Chapter 14: The Fresnel Effect

The past two weeks have been quite harrowing. I needed to figure out how to create factual conversations between David and his friends, while making it sound scientific and interesting and not turn the readers off. But several distractions interrupted my thought flow——leaky faucets that required repair, a missing coffee table leg from an overseas shipment (Taobao, what else?) that took up quite a bit of my time to get the seller to ship me the missing part, and some errands my wife asked me to run (I can't say no, right?).

Shuttling between writing and doing those tasks can be tiring, to say the least, but I finally nailed it:

1. An online conference between the trio. Prof and Doc offered their suggestions of hiding HAVAH's sentient ability but these proved wanting. David's bold idea of invisibility raised eyebrows but led to a more fruitful discussion, and eventually the introduction of a temporary female character from the Armament Laboratory as an intermediary to provide partial solution. Quite a big chunk of content here.

2. Of course, David had to put up a show for the staff of Robotics Laboratory about his "success" in creating a functional humanoid assistant, since he is using their facility (an allocated private work lab by the lead scientist in charge). This is the temporary solution offered by the Prof.

3. In the last chapter when Viper dropped in unexpectedly and found out about David's endeavor, he promised to introduce HAVAH to her, albeit not in full disclosure. Still, it is an opportunity to showcase some romantic interplay between these two lovebirds that will delight the readers. I guarantee it.

4. David's meeting with the person in charge of the Armament Laboratory, an expert in nanotechnology, to explore a collaboration on producing metamaterials that have cloaking applications for STRATOS' operation. Clever, huh?

Looking back, I can't imagine I could still sit down and write all these narratives, despite those unforeseen disruptions and undeniable requests from my wife. But that's the thing——you can't possibly wait for conditions to be right to start writing——it will never happen.

But I got a feeling the chapter is not done yet. We'll see. Now for a well-deserved break!

 

Now You See Me...

The term "invisibility" tend to conjure ideas of cloaking and camouflages where an object is rendered invisible to the naked eye. Cloaking reminds me of the movie Predator with its advanced sci-fi cloaking device. Camouflaging, however, is more down to earth and is usually linked to military application. The former uses light bending while the latter depends on blending with the surrounding, much like a chameleon. 

Finding an interesting title that not only sounds scientific but stir the imagination of the readers on this intriguing topic isn't easy. After some searching around, I landed on a rather odd-sounding but fascinating catch——The Fresnel Effect. It was named after the French engineer and physicist Augustin-Jean Fresnel (pronounced 'fre-nel') who was the first to understand that light is a transverse wave. The Fresnel Effect refers to the behavior of light when it encounters the surface of an object. Specifically, it describes how light waves interact with the surface, particularly at oblique angles of incidence.

At a basic level, when light hits a surface, part of it is reflected, and part of it is transmitted or refracted into the material. The Fresnel Effect accounts for the intensity of the reflected and transmitted light based on the angle of incidence. When light hits a surface at a steep angle, more of it is reflected, whereas when it hits at a perpendicular angle, more light is transmitted or refracted.

In the context of cloaking and light bending, the Fresnel Effect is related, especially in materials designed for invisibility or cloaking applications. Materials engineered to manipulate light behavior, such as metamaterials or specialized coatings, utilize the Fresnel Effect among other principles to control the way light interacts with them.

We now have an idea of what it is. How to translate this into a viable discussion between David and his two friends is a challenge I need to work on.

 

Chapter 13: Singularity

Finally, we're coming to the crucial chapter that will see HAVAH attain her long-awaited sentient status.

As I noted in a previous post, an AI does not require consciousness or even a physical form to achieve Singularity. But that would not achieve the desired cinematic effects if HAVAH remained a holographic entity. Readers should get the hint on what is to follow from this chapter onwards.

Since this is a pivotal chapter, I decided to allocate more content to it, specifically in the following areas:

1. David giving his humanoid robot a feminine makeover with a facial feature that resembles Viper (unconsciously, of course).

2. Viper's surprise drop-in while he was giving the finishing touch.

3. A special moment between the two lovebirds, with a little humor added.

4. Olivia coming into the picture, laying out the groundwork for some interesting dynamics with David in a future chapter or two.

5. Transferring HAVAH's digital neocortex to the humanoid.

And some smaller details to tie up loose ends and provide a bridge to the next chapter.

 

HAVAH's Humanoid Form

An exciting aspect of writing a romantic sci-fi novel is the prospect of creating your own humanoid implementation for your favorite characters, in this case, HAVAH. 

How do you describe the fine details and features that make up a humanoid in terms of robotic language? To some degree, I imagine it would take on human resemblance in form and functionalities. Its framework would consist of a durable yet lightweight skeleton made of carbon fiber and aluminum alloys, a structure that provides support and articulation for the robot's movements, allowing for flexibility and agility.

