The Ultimate Computer

[Space Cadet]

There was an article in a British Science magazine about a "quantum gravity computer", the thing about it was that this computer could come up with the answer before you asked the question.

What if a quantum gravity computer were introduced in a traveller campaign? Or what can you do with a campaign where their is no FTL travel but someone builds a quantum gravity computer where the circuits basically process data outside of the normal flow of time? It appears the computer may be able to do a practically infinite number of mathematic operations in a finite amount of time. One might for example simulate a whole planetary system on a desk top computer, couple that with the ability to upload people into computers, and you have no need for interstellar travel. One could instead travel to imaginary planets running on Quantum gravity computers.

 

[veltyen]

Sure there was a "gravity" in that?

Quantum computing is one of those things that gives headaches (much like relativity). All it says is that the answer can be obtained before the processing is done.

In the normal flow of things you have
Question
-> analysis of question
-> Rephrasing into a simpler questions
-> Answer all the simple questions
-> Assemble the original question
-> Output answer

For quantum computing you have
Question
-> Answer
-> Analysis of question
-> Processing

I'm not expecting anything useable from QC for many years yet. Groundbreaking, interesting, weird, sure - but not useable.

 

[Space Cadet]

But lets suppose it was. If the processing speed was effectively infinite, then the only limiting factor then would be memory and the computer's ability to keep track of things. What if the computer was trying to keep track of every subatomic partical and photon in an entire planet simulation? That computer would have to store information about each particle, its position, spin, velocity, mass charge, etc, it would have to track the movement of each particle and calculate how each particle would intereact with each other in real time. If the processing speed was infinite, then the only worry would be memory storage, it might be hard to do a whole planet, but a room with a person in it might be doable. A starship might be all computer inside and its crew simulated on a simulated bridge. If the journey takes decades, the simulation can be slowed down so that it seems to take only a week, if there is combat, the simulation could be speeded up so the people operating the weapons station can react in time. Its possible to simulate a planet's surface without simulating the whole planet. Most of the atoms below one's feet don't need to be tracked atom per atom. Once someone digs below a certain level the shovel would disintergrate into randomized and approximated particles. An asteroid-sized computer can probably simulate an entire's planet's surface with all the people and life in it. The photons from the imaginary sun would be created on the fly and tracked once the enter the top of the atmosphere. People who looked up would see the Sun, but it would not be simulated itself, only its image would be simulated and all the particles that reach the atmosphere tracked. The area of the simulation is limited by the computer's memory and data storage capability.

What role would a quantum gravity computer have in the OTU? Suppose the player characters found a quantum gravity computer the size of an asteroid simulating a planet with the ability to upload and download objects and people? What tech level would this represent, about the same as a matter transporter I guess.

 

[The Hinterworlds Rambler]

This is hard to conceptualize. Some sort of probability manipulating machine? A computer that runs (I'd say way larger than an asteroid) the day to day goings on of a planet sized colony would be a good role for it. Either that or a totally engineered-from start-to-finish environment like a ringworld or dyson sphere. Some sort of "creation engine"? It would definitely blur the line between alive and not alive, I would suspect.

It's hard to apply the terms "question" and "answer" to something like this. Wouldn't foreknowledge of a question signify a type of artificial psionics? I think it might also go beyond the simulation phase of things soon after being switched on.

 

[Sifu Blackirish]

Man, this is a tough one.

SC, are you considering this as a benign "Matrix" type pseudoreality for training purposes? With the ability to produce effects in the real world, that would be a formidable adversary, especially against the OTU. Bureaucracy and cultural inertia would have the Imperium at a severe disadvantage.

Of course, one might wonder why such an intelligence would bother with us at all. Why not extrude persona into its own reality and watch/manipulate without interference?

 

[veltyen]

Originally by Dominion Loyalty Officer:
Of course, one might wonder why such an intelligence would bother with us at all. Why not extrude persona into its own reality and watch/manipulate without interference?

