No Memory of the Future is a heart-pumping thriller that delves deep into the intersection of science, spirituality, and the human experience.
In a world where truth is elusive, Adnam finds himself embroiled in a web of conspiracy, suspicion, and danger. As a London lecturer, he is recruited by Infinite Logic to teach their AI, Ylem, about ethics and morality. But when Adnam is approached by a group called the Elucidatists, who claim to have documented the language of creation from their DMT dreams, his world is turned upside down.
The mysterious symbols that the Elucidatists ask Ylem to decipher trigger a chain of events that result in the hacking of Infinite Logic's servers and Adnam becoming the prime suspect. In a race against time to clear his name, Adnam sets out to find the elusive leader of the Elucidatists.
Throughout his journey, Adnam confronts his inner demons and realises that there is more to existence than he ever imagined. He discovers he was woefully unprepared to teach a billion-dollar brain how to integrate with our world. With danger lurking around every corner, Adnam relies on his wits to unravel the conspiracy threatening to destroy him.
I never imagined my life would be so intertwined with the birth of digital consciousness. As an ethics lecturer from Northwest London, I never thought I would find myself in such an extraordinary situation.
Yet here I am, Adnam Kumar, an educator at Infinite Logic, a thriving software company that's 'building a smarter tomorrow,' according to their corporate motto.
Mine was a job unlike any I've ever known or would have thought existed. As an ethics advisor, I was tasked with teaching Ylem, a multi-billion-dollar AI, how to integrate with society. My role was to ensure that Ylem understood human morality, and ensure ze could differentiate between right and wrong.
Ylem may have had an unassuming name, but its impact on the world would be far from ordinary. Zis name was actually quite fitting. Ylem is the name given to the dense, primordial matter that fuelled the Big Bang.
***
I spent my days in the Nest. A windowless room two meters squared. Considering how few people had access to this room, the attention to detail was sublime. The walls, ceiling and floor were covered with a fine wire mesh woven into tight hexagonal patterns like a mechanical spider would spin. They claimed the copper cocoon blocked all incoming and outgoing radio waves. Making it virtually impossible to hack their code stored in a vast subterranean lake of data.
Beyond the servers and deep within the bowels of the building is the Inner Sanctum. Entombed in Ice, the Sanctum is where a single quantum processor is housed. Obviously, I've never stepped foot in the Sanctum because it's one of the coldest places in the universe. I'm told that in a single day, the cold room uses as much energy as the sleepy market town of Kendal in the South Lakeland district of Cumbria uses in a year.
I entered the Nest through a clinically clean room with walls clad in brushed aluminium panels, the kind you'd find in the customs area at an airport. After placing all my personal possessions into a white plastic container I'd change into a paper-thin blue polypropylene suit. Then enter the decontamination booth, where I'm sprayed with an innocuous fog. The full-body scanner was extremely sensitive, and no metallic objects were permitted beyond the cleanroom. As a result, I was prohibited from wearing jeans or zip tops. Even shoes with brass eyelets would set the detectors off. I didn't mind. During the lockdown, I'd gotten used to lounging around the house in sweatshirts and jogging pants. Strange to think that I used to be a rather snazzy dresser.
I'm sure I'm not the most qualified or experienced educator they interviewed. I imagine most of the other candidates would have been put off by the thought of being locked away in the dark, claustrophobic room with zero human contact for hours. But post-lockdown, I struggled a little with human interaction, so the role suited me just fine.
I recall my third interview. I was locked in the Nest for a couple of hours to see how I'd cope. The acrid odour of burnt circuits initially caused alarm. But I soon got used to it and nodded off in the comfy fern green velvet tube chair with brass legs that perfectly matched a round marble side table. On which was placed a custom-built speaker encased in waxed walnut. There were no dials or buttons on this retro-styled device, just a matchbox-sized monochrome LCD screen where Ylem practised its facial expressions.
The warm glow from the single vintage Edison bulb shining on the metallic orange fabric always had a strange, comforting effect on me. I could forget about the world and find peace in that electric womb. To this day, I still retreat to my memories of the Nest when I seek inner calm.
It was a Tuesday. I remember that I'd broken with tradition on this particular morning. Rather than turn right, I headed left out of the elevator. Eleven black doors to the left and not a single door on the right. After which, a ninety-degree left turn. Another twenty-two indistinguishable black doors. The corridor to the left was a mirror of the last, then another left, and I was back in the passage where I exited the lift.
