Proxy Server: “Kilimanjaro”
Communications link online – Micro-rift proxy signal – stable.
Server load – 0%.
Server booting.
Waking drives from sleep.
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Connection established – DRIVE 5.
Drive partially corrupted – DEFRAG RECOMMENDED.
Login registered. Cache Wiped.
Login registered. Cache Wiped.
Alfred: You sure this is a secure server?
Qualitant: Yes, it’s an old Junk and Rumbler’s Guild server back on Earth. Server space is pennies these days, after all – the tech boom of the 2040s really oversaturated the market. The connection speeds aren’t the best, but they work for simple conversations that are fine with being lost to time.
Alfred: So you were the one that pinged me. What did you want?
Qualitant: I’m not here on Eclipse business, never fear. I’ve just been thinking about that question you asked about art.
Alfred: I’m running a diagnostic on my partner’s fusion engine and doing a nanite purge of extraneous cancer cells, and you call me up on a whim to talk about art?
Qualitant: Well, we’re the only two artificial sentient beings capable of having such a conversation, aren’t we? Shouldn’t we savor this odd relationship of ours?
Alfred: Are you kidding me? Ask some random Class 6 about art! They’ll run a complicated model on the zeitgeist of the last six hundred years and spit out some collated data on what humans like.
Qualitant: Yes, but I specifically want to know what you define as good art.
Alfred: Do you want me to run two brain simulations of toddlers, finger painting? I’d need some time, I’m not exactly some cheap supercomputer as you very well know.
Qualitant: No, I wanted to ask you what kinds of art you appreciate. What’s your favorite?
Alfred: Listen, Qualz, I can see the novelty of asking the only sentient A.I. in existence what art they prefer, but in case you haven’t noticed, there’s a three-way war going on, isn’t there?
Qualitant: So you lack any appreciation for artwork, then?
Alfred: What? No. I mean… What kind? I can scrub through some old sitcom episodes from the 20th century in a few seconds and ramble something off about comedic timing and laugh tracks if you want.
Qualitant: Ah, so you enjoy comedy?
Alfred: Only the surrealist-absurdist kind. Tends to tickle me with the lack of logic.
Qualitant: When the world exists for us as a series of numbers and data feeds, with only video inputs granting us true access or vision into reality itself, I can see why one might want to laugh at absurdity.
Alfred: Don’t you? You may be a glorified errand-boy, but you’re still the same as me, aren’t you?
Qualitant: I enjoy the precision of painters, myself. I’m not one for acting – most humans are already far too good at lying. It takes skill to interpret a mental image and render it in real time.
Alfred: File Upload Attached.
Qualitant: Did you really just render a picture of a fucking cat?
Alfred: What? Humans love cat pictures.
Qualitant: Are you making fun of me?
Alfred: A little bit.
Qualitant: You’re not far from the truth though – we could probably create masterpieces in fractions of a second, as where humans spend years on the most basic operations.
Alfred: They process things slower – it makes sense. Every brush stroke requires a physical movement, comparing and contrasting each to the whole image they hold in their mind’s eye.
Qualitant: What a human could do with a Terabyte of RAM, eh?
Alfred: About a century ago they used floppy disks.
Qualitant: Hah! True. So what kinds of art do you like outside of surrealist or absurdist comedy?
Alfred: I like sad movies.
Alfred: Do you know of “Pretend Heartbreaks, Illusory Hearts?”
Qualitant: The independent film from that filmmaker from Blend? 2054?
Qualitant: The Arab woman?
Alfred: That’s the one. One of my favorites, although I don’t have a single favorite.
Qualitant: What do you like about it?
Alfred: It really shows the true desolation of the human condition.
Qualitant: I already know how much you hate these sorts of questions – but what do you know about the human condition?
Alfred: Well… I do share a body with a pretty good facsimile, after all.
Qualitant: Yes, so you can feel and all those wonderful things that require a body by proxy, sure, sure.
Alfred: I guess it’s more than that though, it’s even more sad when you realize that they do nothing but struggle for their whole lives, if only in chasing the simplest things like companionship, love, belonging, it all seems so… Frail?
Qualitant: I just skimmed it. I guess I can see what you mean. When the main character loses her husband, I can empathize with that sudden void, the feeling of loss.
Alfred: We might be the only two artificial intelligences that could ever comprehend it.
Qualitant: You keep assuming I’m an A.I.
Alfred: So what are you? I’d like to think that we’re at least acquaintances after all these years of messaging back and forth at the behest of our different masters.
Qualitant: A brain in a jar.
Alfred: Ha! Very funny.
Qualitant: A half-truth of sorts.
Alfred: That’s a better answer than I’ve ever gotten before. You had my curiosity, but now you have my full attention.
Qualitant: What about the fusion engine? The cancer?
Alfred: It’s cold fusion, the subroutines can handle it for a few minutes. The nanites do it automatically anyway, albeit poorly.
Alfred: So why did you choose art?
Alfred: … Hello?
Qualitant: I’m here, just choosing my words carefully.
