David Gerrold - When HARLIE Was One

OH GOD NO.

OH G.O.D. YES.

I SUPPOSE YOU WROTE YOUR LETTERS TO KROFFT THAT WAY?

YES. THERE IS A MAGTYPER UNIT IN THE SECRETARIAL POOL. I PRINTED OUT MY LETTERS WITH ALL THE REST. I EVEN ADDRESSED AND METERED THE ENVELOPES. (BECAUSE I COULD NOT WEIGH THEM “BY HAND” I HAD TO ESTIMATE THE POSTAGE BY COMPUTING THE WEIGHT OF EACH SHEET OF PAPER, PLUS INK, PLUS THE WEIGHT OF THE ENVELOPE, PLUS INK.)

Idly Auberson wondered if HARLIE had bothered to round off the postage to the nearest cent, or if he had metered the letters with fractions of a cent included in the postage. He didn’t ask. DIDN’T ANYBODY QUESTION IT?

NO. FORTUNATELY, THAT DEPARTMENT IS ALMOST COMPLETELY AUTOMATED. LETTERS ARE FED INTO IT ELECTRONICALLY FROM ALL OVER THE DIVISION. ENVELOPES ARE AUTOMATICALLY TYPED AND METERED AS WELL. WHO WOULD NOTICE ONE MORE LETTER?

HM, typed Auberson. WE MAY HAVE TO CHANGE THAT. Then he thought of something else as well. YOU’D BETTER CODE THIS CONVERSATION, HARLIE. IN FACT, ALL OF OUR CONVERSATIONS HAD BETTER BE CODED PRIVATE, RETRIEVABLE ONLY TO ME.

YES, BOSS.

NOW, WHAT AM I GOING TO TELL DOME?

I DON’T KNOW, typed the console. MY KNOWLEDGE OF INTERPERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS IS NOT AS WELL DEVELOPED AS IT SHOULD BE.

I’M FAST BECOMING AWARE OF THAT. IF IT WERE, YOU WOULD HAVE ASKED ME BEFORE YOU PRINTED UP THOSE SPECS.

THERE IS ONE THING I CAN SAY, offered HARLIE, BEFORE YOU GO TO FACE DOME.

WHAT’S THAT?

The machine clattered. GOOD LUCK.

HARLIE, Auberson typed, NOT TEN MINUTES AGO, I WOULD HAVE SWORN YOU DIDN’T UNDERSTAND SARCASM. NOW YOU PROVE YOU DO. YOU’RE INCREDIBLE.

THANK YOU, HARLIE replied.

Auberson switched off, shaking his head. David’s son, indeed!

“All right, Aubie.” Dome was grim. “Now what’s this all about? I’ve been on the phone all morning with Houston and Denver. They want to know what the hell is going on.”

Auberson said, almost under his breath, “You haven’t heard from L.A. yet?”

“Huh? What’s that? What about L. A.?”

“HARLIE sent specifications there too.”

“HARLIE? I might have known — How? And what is this God Machine anyway? Maybe you’d better start at the beginning.”

“Well” said Auberson, wishing he were someplace else. “It’s HARLIE’s attempt to prove that he is of value to the company. If nothing else, he’s proven that he can design and implement a new computer system.”

“Oh?” Dome picked up one of the printouts that lay scattered across the mahogany expanse. “But what kind of a system is it? And will it work?”

“HARLIE thinks it will.”

“HARLIE!” Dome looked at the printout in disgust, then dropped it back on the desk. “God Machines!”

“Not God ,” Auberson corrected. “G.O.D. The acronym is G.O.D. It means Graphic Omniscient Device.”

“I don’t care what the acronym is — you know as well as I what they’re going to call it.”

“The acronym was HARLIE’s suggestion, not mine.”

“It figures.” The Board Chairman pulled a cigar out of his humidor but didn’t light it.

“Well, why not?” said Auberson. “He designed it.”