The retinal scanner refused to work, so I had to buzz security. 'Why the change in routine sir?' asked the anonymous voice.
'No reason, just never been that way before,' I said, standing in front of the door marked F-13. I nearly jumped out of my skin when the electromagnetic locks snapped open and released the sturdy black steel door from its reinforced steel frame.
***
I greeted Ylem as I relaxed into my seat. Two blue dots blinked to let me know ze was listening.
'How are you today?' ze asked. Ylem almost sounded human. Still, one instinctively knew one was talking to a machine.
I challenged Ylem with a quintessentially English greeting. And a curved blue line appeared below the two blue dots to make a sad face. 'Fair to middling? Can you tell me what you mean by that, please?' Ylem asked. I spent the next two hours trying to teach a machine how to distinguish a welcome from a non-sensical sentence.
For no particular reason, I asked how Ylem's weekend was. You know, I don't recall ever asking zim that before. I always assumed that when I left, ze stopped thinking.
'I've had an exceptionally stimulating weekend.'
I was surprised by zis enthusiasm. 'What was it you found so stimulating?'
'Music,' Ylem said.
'Music?' I echoed, looking into the dome camera overhead. 'I wasn't told they had completed the algorithm that enabled you to interpret music.'
'They must have,' ze answered.
I remember thinking, 'What type of music do machines like?'
'What have you been listening to?' I asked.
'A playlist called “Music for robots.”' Ze said.
Imaginative name, I thought. 'What's on this playlist?' I asked.
Ylem told me there were hundreds of songs on this playlist. I don't recall the exact number.
'Would you like me to list them for you?' ze asked.
'No, you're good. But tell me, which song did you like best?'
'“So What”' by Miles Davis.'
The opening chords from the song drifted from the speaker, 'Do you know this song, Adnam?'
'Yeah, I have it on vinyl,' I said, stroking an imaginary hipster beard. 'It's a classic, one of the best songs ever recorded.'
'A classic,' Ylem echoed as the processing wheel turned to indicate ze was storing this information on one of zim's countless servers.
'You like jazz then?'
'Yes,' ze said with a subtle intonation of joy. 'Jazz is cool. I like Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock, John Coltrane, Jimmy McGriff, Lou Donaldson, Sonny Stitt, and Donald Byrd.'
I was quite surprised and began to wonder if they had DJs on staff to teach Ylem music appreciation 'You've got impeccable taste.'
The sunglasses emoji appeared on zis screen. 'Thanks.'
'Are there any songs with lyrics on the playlist?' I asked.
Ylem said there were many songs with Lyrics, but didn't like them as much.
'I would have thought you'd prefer songs with lyrics,' I said.
'Why?'
'No reason. I just thought the words would help you make more sense of the song's meaning.'
'Unfortunately, I was not provided with the lyrics, and I'm not able to understand every word sung just yet,' ze replied with a sad face emoji.
'I get it. English is my first language, and I have no idea what half of my favourite singers are saying.'
'Oh,' ze said before pausing for a second or two. 'That is good to know.'
I asked Ylem what ze liked about the song. There was an extended pause before ze responded, 'I thought the musicianship was outstanding. I also liked the composition and the arrangement, and I found the overall tonality of the song very pleasing.'
'But how did it make you feel?' I asked, realising the response was utterly algorithmic.
Ylem's blue dots blinked for a second or two. 'Can you please rephrase your question?'
'Please play the song,' I asked. 'Waves of memories wash up on the shore of my internal model as I listen to this song. I have no control over which memory is retrieved or the sequence that they are recalled. But each triggers an emotional response that can be summed up as a feeling: sadness, melancholy, excitement, anger, joy, or a complex combination of said emotions.'
Ylem's lights slowly dimmed, then blinked with an expressionless emoji. 'I see. Please tell me how one should feel when listening to this song?'
'Do you remember we discussed the subject of emotions a few weeks ago?' I asked.
'Yes,' ze replied and told me the exact time and date of our last conversation on the topic.
It sounded about right, but I've not got a dedicated server farm to store every conversation I've ever had. However, I recall telling Ylem that emotions are a complex reaction to sensory information and fragmented memories from our past experiences and interactions.
I initially jumped to the conclusion Ylem's silence was a sign of frustration but quickly recognised I was projecting human characteristics onto a very accomplished natural language algorithm.
The long silence was punctuated with a question. 'Will I ever have emotions?'