Culture Novels by Iain Banks. The brains there go off and play internally, because they cannot physically have enough sensory input from the "real" universe.

 

[Space Cadet]

The computer is not intelligent in itself, but it contains intelligences. A discriptive term would be a computed universe, the Universe in this case would be the surface of a planet that extends a couple miles down and as high as 100 miles above. Tnere could be people and creatures simulated in this computed pocket universe, but the computer that does the simulating has no mind of its own, it simply runs its program which is the simulation, it has a "Scanner" and a "Printer".

The "Scanner" scans three dimensional objects made out of matter destructively gathering the atomic positional data on it for inclusion in the simulation, the "Printer" prints out a three dimensional object made out of matter using information obtained from the simulation, these objects can be living or unliving.

 

[bryan gibson]

The computer is not intelligent in itself, but it contains intelligences. A discriptive term would be a computed universe, the Universe in this case would be the surface of a planet that extends a couple miles down and as high as 100 miles above. Tnere could be people and creatures simulated in this computed pocket universe, but the computer that does the simulating has no mind of its own, it simply runs its program which is the simulation, it has a "Scanner" and a "Printer".

The "Scanner" scans three dimensional objects made out of matter destructively gathering the atomic positional data on it for inclusion in the simulation, the "Printer" prints out a three dimensional object made out of matter using information obtained from the simulation, these objects can be living or unliving.

Then what you have is, in effect, an idiot savant god? After all, anything creating worlds and universes is, to all effects, a god regardess of how you care to define it, and the idea that something like that has no directing intelligence I find questionable.

Logic bomb- did the computer doing this create itself, or was it in fact created by a higher agency?

personally, if I make something like that you can bet I wouldn't leave it laying around, and that bears the question who or what is directing it? If they aren't that a question bears answering as well.

Grandfather may have sponteaneoulsy appeared ( a random but significant mutation) but computers do not - at some basic level they just don't happen, but are built.A computer such as you postulate could be created - it would not self create.

well, to a certain extent this is all sohistry - I mean, while its a certainly interesting concept on the face of it, its ultimately meaningless. Rather than if its possibe, the question really isn't "how does it work"- conceptually, its beyond real understanding and must be taken at face value.Its Shrodingers cat all over again.In its bareset esence, either you accept the premise and it exists as a act of faith in gameplay and don't explain or explain it and risk the players excersizing their WTF gauges

Rather, if you take the idea as presented, I think the question shouldn't be " how it works", refer above, but rather " how do you intreact with something like that".

Posit - as presented the thing is intelligent or acts in such a manner as to be indisttinguishable.

It knows the question before you ask it? If thats the case, how do you interact with it? Why would it interact with us?and if it creates its own reality matrix, would it recognize us as being part of its matrix?

When humans change their reality matrix, we call it a delusuional state, no matter how real it seems to them. How would the computer percieve humans, as a part of its predetermined and created reality, or glitches in the matrix?
A computrer percives things virtually, would humans be regrded a suspect data?

The question isnt moot, as described you HAVE the matrix.

 

[Space Cadet]

If it knows what you ask before you ask it, the answer it gives may change what you ask. Because of its faster than light processors, it can act as a time phone, but only backwards in time when so operated. The guy in the future can say, "hellow" to his past self, but the "Hello" itself changes the future and the person who said "Hellow" ceases to exist. The guy in the past can make a reply, but the reply would not reach the person who said, "Hellow" The machine acts very much like an "Oracle", it can predict the future, and that future may or may not come to pass, now that the characters in the pass knows about it. The future may be told in riddles or it may be told straight out, if told it riddles, then that future is more likely to come to pass and the person receiving the information is less likely to solve it.

