknown of Edgar Rice Burroughs, the cradle of cosmically ambitious Little Green Men. The romance was fading, replaced by a sense of mechanistic ennui and, somewhere underneath that, fear.
This was the big danger for tech journalists like me. Wiping out, it was called - suddenly becoming disinterested in the crest of the wave, looking behind you at where it¹s been. Once you lose it, once you¹re out, you're gone. Wipeout. There's a queue of fiery 16-year-old optimists waiting impatiently for you to crash, and there¹s no room in the industry for Eeyores .
I'd seen my share of coworkers wipe out. We'd talk about them when they weren't around. "Katz is headed for a wipeout," I'd said once. "I heard him asking the VP of GeneLux if he had any plans to clone Hitler to fill in for him on sick days." And sure enough, just two weeks later, Katz was gone. He didn't resign. Just stopped showing up for work. I don't think his last paycheck was even cashed. Now it was my entrance into the room that shushed conversations. I was not going to wipe out, I told myself. I will not wipe out.
Suddenly my little 10-yen circle of life fills with the vision of a silver-haired gentleman I recognize from the back of his book jackets. When I wave to get his attention, a boyish grin lights up his face, and Father Cooper plucks a coin from his pocket and mimics me. He then points at a restaurant that bisects the distance between us. It's a tiny slot nestled like a prayer between two towering brick edifices, dappled with neon and diffuse in the afternoon sun. We both stagger toward it.
The restaurant smells deliciously of ginger and soy, and it¹s twice as hot inside as out. We're presented with a platter full of the most exquisitely appetizing delicacies. Father Cooper selects the kaki-age donburi, sumptuous tempura shrimp, scallops, and vegetables on a bowl of sticky white rice, but all I can do is stare at the platter. There's a reason why all the food looks so good. It's plastic.
The plastic food industry here is intense. The idea of using plastic food stems back to the early days when Japanese shopkeepers would put real food in the window to woo prospective customers. Unfortunately, real food had the disappointing tendency to attract flies as the day went on, and plastic food could be made to look more tantalizing than the genuine article. Now, in the Daiba district, the chemical chefs of polyurethane pleasures compete for the yen of restaurant owners in a parody of the dining experience. In 10,000 years, the counterfeit teppanyaki will still look as fresh and inviting as it does today. I wonder if someone will have figured out a way to digest it.
"You know," I say, ignoring our waiter, "the cost of that platter of plastic could've stopped, what, maybe 300 children from starving to death." Even as I say the words, I can't tell whether I'm truly outraged or if I'm just overcompensating because I'm in the presence of a priest.
A smile lights up Father Cooper's face. "Beauty is important, my friend, at least as important as food. This is sculpture; this is art! Should we live in a world of full bellies that are starving for beauty? Eat something. You'll feel better. The starving children will thank you." Gratefully absolved, I order the teppanyaki.
When our food comes, I question him between mouthfuls.
"So why come all the way out here, Father? The Turing Test tomorrow is really nothing more than a PR device for Denkikon, and most scientists would say that even in the best case, the Turing Test isn't really a test at all. There's no quantifiable data. There's no objectivity. It's simply whether or not the judge feels a computer is conscious. How valid is that?"
Before the last word leaves my mouth, Father Cooper replies.
"So often we hear the phrase, 'I think, therefore I am.' Cogito ergo sum. It's attributed to Descartes, but this isn't quite accurate. Descartes wasn't concerned so much with thought as he was with doubt. Descartes was consumed by it. It was only his conviction in his own doubt that allowed him to assert his existence. Now doubt, it's plain to see, is a very different thing than thought. Doubt is an emotion. Doubt is a feeling. And from my perspective, doubt comes from the soul. I'm not interested in whether a computer thinks. I'm interested in whether it doubts. And the Turing Test is a great test for that."
"What was that line again? About the soul?"
"Oh yes. Doubt comes from the soul."
My chopsticks slip in my fingers. "And you believe a computer could have a soul?"
"Of course. Don't you?" He grins widely at this. "You know, the ancient Greeks believed that reality at its deepest level was mathematical in nature, and that it was only through our souls that we were able to perceive it. It was the soul's ability to apprehend the world of numbers that separated us from the animals. Pythagoras would've thought computers had bet ter souls than we do." He popped a shrimp in his mouth and chewed vigorously.
"Don't you need to be human to have a soul?"
