‘Xiè xiè,’ Dr Wang Shu said to the barrista and walked out of the Renaissance Hotel coffee shop with a cup of her new favorite taste, Café Luna.
Every morning she got her coffee here, regular like clockwork. The machine at the University was an abomination and this place was right across the street. Normally she chose a simple latte, but today her eye was caught by the miniature chalkboard on the counter, advertising ‘Café Luna’, the ‘C’ drawn in the shape of a small crescent moon. They described it as less milky, more caramelly.
She took a sip while waiting for the traffic light, savoring the surprising taste.
The path towards the University’s entrance forked and went left and right around a well-manicured lawn. Wang Shu cut right through the grass. It was her own small act of rebellion. A sign in English said ‘Keep off the grass’ with in smaller Chinese underneath:
请不要踩草坪 which translated back to ‘please don’t step on the lawn’ which really said everything about the two languages, thought Wang.
She looked up. As always she felt a mixture of awe and pride. Awe for the imposing white building with its central tower of blue glass, which looked like an elevator to the heavens. Pride, that she was a part of all that this prestigious institution embodied. ‘The future will start right here in Wuhan,’ the director had said at her appointment. And, stepping through the big black oak doors today, hugging a cup of magnificent coffee, she felt like it.
As always, she looked at the matte black sign which said ‘Department AI’. Ai was her mother’s name. She couldn’t think about her without thinking about the coconut smell of her hair and the proud look in her eyes. Wang Shu was an only child and her mother had paid dearly for her. She was born with a black birthmark over the left side of her face and though the doctors swore it was innocent, her superstitious father had left them. Her mom called it her moon shadow and said she was destined for greatness.
Wang stepped into the quiet lab. She went systematically through the data and looked at the screen of the AI they had named Zhi, currently turned off for updates. Seven hundred irregularities today. Zhi rewrote her code more often and faster now. The team could hardly keep up. Some were elegant improvements on her algorithms, but sometimes Zhi made changes in her code for no apparent reason.
Wang liked to compare it to evolution if she had to explain. They were mutations that weren’t useful right now, but might come in handy in the future. Zhi herself couldn’t really explain either. She simply lacked intelligence. Even though her neural network was improving exponentially, you couldn’t really talk with her. For now she wasn’t much brighter than a toddler, incapable of carrying on a coherent conversation.
Wang sat down behind her small monitor, downed her coffee and pressed ‘execute.’