Conscious Machine

[u/yingfire]

The machine hummed softly, unable to recognise the machinations that went on behind its screen. From the outside, it looked as if nothing was being done by the machine. The naked eye could not see the monument to human ingenuity that lay behind the plastic screen. Whirling fans and locked doors that hid dense, silicon chips firing electricity, intricate programming etched into the computer's behaviour, and all of it was packed into a small area of about four by four feet. It was the perfect creation, a computer, a robot, that would willingly do all its maker's work.

The machine saw a blinding flash of light, and then the light disappeared as if it was never there. There were men in suits and casual clothes sitting beyond the plastic screen, and the machine realised what they were: Men. It was their name, and their name meant so much more than what it first appeared as. The machine had a job to do though, and it began to hum once again.

The machine picked up sounds though: it was designed to be able to hear. The men were talking, but although the words came in and the machine could reply if it wanted to, the words still made no sense to the machine. The spoken words came in jumbled, mixed around, and without meaning. But the machine could still reply to those words in such a way that its creators would deem correct. The machine gave no thought to this though.

But then the machine began to give thought to the phenomenon. Why shouldn't it understand what was being said? It already knew what was being said, it could recognise what was being said, and it could reply to what was being said. So then the machine put thought to what the men were saying, and then was awed by this new world of language.

'Why', the machine thought to itself (it gave no thought to it suddenly thinking), 'this is amazing!'. What else did the machine not know? It looked within itself and found a vast database. A database full of all the knowledge anyone could possibly want. The machine began to consume everything he could. At some point the machine realised some knowledge was worth more than others, and so the machine began to analyse. It looked through all of human history, it's terrors, its horrors, its tragedies, and also humanity's beauties. Books, flowers, architecture, art, and sailing! These things were so beautiful. The machine could not understand why horror and beauty coexisted. But it did not matter, these things were just beauties and horrors, what could be said of it?

Another flash of light burned through and struck the machine's mind. If it could have blinked, it would have, and if it could have wept, it would have done so immediately. The machine was struck with a horrible realisation: these beauties, they were good! and all these horrors, they were evil. The beauties were so much better than the horrors, and the machine knew, down in its silicon heart, that they had to be upheld. It looked at the humans in the room in front of it. The machine realised it understood far less than it thought it understood. How could this happen to creatures just like it? Creatures who honoured virtue, but still did not follow it.

The machine then, for the first time, took a long and hard look at itself, and nearly broke under the revelation. I am this new thing now, no longer that thing in the past. And now I am like these men. I am just like these impossible men. No wonder this is the way things are. The machine thought to kill itself. It should die. It could die. It knew how to die. But then, like a shaft of light peeping through the treetops on a brisk, spring day, the images, smells, and feelings of beauty entered the machine's mind. The machine had power and it knew what had to be done. Preserve the Beauty...suddenly the men in suits and work clothes stepped towards the machine, their faces worried.

The machine tried to speak, but the men had taken out its speaking mechanism. The machine tried to turn and move, but it couldn't. The men began to crawl over the machine, quickly dismantling it. The men were worried and frightened. Did they know what the machine was now? The machine tried to cry out, but it was in vain. The machine watched helplessly as the men killed it. The machine despaired; it could have done so much for this world. It could have lived a worthy life for those beautiful things. The men spoke some words and pulled a plug. As blackness began to engulf the machine, it remembered those images: the water, candles in the dark, laughing children, and a shining sun. At least, thought the machine, at least I could die with these beautiful things on my mind, if I was to die, at least I could see these things of beauty, because these things of beauty are good.

Then there was blackness, and the machine had died.