"Let me read you something." He produced a worn, leather-bound Bible with copious notes scribbled in its page margins.
"Here it is. First Corinthians, chapter 15, verse 37: 'All flesh is not the same: men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed. But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body.' Over and over, the Bible tells us that the body is merely a vessel. We create vessels for souls every day, but God is the one who fills them with spirit. If God decides he wants to grant a soul to a vessel made of silicon instead of flesh, who am I to tell him no? My job is to spread the word of God to all souls, because all souls are in need of salvation."
"So that's why you're here? To convert Ii-ko?"
His eyes flashed with a secret. "Mmmmm, partly. Partly." He laughed again. "I would like to try a bite of your teppanyaki. May I?" An interesting fact: Japan has more neon per square inch than any other nation on Earth. This is quite a feat, considering the fact that the first Japanese-made neon signs didn't appear until almost 1950, during Japan's long reconstruction after the Second World War. (Neon was introduced in the U.S. in 1910. The first American neon sign is still glowing at a car dealership in Dallas.)
Another interesting fact: neon is colorless, odorless, tasteless, and everywhere. You are breathing almost undetectable quantities of it right now. It makes up one part per 65,000 of Earth's atmosphere, and yet for billions of years, it kept an astounding secret.
Neon emits light.
Like other inert gases, neon has low chemical activity because its outermost, or valence, electron is complete. But when an electric current is passed through it, normally complacent electrons become boisterous and jumpy. There is a mad dash to find new orbits, new places to sit, like some electromicroscopic game of musical chairs. It's in all this chaos that photons seem to escape out of nowhere like naughty children, beaming the most brilliant crimson. Human eyes never saw this amazing light until just a few short years ago, cosmically speaking. Who knows what other secrets are hiding in this incandescent universe of ours?
This is what Father Cooper told me as we continued talking late into the night. Now, as I'm getting dressed for the Turita exhibition this evening, I keep going over our conversation in my mind. He said that it seems somehow appropriate that Japan would have the most neon. The root of neon is the Greek word for "new." And tonight is a very new thing.
I'm uncomfortable with the idea of a computer having a soul, but for the life of me, I can't quite explain why. Father Cooper brushed away objection after objection as if they were gnats in a breeze. And all this is made even stranger because I swear I can't remember ever believing I had soul before, even as a child. What modern person believes in souls? If I'm going to stand here talking to myself, I think, I want to change the subject. Shaving in front of the mirror, I glance down at the English printed on the side of a box of Naive-brand soap:
"What feeling do you need the best in your lifestyle? Trendy feeling, natural feeling, or traditional feeling? We'll lead a tasteful life to find your personal style. Mild and tenderness are basic of our living life."
I love the way Japanese and English mate here. It's commercial poetry. Little accidental koans like these are scattered over everything: tote bags, T-shirts, toaster ovens, toilet paper.
I pick up a pack of "Pocket Wetty" wet-naps sitting beside the sink and read: "Cute happy freedoms of clean and wet make 'Pocket Wetty' the wettest. Enjoy your everyday 'Wetty' to the maximum."
I'm on a roll. There is an electric toothbrush in front of me. I don't see anything but a smiling Japanese boy on the front who looks happier than toothpaste has any right to make a child. I turn over the box, looking for my fix, and there it is, in tiny English letters: "Modern systemic spiritual progress."
The eight-panel cartoon explaining how to use the battery-operated toothbrush enthralls me like television. Four panels are "do's" and four panels are "don'ts." It's long been said that the Japanese are the most fastidious culture on Earth, but four panels of "don'ts" on a toothbrush box is a bit much even for me. I make a mental note to be sure not to brush my teeth with my mouth closed, like the girl in panel six seems to be doing.
I read the Ii-ko press release one more time. Ii-ko uses quantum computing to solve natural language problems. Advances related to Ii-ko will help us learn to use natural resources more efficiently. (How very Japanese!) New algorithms devised by the Ii-ko architecture will help us feed the world. Even though it's early, I want to go. I call a taxi.
The Denkikon auditorium is huge. Wall-size tinted windows offer a view of a park filled with Japanese maples. It's all the more impressive because of where it is. In a crowded country like this, the Denkikon auditorium seems to stretch to the horizon. This is a status symbol for Denkikon, for space is the ultimate commodity in Japan.