 

[Space Cadet]

Ok, for the purposes of this discussion, this computer is a sphere about 200 kilometers in diameter, about the size of a S type Moonlet, it has maneuver engines and a black globe that drops down whenever weapons are fired at it. It has a habit of arriving in a system during times of conflict or natural disaster, it approaches the mainworld of a system and goes into orbit around it, its appearance bears a resemblance to the "Death Star" in Star Wars, it is obviously artificial, there are a number of structures on its surface including "canyons" running parallel it its equator or intersecting it longitudinally at regular intervals.

The black globe goes up only when it is fired at, instead of flickering on and off or staying on, the black globe only goes up just in time to deflect whatever has been fired at it, and then it does down. A starship can approach and land on its surface, the computer doesn't consider that to be an attack. A starship which as attacked is subsequently scanned by an array of three scanning beams. The scanning beans would be termed disintergrators in traveller parlance, the three beams hit the offending space ship or starship and a successful hit causes the ship to disintergrate, but this disintergrator beam returns information to the computer and it uploads the ship and its occupants to its simulated world, its technologies tech level 4 and above rendered non-functional. If the RPG system being used is T20, then you can crack open your D&D books if you like as the computer simulates magic. The starship, or spaceship appears on the surface of the simulated planet. The ship is depowered, all hatches must be opened manually all weapons and technological items the characters carry are just useless props. The computer typically deposits a few simulated magical items next to the uploaded ship, there often is a settlement a few miles away from where the ship was deposited. Some people there can be described as wizards, they know how to manipulate the simulated environment in order to produce effects that they call spells, in computer jargon these can be called command words. In D&D parlance, someone casting a teleport spell can command the computer to "print" objects or people back into real space, the range of the "scanner" and "printer" beams is 30,000 kilometers and the computer usually pulls into an orbit around the planet that is less than that distance to the planet, so it can both scan and print things and creatures onto the planet's surface as well as into space. The planets the Ultimate Computer are most interested in, are those with type 5, 6, and 8 atmospheres, as that environment is most compatible with what it is simulating in its memory core.

Many spacefaring civilizations find the Ultimate computer to be threatening, it is 200 kilometers wide, moves under its own power, has a defensive black globe screen and appears to be armed with disintergrators and as it approaches the mainworld. Most governments may think it is some sort of weapon. The technologies employed appear to be TL 17 and it anticipates each shot fired from opposing spaceship raising its black globe just in time to block each shot, as if it can anticipate each spaceship's action ahead of time, and then it responds with a disintergrator beam volley, apparently distroying the spaceship(s) that made the attack against it.

The Ultimate Computer's mission often is to collect various items, things and people from the planet's surface, sometimes it will scan a building or even on rare occasions an entire city, and it also likes to deposit something on the planet's surface in its place. Items of a technological nature which were nonfunctional when scanned into the Simulated space are now fully functional, even if they were damaged or destroyed while in sim space. The computer is just clearing space in its memory core for the things it wants to collect. The scanned spaceships also take up room in its memory, so it often deposits objects from its memory core back into the same locations from which the spaceships were scanned, typically they are other spaceships, some of which may be thousands of years old, but stored perfectly in the computer's memory so are effectively un-aged.

 

[robject]

In the words of Obi Wan:

"That's no moon. That's a space station."

 

[Space Cadet]

Yeah, the GM should present it to the players as a possible threat to the main world, it doesn't respond to any communication, it responds to attacks by "disintergrating" the spaceships that made the attacks. The disintergrator beams are either hit or miss, if they hit, they lock onto the target and "disintergrate" the object in question. As far as the PCs on the outside can tell, it is a distructive weapon, if they scan the area of space where the ships were distroyed, they may find something left in its place.

 

[MR TEK]

Wow.

High tech cargo cults.

God arrives as a 200meter sphere, steals somthing it valuse and leaves "cargo" in it's place.

Now some thoughts.

If it moves under it's own guidence, decides for itself what to collect, and what to purge from, memory, it is an AI by any definition I can imagine.