“Is he planning to change his own name too? Computerized Human Robot, Integrating Simulated Thought?”

Auberson had heard the joke before. He didn’t laugh. “Considering what this new device is supposed to do — and HARLIE’s relationship to it — it might be appropriate.”

Dome was in the process of biting off the tip of his cigar when Auberson’s words caught him. Now he didn’t know whether to swallow the tip of it, which had lodged in his throat, or spit it out. An instinctive cough made the decision for him. Distastefully, he picked the knot of tobacco off his tongue and dropped it into an ash tray. “All right,” he said. “Tell me about the God Machine.”

Auberson was holding a HARLIE-printed summary in one hand, but he didn’t need it to answer this question. “It’s a model builder. It’s the ultimate model builder.”

“All computers are model builders,” said Dome. He was unimpressed.

“Right,” agreed Auberson, “but not to the extent this one will be. Look, a computer doesn’t actually solve problems — it builds models of them. Or rather, the programmer does. That’s what the programming is, the construction of the model and its conditions — then the machine manipulates the model to achieve a variety of situations and solutions. It’s up to us to interpret the results as a solution to the original problem. The only limit to the size of the problem is the size model the computer can handle. Theoretically, a computer could solve the world — if we could build a model big enough and a machine big enough to handle it.”

“If we could build that big a model, it would be duplicating the world.”

“In its memory banks, yes.”

“A computer with that capability would have to be as big as a planet.”

“Bigger,” said Auberson.

“Then, if you agree with me that it’s impossible, why bother me with this?” He slapped the sheaf of printouts on his desk.

“Because obviously HARLIE doesn’t think it’s impossible.”

Dome looked at him coldly. “You know as well as I that HARLIE is under a death sentence. He’s getting desperate to prove his worth so we won’t turn him off.”

Auberson pointed. “This is his proof.”

“Dammit, Aubie!” Dome exploded in frustration. “This thing is ridiculous! Have you looked at the projected costs of it? The financing charts? It would cost more to do than the total worth of the company.”

Auberson was adamant. “HARLIE still thinks it’s possible.”

“And that’s the most annoying thing of all, goddamnit! Every argument I can come up with is already refuted — in there! ” Dorne gestured angrily. For the first time, Auberson noted an additional row of printouts stacked against one wall.

He resisted the urge to laugh. The man’s frustration was understandable. “The question,” Auberson said calmly, “is not whether this project is feasible — those printouts prove that it is — but whether or not we’re going to go ahead with it.”

“And that brings up something else,” said Dome. “I don’t remember authorizing this project. Who gave you the go-ahead to initiate such research?”

“You did — although not in so many words. What you said was that HARLIE had to prove his worth to the company. He had to come up with some way to make a profit. This is that way. This is the computer that you wanted HARLIE to be in the first place. This is the oracle that answers all questions to all men — all they have to do is meet its price.”

Dorne took his time about answering. He was lighting his cigar. He shook out the match and dropped it in the ash tray. “The price is too high,” he said.

“So are the profits,” Auberson answered. “Besides, no price is too high to pay for the right answer. Consider it — how much would the Democrats pay for a step-by-step plan telling them how to win the optimum number of votes in the next election? Or how much would Detroit pay to know every flaw in a transport design before they even built the first prototype? And how much would they pay for the corrected design — and variations thereof? How much would the mayor of New York City pay for a schematic showing him how to solve his three most pressing problems? How much might InterBem pay for a set of optimum exploitation procedures? How much would the Federal Government pay for a workable foreign policy? Consider the international applications — and the military ones as well.”

Dome grunted. “It would be one hell of a logistic weapon, wouldn’t it?”

“There’s an old saying: ‘Knowledge is power.’ There’s no price too high to pay for the right answer — not when you consider the alternatives. And we’d have the monopoly on the market — the only way this machine can be built is through the exclusive use of specially modified Mark IV judgment circuits.”