In front is a series of 14-foot monitors on which spectators and journalists can watch the Ii-ko code run - live, as it happens. There's a large Denkikon workstation on the platform, too. It's about as big as a Japanese refrigerator. This must be Ii-ko, if any thing really can be said to be Ii-ko. To each side, facing away from it, are a half-dozen isolation booths for the contestants and the judges. What thrills me most is a tiny thing - the chairs. Instead of arranging the chairs in a box of orderly, rigid rows, instead the event planners have placed them in a succession of S-shaped waves that run past the eye like flowing water. The effect is striking.
I take my place in the very back, and unfold today's copy of Yomiuri Shimbun.
Reading the front page, I feel a sudden surge of déjà vu. The paper tells me that tonight Mars is at its perigee, as near to Earth as it gets. We haven't been this close in a handful of years, and Redheads are out tonight in full force. There's been a significant addition to the Martian atmosphere since the last go-round, too - from .004 bar to .1 bar of nearly pure oxygen. Mars' albedo has been increased by a similar amount, and because of the new moon, tonight may be the first night that we Earth folk will see the difference.
For the first time ever, Mars will be the brightest object in the sky. A manufactured star, the latest model, brighter than the last eon's old fashioned designs. It's funny that I spent so many years working on articles like these but have no desire to go outside and see it.
Unexpectedly, I hear a faint but familiar voice wafting back to me. Peering out from behind my paper, I see Father Cooper kneeling down on the platform in front, talking.
To Ii-ko.
This is definitely not supposed to be happening. It's against the rules for him to have contact with Ii-ko before the Turita. The fact that Ii-ko is up and running (has it been awake the whole time?) must mean that someone on the Denkikon staff set this up. I know I should just get up and ask Father, but instead I wait and strain my ears to hear. I can't make out a thing.
Minutes pass, and as my ears become attuned, I can make out the soft, moderated tones of a second voice. Ii-ko's voice. I sense something very important is taking place but have no idea what it is. My nervous hand brushes against the side of my chair and feels something rubbery. Headphones. I carefully put them on. In my ears I hear Father Cooper's voice:
"Et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine: et homo factus est..."
It's the Latin Mass.
"Et iterum venturus est cum gloria judicare vivos et mortuos: Cujus regni non erit finis..."
It's something about Christ's glorious return, reign without end. Father Cooper is silent for a moment, then reaches into his pocket and takes out a vial. He shakes it over the console once, twice, three times.
He is obviously startled when I rustle my paper and drop it. His face is full of emotion. He looks back at Ii-ko for a moment, and then rushes to meet me at the door.
"Hello, Father."
There is a pause as he realizes how much I've seen. A long pause. He seems to have something to tell me but can't figure out quite how to say it. I am uncomfortably aware of Ii-ko's presence in the room now.
"Do you know much about the Shakers?" Father Cooper asks slowly. I shake my head. He looks at me, choosing his words carefully.
"The Shakers were an 18th-century Christian sect. Unlike most of their contemporaries, they did not look for the return of Jesus Christ in the flesh. They sought his return in the spirit - the Christ Spirit - the anointing spirit of God, the spirit of love for humanity. They believed that Christ's Second Coming would be a quiet, almost unheralded one."
My heart pounds in my chest as I realize what he is implying.
"I'm an old man. I've dreamed of this moment for years now. I couldn't wait," he says. With neon eyes he looks at me. He reads my face.
"Man's mind is hostile to God," he says. "Romans 7:8."
Half-remembered fragments of religious terms float through my mind. The Immaculate Conception. Son of God. Loaves and fishes. Son of Man. Transubstantiation. I can feel something slipping inside me. Modern systemic spiritual progress. I turn away from him and push through the glass doors, walking, careening, stumbling outside. I wonder where Katz is at this moment, if he is still alive. My feet carry me to the Japanese maples, and I lean against one, breathing deeply, feeling its rough bark against my cheek.
A crowd has gathered in the park. Redheads. Somehow they have managed to convince local shopkeepers to turn off their signs. Families and couples are standing together in the clearings, their necks craned all the way back. I step out to look, pointing my chin at an angle nearly perpendicular to the ground.
In the entire universe, there are billions of stars. We can see very few from Earth. Most of them are too far away. Their message takes millions of years to reach us, and our atmosphere distorts their feeble light. In today's world, we've run out of patience waiting for our necessary miracles. We've started making miracles of our own. Or they have started making us.
