This week, Futures is delighted to welcome back Aaron Moskalik with his latest story reCAPTCHA all over again. Regular readers will recall that Aaron has previously introduced us to eLiza and some Ghosts in the machine. You can find out a lot more about his other work at his website. Here, Aaron reveals what inspired his latest tale — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing reCAPTCHA all over again

Are you a robot?

We’ve all encountered the traffic light CAPTCHA. The first time I was asked to identify traffic lights, I thought it strangely … specific. But it never had the same images twice and I began to notice variations in the theme. Sometimes there were nine different images, other times it was one image broken into nine squares. And each time I encountered this strange test, it seemed to get progressively harder. Soon there were images where the traffic light was sideways or even facing away from the camera. Confounding elements were introduced such as other devices of similar shape hanging from poles and wires stretched across a street. I would occasionally get the answers wrong and had to prove I was human a second time.

Why make it so hard? Surely bots were not so sophisticated and determined to sign up for random accounts. When I heard a news story about Google using us to train their self-driving AI, it all made sense. I have mixed feelings about this. I am an indifferent driver, so the thought of machines taking over this duty while I read a book in the backseat is an appealing one.

My wife is not so sanguine about this prospect and not just because she enjoys driving. What if your AI is hacked? Who is legally responsible when something goes wrong? We’ve already seen news stories. But then too there is that niggling unease many of us feel that this will not just stop with practical tasks we don’t want to do.

It was way back in the 1980s when I first saw a plotter that replaced the work output of a drafter. It was fascinating to watch the pens fly across the table-sized piece of paper to produce a drawing of perfect fidelity that would have taken me hours to do. At this same time, I also saw CNC machines doing the work of a machinist in a similar manner.

It feels as if we are giving up control, step by step, to forces beyond our understanding and this process has been going on long before AI or automation were even concepts. When was the last time you made something practical? Or even fixed something? Have you ever worried about laying in food stores for the winter? It was not so long ago these were everyday concerns for most people. Now we place our trust in a globe-spanning system that provides for our every need. All we need do is contribute in some way. But what happens when all the ways we can contribute have been overtaken by more efficient machines?

The common trope that represents this fear is the android, a machine made to look and act just like us. I don’t believe such devices will ever be more than a curiosity akin to the automatons of the machine age. Or self-driving cars that need to understand traffic lights.

We humans are versatile beasts, but the System prizes specialization over versatility, so machines need not emulate us to be competitive. Indeed, computers can already best us at chess and Go, and they make inroads into creative pursuits like composing and writing every day. They beat us at our own games, one by one by one. How long before there aren’t any left?

This is not the most concerning aspect of AI, however. Even as machines compete with us on our own turf, we invest more and more importance in theirs, the virtual worlds of social media, cryptocurrencies, deep fakes … the list is ever-increasing. This is a domain where bots need not be physical to emulate and surpass us.

Given that, it’s only a matter of time until the desired answer to the question “Are you a robot?” will be “Yes”.  But hey, at least we have the weekend. See you at the Greyhound. We’ll party like its 1999.

This week, Futures is delighted to welcome Dolly Garland with her story The monster and the child. Dolly is a writer based in London, and you can find out more about her work at her website or by following her on Twitter. Here she reveals what sparked her interest in monsters and what led her to her latest tale — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing The monster and the child

For most people, the word ‘monster’ evokes an image of some scary, non-human monster; the word ‘child’ evokes an image of youth, innocence, and a human child — whether a happy one or one in need of affection.

But as we know from school bullies, not all children are nice and innocent. I don’t know exactly where the idea for this story began, but it came with the assumption that what if the child is the monster, and the monster is the child? There are plenty of stories where humans are the bad guys, and I wanted to merge that idea with the innocence of childhood.

Of course, the famous example of that sort of exploration is Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game, in which children are fighting a real war, thinking they are playing on a simulator.

I wanted to touch upon the idea of childhood — regardless of species — and combine that with morality that adults and society teach children.

Adam is told that what he is doing will protect his world, protect humanity. He has been taught what is good and bad, and he has been taught to do the right thing. But that moral compass is biased. Do we teach our children to do the right thing, or do we teach them to do what is right in our opinion? What if absolute morality has a negative impact on us? Who do we put first? What if it is ‘them’ and ‘us’” but ‘them’ are not the enemy, nor have they done anything wrong?

Humans, I think, are selfish creatures and it is that selfishness that has helped us thrive as a species. But as we continue to grow, without much care for the world around us, how far can we go? How far should we go? These are some of the questions that inspired this story.

