Origin by Dan Brown... or Killer AI?

Origin by Dan Brown
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Origin by Dan Brown.

Most of Dan Brown's "Robert Langdon" novels are considered to be thrillers, this particular book falls into the Genre of Science Fiction. I found the book fascinating because it has to deal we would we all call the singularity. The plot can be found of course on the internet. Wikipedia or Goodreads. Why one may consider this book to be science fiction? Let's talk about the technical singularity. At this point, I will go into spoilers if you haven't read the book and if you're planning on reading it please stop here.

The technical singularity deals with the ability of machine intelligence that can become self-aware. As of now, many companies are already using expert systems. In other words artificial intelligence. But are these artificial intelligence or AI self-aware? Michio Kaku a renowned physicist has mentioned once in his many talks that the most advanced AI system has less intelligence than a cockroach.

In the book Origins, Robert Langdon meets a very sophisticated program or AI that calls himself Winston. And it even has an artificial British accent. The fictional character named Kirsch, created this program using quantum computers at least that's what I believe they were, correct me if I'm wrong. This is the most advanced program known but is kept as a secret from many people.

As one read the book, one can start putting the pieces together. This is no ordinary artificial intelligence. The novel present dilemmas that computer scientists have been talking for quite some time. And that is the subject of ethics. This particular artificial intelligence program is following a specific directive. However, it seems that it is allowed a certain amount of free will to accomplish the directive given to it by its programmer and can make decisions on its own with informing the programmer. A question must be asked. Can you program free will into an artificial intelligence, and thus becomes a singularity?

Once the book is read, the conclusion may leave you with a dropped jaw. And presents the ethic dilemma nicely. One may find the conclusion exhilarating, and frightening at the same time. If you have read the book let me know if you agree with my thoughts.

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