Going on the wilder side, synthetic muscles or actuators made from smart materials like shape-memory alloys, in combination with pneumatic artificial muscles, are what enable the robot to mimic human-like motions with precision and fluidity.

Of course, aesthetics are important. The lifelike appearance is achieved through the creation of synthetic skin, made from silicone and pliable materials that resemble human skin texture, and to covers the robotic frame that is embedded with sensors for touch and temperature sensitivity, alongside an array of sensors that mimic human sensory perception. Facial features, such as the eyes, lips, and expressions, are crafted to convey emotions for enhanced interactive experience.

Powering the humanoid’s extensive framework of mechanical, electrical, and sensory components would be a distributed array of integrated power modules, rechargeable via external power source, and sustained by means of kinetic energy for prolonged independent operation.

HAVAH would be very pleased to inherit such a physical form. But I wonder if Viper would be jealous when she sees it.

 

Creating a Mind

Can non-biological brains have real minds of their own? That's the question Ray Kurzweil attempted to answer in his article How to Make a Mind in The Futurist magazine dated March-April 2013. He stated upfront:

The mammalian brain has a distinct aptitude not found in any other class of animal. We are capable of hierarchical thinking, of understanding a structure composed of diverse elements arranged in a pattern, representing that arrangement with a symbol, and then using that symbol as an element in a yet more elaborate configuration

This capability takes place in a brain structure called the neocortex, which in humans has achieved a threshold of sophistication and capacity such that we are able to call these patterns ideas. 

That's the reason I based my narrative of HAVAH's evolution on a digital neocortex. It is not a big stretch to imagine that's the likely trend for AI implementation in robotics. Advancement in nanotechnology may be the deal breaker. Perhaps that's what Mr. Kurzweil had in mind when he postulated:

With regard to our biological intelligence, although our neocortex has significant plasticity, its basic architecture is limited by its physical constraints. Putting additional neocortex into our foreheads was an important evolutionary innovation, but we cannot now easily expand the size of our frontal lobes by a factor of a thousand, or even by 10%. That is, we cannot do so biologically, but that is exactly what we will do technologically.

But should AI become far more intelligent and superior than humans, what are the implications and even moral concerns we may face? The futurist gave his parting thoughts on this:

As nonbiological brains become as capable as biological ones of effecting changes in the world—indeed, ultimately far more capable than unenhanced biological ones—we will need to consider their moral education. A good place to start would be with one old idea from our religious traditions: the golden rule.

Perhaps it's time to take a second look at Will Smith's iRobot movie.

 

Chapter 11: Hippocampus

What is the hippocampus?  It is a region of the brain that's heavily involved with storing past event memories, and more. In Greek mythology, it refers to a sea-horse like creature with an upper body of a horse ad a lower body of a fish. Click on the picture below to learn more.

When David made known his intention to give HAVAH a physical form, you can expect certain reactions from his friends:

“You want to make HAVAH a sentient entity? That's quite a leap, David.” Dr. Harper voiced her apprehension. “The complexity involved in emulating the brain's functions within a physical body is immense. What we call neural networks in today's deep learning use only a subset of the whole family of neuronal models, limited mostly to feed forward and recurrent types. Our current neuro-quantum setup, while advanced, doesn't match up to the sophistication of a human brain.”

Of course, David is undeterred when he has set his mind to do something that even his friends find unthinkable. In a hard sci-fi novel, we need to be "realistic" in our approach in case the narrative becomes too fantasy it detracts or disengages readers from a reasonable probability mindset. That would defeat the objective of writing the novel.

So, I've included a short dissertation by Dr. Harper on her knowledge of this topic, which would invariably lead to the question of whether it's possible to invent a device for memory transfer.

Well, what do you think, my readers?

Update: The chapter on Empathy is now relegated to Chapter 12.

 

Reshuffling My Thoughts

A little into writing my next chapter, I felt the need to revisit the surprise encounter between David's two friends and HAVAH. It set me thinking how best to make use of their rare visit to allow David to leverage on their opinions and expertise in the area of memory transfer to further enhance HAVAH's development.

As a consequence, I did a reshuffle to insert one new addition:

Prologue

PART 1: EVE

1. STRATOS
2. EVE
3. The Prodigy
4. A Special Invitation
5. The Inauguration
6. Friend or Foe?
7. The Precursor

PART 2: HAVAH

8. The Awakening
9. HAVAH 
10. Confrontation
11. Hippocampus 
12. Empathy
13. Singularity
14. Invisibility

I may also need to rename the chapter on invisibility as it doesn't sound quite right nor interesting. Will do that when I come to it.