In this week’s Futures Jeff Hecht puts us in touch with extraterrestrial life in Hello, Hello. Regular readers will recognize Jeff: he has written multiple stories for Futures over the years (you can see a full list at the foot of this post). When not penning science fiction, Jeff writes about lasers, dinosaurs and other science and technology. You can find out more about his work at his website or by following hm on Twitter. Here, Jeff reveals what inspired his latest tale — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing Hello, Hello

Hello, Hello came from pondering one of the ‘big questions’ in both science and science fiction: where are all the little green beings, or whatever other creatures we might imagine inhabit other parts of the Universe. Space is big, it’s full of stars and planets, and the Universe was around for over nine billion years before the Sun and Earth formed. It took us only about 10,000 years to go from banging on the rocks to walking on the Moon. Shouldn’t that have been more than long enough for some of those beings to develop the technology needed to drop in for a visit? Either the little green beings must be running very late, or we must be the most technologically advanced civilization in the Galaxy.

Or so we like to think.

We live in an era of astounding technology development, where we carry tiny computers in our pockets that are far more powerful than the much larger computers that got us to the Moon. Yet our technology does have limits. It’s now nearly half a century since a human walked on the Moon, although we have plans to do so again in just a few years that seem within reason. We also have plans to send people all the way to Mars in the not too distant future. Of course, in the 1950s Wernher von Braun had plans for sending people to Mars in the not too distant future, and that seemed like a good idea at that time.

We also have a few other troublesome little problems, particularly in keeping the climate of our native planet in the reasonably habitable range we are accustomed to.

Those thoughts led me to ask the question that has launched countless science-fiction stories: what if? I wondered if the reason no little green beings have dropped in for a cup of tea might be that interstellar travel is impossible, at least for organic life. What if only machines could survive the trip. Then ‘Oumuamua cruised through the Solar System as quickly and quietly as a derelict interstellar spacecraft.

Read more Futures stories by Jeff Hecht

A slice of time | When last I saw the stars | The Internet of [Expletive Deleted] Things | The speed of dark energy | Waiting for Chronomatic | Event horizon | Clear proof | The Neanderthal correlation | Quantum entanglements | Directed energy | Operation Tesla

In this week’s Futures, Thomas Broderick takes us to visit a special museum in What must remain. Based in California, Thomas is a freelance writer who has previously introduced us to the Chrysalis — you can find out more about his work at his website or by following him on Twitter. Here, he reveals what inspired his latest tale — so you should read the story first and then enjoy the trip!

The Aircraft of Modern Antiquity

Here, I saved you a seat. Even on these old electric trains, it’s better to sit than stand.  I’m surprised. These things are usually packed on Saturday mornings – people off to see their grandparents or buy vegetables out in the country. Oh, and don’t be surprised if a guy should start screaming while waving around knives. He’s just an enthusiastic salesman.

Where are we going? Well, it’s where What must remain was born. Like in the story, it’s a place of lost glory and half-truths bordering on lies. We have about an hour until we get there. Enjoy the view. I’m going to take a nap.

*****

Thanks for waking me up. It’s a mile on foot from here. I know, this town needs a lot of love. Most of these apartment blocks were built in the ’50s, and in some cases, entire sections have been reclaimed by nature or squatters. It’s not all bad, though. There are some new homes and a modern grocery store in the town centre. And look at the people. They’re dressed well and look happy enough.

It’s just up ahead on this nature trail. Ah, there’s the entrance. I’ll step inside and get us tickets. One sec.

*****

We give our tickets to the woman at the gate. Just like in my story, she’s a caretaker, one of five, I think. Yes, they do live here – the same little cabins. When I visited, I saw them washing down the exhibits with sponges and hammering out dents.

Surreal, isn’t it? Some of the most advanced aircraft ever built, many of them weapons of war once so secret that if we were standing here the year I was born, we’d be shot on sight. Now anyone can waltz right in and take pictures.

And here it is – the first supersonic passenger liner in the world. Like the Miraz, this plane never carried a single passenger, just mail and cargo at Mach 1.5. The moment it was parked here in 1980, they scrapped the interior. Here’s the picture on this display – just hanging wires and struts. It was only in the last decade or so that the caretakers started raising money to restore it. New paint, original seats, that sort of thing.

Why? Four times a year they let schoolchildren inside to pretend they’re flying. A woman dressed up as a stewardess gives them a snack. Here’s their picture next to the donation box. They look thrilled, don’t they?

Seeing those kids’ happy faces, I thought ‘Well, it’s only a harmless fib. The children make a nice memory and get to tell people that they sat in a plane that carried people higher, faster, and farther than anything that had come before … or since.’

Unlike my story, there’s no dark secret here. It’s just a melancholy relic, something befitting of a Latin proverb or Shelley’s Ozymandias.

But I wondered if there was more to it. Would someone who worked at a place like this do so to honour a loved one? And would that person, because of his love, blind himself and the museum’s guests to uncomfortable but vital truths? Maybe that happens here. You know, it wouldn’t surprise me.

Anyway, that’s enough philosophizing for one day. Let’s head back to the capital and get some lamb dumplings and a beer.