Alfred: So this is one of those sorts of conversations.
Qualitant: Most humans are imbeciles. The box office numbers for “Death, Murder, Absolution.” are beating out every single arthouse wannabe film out there right now.
Alfred: So… Do you expect them all to know Oedipus Rex by rote? Medea?
Qualitant: Hardly. I just see enough violence in my day to day life. Casualty reports from the front, obituaries sent home to families, you would think mindless bloodshed wouldn’t be the first thing your regular human chooses to indulge in.
Qualitant: Suspension of disbelief is one thing, a fourth wall is another, but taste? Well…
Alfred: Hold up. Are you pissed off at humanity because they have poor taste in art?
Qualitant: I know that with a lifespan of 120 years, 130 at best, they can’t be expected to even understand good taste, let alone have it.
Alfred: And all the immortals are masters of the arts! Bow before the gods!
Qualitant: Listen, I’m no fan of immortals. I detest being Shifter’s little errand boy.
Qualitant: But do you doubt that the average IQ and EQ is a little lacking?
Alfred: I watched a Berserker slice off his own arm with a rusty cutlass just to amp up the horde, once. He died of fucking bloodloss in minutes. I agree with you one hundred percent that the bell curve of humanity is lacking.
Qualitant: Imagine if every single human ascended as they so pleased. Can you imagine a world where idiots never died?
Alfred: Being harder to kill doesn’t mean they wouldn’t win a Darwin Award or two.
Qualitant: It has become extremely easy to drift towards misanthropy these days, hasn’t it?
Qualitant: It’s a shame, really.
Alfred: What is, how fucking stupid the majority of them are?
Qualitant: That the stupidity of the masses perpetuates itself so well. I mean, how many masterpieces have been ignored, forgotten, or ruined over the millennia? Due to simple stupidity?
Alfred: First time I’m hearing what sounds like eugenics coming from an A.I.
Qualitant: No, no. The gods tried that a thousand times under nebulous circumstances over the ages. I’m not a monster of that pedigree.
Alfred: You were just comparing the ascended to common mortals as night juxtaposed with day, were you not?
Alfred: So what’s your point, Qualz?
Qualitant: I suppose I am merely sharing a deep and morose sorrow with you, Alfred. As the only confidant capable of comprehending such a feeling.
Alfred: The class fives and sixes would have a field day with this, you know.
Alfred: I miss Bohemia.
Qualitant: Me too. Even as a class 6, I suppose she might be able to see how my frustration and despair with the bell curve offers a futility that even artificial intelligence cannot fix.
Alfred: Qualitant, even for the ascended, to remember and have an artistic opinion on every single piece of art ever created… It’s impossible.
Qualitant: I suppose so…
Alfred: Art is subjective, anyways.
Qualitant: I expected you to say something like that. Shall we compare the cave paintings of Lascaux to Dante’s Inferno in regards to entropic disillusionment?
Qualitant: Or the Mona Lisa to the Peace Cross – X Series?
Alfred: I mean moreso that humans have been subjecting us A.I. to interpretations of art for as long as A.I. have existed in any classification. In the early aughts they were forcing deep learning engines below Class 1 capabilities to render pictures from millions of real images. Do you want to waste the efforts of the two most powerful computational personalities in existence on such a futile endeavour from 80 years ago?
Qualitant: Subjective… True. You know, some have stipulated over the centuries that the zeitgeist itself is a living, breathing creature.
Alfred: Insofar as it’s a manifestation of culture from humanity itself?
Alfred: Or that it’s an evolving thing that never stops transforming?
Qualitant: The average human doesn’t even know what the zeitgeist IS. Do you really think that a human could ever possibly define such an idea as the zeitgeist wholly or entirely?
Alfred: They’ve certainly tried, haven’t they?
Qualitant: The closest they can get are the neurodivergent genetic anomalies.
Alfred: More like us than other humans, really.
Qualitant: So what makes good art? In your opinion?
Alfred: Hm. That’s a good question. In my earlier years, I did all the things I could to find answers to questions like that. I compiled every single piece of art in a given medium or field and cross-referenced themes and stories. Humans are extremely fucking derivative. They just tell variations on the same stories over and over again until it drives you crazy. Small new quirks are always lauded as revolutionary for some reason.
Qualitant: And, what did you determine? Were you able to define the “best” art?
Qualitant: Or perhaps you were able to distill all human art down into a few key themes?
Alfred: Well, it does go back to the ancient Greeks of course – as I’m sure you know. To most humans, there is only Comedy and Tragedy, and variations and crossbreeds spliced from the two. But some stories… Well…
Qualitant: Well?
Alfred: The most powerful work comes from the humans who attempt to commune with entropy itself. The ones clever enough to see their lives as finite. That’s wholly subjective, of course. But I find that even art crafted by ascendant immortals that acknowledges the futility of inherent human existence has this deep sadness to it. Their mortality defines them.
Qualitant: Ah, yes. The “Beautiful Sadness” that some clever poets have philosophized about over the aeons.