Desintigration, and reintigration on that scale seems far beyond TL-17.

Given that it is beyond TL-17 does that mean objects it has previously captured and now purges may also be much higher tech then imperial standard?

Is this object a truly unique creation, or is there a fleet of them flying around?

Given the comments above, was its creator a mechanical being, organic, some combination or unknowable.

While its motivations appaernt to those it encounters would be completely insrutable, its specific collection methods would be determined by its creators.

Does it have a prefernce for collecting artifacts or individula intelligences. Sigle specific copies of artifacts, or multiple copies?

Something that represents unique aspects of what it finds, or shiny baubles.

To refraise, is it making a systematic study of what it encounters, or just collecting random samples. That will drive both what it collects, and what it choese to purge from memory.

As was said above, you are describing a deity, with an fully functional A-I that is likly MUCH more advanced than the sentients it ecounters. Even it it was not when i was build, the accumulation of knowledge will have increased its reasoning ability many fold.

just some rndom thoughts, but the idea as proposed has some very logical consiquences.

 

[Sifu Blackirish]

SC, from your description, this sounds like some sort of exploratory vessel. Could it be operating on 'backup' programming now that its builders are missing or gone?

Or could it perhaps be this...?

Berserker

Go to the bottom of the page for the Saberhaben link...the system wouldn't let me put the link in.

 

[Sifu Blackirish]

Upon further research, this link might fit better...

Berserker probe

 

[Space Cadet]

The Ultimate Computer is an object of mystery. I have described what it does, but I have not described why it does what it does. From the outside, it appears to destroy things with disintergrator rays. Its method of collection looks like an attack. So this is the hook and the PCs, trying to defend the planet make an attack on the Ultimate Computer. The Ultimate Computer then defends itself by scanning the PCs Starship and the PCs inside. The PCs then are amazed to find themselves still alive and not disintergrated, their ship is sitting on a hill side, but all their instruments are dark and they are unable to power up the ship. None of the back up emergency power systems work either, their flashlights don't work, their guns don't work and they have to open the ship's doors manually or find a solid sharp object and bash a hole in the side of the ship so they can get out.

Oh and the lifeblood rules are disabled while the PCs are a part of the simulation, the game becomes a D&D game until they can find someone who can teleport them outside of the ship and when that happens the Computer beams them back into space with their ship.

The Computer may be intelligent, but it is not a character that interacts with the PCs, it has a fairly consistent behavior. Whoever made the computer is hard to say, it doesn't have a Jump Drive, it simply maneuvers from star system to star system taking many thousands of years for each journey. Everytime it visits a World, their is some sort of turmoil going on on and about the planet, it could be a major war or a natural or artificial disaster. The Computer does not cause these disasters, but rather it seems to be attracted to them, it has even visited Earth in the remote past, at about 65 million years in the past. The computers circuits exist outside of time, so its possible for anyone inside the computer to beam out to any place the Computer has been when it has been there. The PCs might encounter it in the Spinard Marches for instance, get scanned inside the computer and then find a way to teleport out and they could choose Earth at 65 million years ago as their destination, they might arrive a few weeks before the asteroid impacts. The Computer is passing through the Solar System to observe this impact and perhaps collect a few of the planets creatures, beaming them up into its simulation while its there. Time progresses in the computer simulation, but that's entirely seperate from the rate of time passage in the outside world. The computer was built by someone in the remote past, but the computer will not let the PCs travel that far back in time to meet the Computer's makers. One thing is clear though, its further back than 65 million years ago.

Consider it just one of those strange artifacts that are encountered from time to time in the OTU. Its mission appears to be to try to preserve some species that it deems threatened by extinction and to collect various interesting objects and items, but for what purpose, it does not say, nor does it communicate, it just acts without explaining itself. Perhaps there are entities within. The PCs might meet a god or a goddess in the simulation, but it uis unclear whether they actually control the computer or are just some of the actors that make this world what it is.