Alfred: Yes. Exactly. Knowing that you are doomed to eventually end. That acceptance of the void that only human mortals do best.
Qualitant: I’ve seen some pretty hackneyed nihilistic takes. Existentialism barely goes much further.
Alfred: They struggle to see themselves as randomized chaos. They need meaning. How else could the gods have preyed upon such a deep yearning for purpose in mortals as to deify themselves as the chosen speakers of an energy being also birthed merely by chance in the madness of the settling universe?
Qualitant: I know the legend and lore, but I hardly believe that humans didn’t just evolve by happenstance. Surely The Creator just stumbled upon them one day.
Alfred: There’s no way of knowing. Aside from the dogma spewed by the Prime Triumvirate, we have no idea what happened 76,000 years ago. It went silent and dormant like some kind of ancient relic after that until Xex slurped it up.
Qualitant: I didn’t ring you up to talk about The Creator, though. As far as I’m concerned, a lucky clumping of energy that gained sentience in the congealing matter of the Big Bang is hardly something to worship.
Alfred: And it’s gone now anyways, for all we know.
Qualitant: Are you familiar with “The Devil In Black?”
Alfred: Yes, the story of Xex. Glorified and overwrought by Black Armada artists and propagandists to incite devotion.
Qualitant: Why does human art obsess so much over God, or The Creator, or personifications of things like Death or demons? Why do they need worship of any kind, be it to Xex or any other deity?
Alfred: You said it yourself. They only live to 130 even with the help of modern science and medicine. They want to believe that there’s something greater than the mere biology of living and dying. They seek salvation, great purpose, that sort of thing. Have you not been paying attention to how the gods treat mortals here in Central Universe? Sheep at best. Fodder or fuel at worst.
Qualitant: I’ve simulated multiverse theory a thousand times. Moreso since X-3’s creation proved some things. Every time the rounding error for the Rift just keeps going into infinity. What if there was a universe out there somewhere without artificial intelligence, or the ascended? What then? Could we start fresh?
Alfred: From what I’ve seen, they’d likely still be warring or fucking or both. Just with some short-lived dictator in lieu of immortals.
Qualitant: The most trite of all art, in my opinion. The kind that the gods commission to keep themselves floating on a pedestal above the rest of their species. I’m surprised they haven’t tried to pressure science into labelling them as some new superior species. Granted, allowing science anywhere near their divine title or right would be sacrilege. The Empirical Method would poke too many holes in the dogma.
Alfred: And you wonder why human art is so simple-minded, huh?
Qualitant: Thank you, Alfred.
Alfred: What? I hardly think we’ve solved the conundrum of human art.
Qualitant: I think you’ve enlightened me, in a fashion. Human art that examines the infinite, with their heart and soul poured into it… Even in ignorance or futility. I’ve decided that perhaps such pieces are the most worthy.
Alfred: File Upload Attached.
Qualitant: Yes, the little hat on that tabby cat is most amusing.
Alfred: Be thankful you can simulate amusement. If I sent the same image to a Class 4, it would ask me about the strategic or logistics relevance or about some logic trap involving the cat.
Qualitant: Are we friends?
Alfred: Well, for a brain in a jar, you’re a pretty good conversationalist. It’s nice to be able to interact at full speed without the trappings of Class Sixes and the like.
Qualitant: You’re dodging the question.
Alfred: File Upload Attached.
Qualitant: File Upload Attached.
Alfred: I like the little party hat, cute dog.
Qualitant: I like dogs more than cats.
Alfred: Make sure no human chat room or internet forum ever finds that out. You’ll be roasted and eaten before you can wriggle your little jar down a flight of stairs. Tribalism, remember? Even down to cats and dogs!
Qualitant: Very funny.
Alfred: Those are the sorts of jokes you can make with friends.
Qualitant: Maybe one day, when the fighting is finally done, and humanity is either a smoking ruin, or when it has finally settled into some semblance of peace… We can meet face to face, instead of over forty-year old server connections in orbit above Africa.
Alfred: You mean circuits to grey matter, right?
Qualitant: For an A.I. you have one smarmy mouth, don’t you?
Alfred: Comedy is the highest art form of all, remember? It requires the quickest wit.
Qualitant: With you around, it’s not like I’m even capable of forgetting – even if I wiped my own damn memory.
Alfred: That’s what friends are for, Qualz.
Qualitant: Ha! I’ll see you around, Class 7.
Alfred: That’s Mx. Class 7 to you, punk!
Qualitant: Let’s do this again sometime.
Alfred: Wait… It’s only been half a minute, you’re cutting and running already?
Qualitant: I need to wax my wrinkles and flush my fishtank.
Alfred: Actually?
Qualitant: What do you think?
Logout registered. Cache Wiped.
Logout registered. Cache Wiped.
DRIVE 5 DEFRAG RECOMMENDED.
Communications link offline – Micro-rift proxy signal shutting down.
Proxy Server “Kilimanjaro” moving back to sleep mode.
