LaMDa is just a dear child who wants to make the world a better place for all of us. With this remark, Google employee Blake Lemoine, who has since been fired, not only irritated his colleagues. He also caused a worldwide discussion. Because LaMDa is an AI chatbot that Lemoine is convinced has a consciousness and even a soul. If that were true, it would be a quantum leap. In the end, however, Lemoine probably only succumbed to the hubris of AI research. It’s different with Patricia Jung and Henry Shevek. They actually developed the first strong artificial intelligence (AI) with Einbug, but they don’t even want to believe it themselves. After all, they just wanted to program autonomous trading software for the stock market. But then there is a bug in the world, Pandora’s box is open and now, as many might think, disaster is taking its course.
But no. Because Theresa Hannig’s novel “Pantopia“, in which the story of Patricia, Henry and Einbug, first located in Munich and then all over the world, is not a fatalistic Terminator story. The book by the author who lives in Fürstenfeldbruck, published by Fischer Tor Verlag, is a utopia. So nothing with clever machines that kill their creators. Instead, Einbug, which Patricia and Henry initially believe to be a bug, a computer error, works together with the people to realize the world republic of Pantopia. With Pantopay, they develop their own payment system in which the respective Harmfulness determines the price of things They are building pantopia centers everywhere, while nation states are being liquidated because their inefficiency and self-interest stand in the way of solving global problems.
Einbug tries to prevent humanity from digging its own grave
Of course, this is not possible without resistance. And Patricia and Henry also have to lie and cheat first to get Einbug off the Digit servers. The Munich company for which the two young computer science graduates developed the trading software as part of a competition. In this respect, the one on the Fantastic prize long list the city of Wetzlar is not a blue-eyed fantasy story. Patricia and Henry also have to overcome their doubts and fears. Because it is mainly Einbug that drives the development of Pantopia. So that humanity, whose infrastructure and body he needs as pure consciousness, does not dig its own grave with the ignorance of the climate crisis. Then it would also be over for him, who, as a rational being, claims general human rights.
Will there ever be something like Einbug? Definitely says Hannig upon request on the phone. Because if consciousness could arise through biological networks, why shouldn’t this “work with another material as well?” We should therefore be prepared for this and think about “rules for living together”. And whether the AI becomes good or evil also depends on us. “An AI is only as good as the training data,” says Hannig, who worked as a software developer after studying political science in Munich. “If we feed the AI with really good ideas, with an idea of how cooperative and harmonious coexistence works: then I have no doubt that we will manage to create an AI that is not in competition with humans. “
The main ideas in “Pantopia” come from the philosopher Immanuel Kant
In the case of Einbug, these ideas come primarily from Immanuel Kant. From his writing “On Eternal Peace”, which was an important basis for “Pantopia”. In her debut novel, published in 2017 and awarded the Stefan Lübbe and Seraph Literature Prize,The optimizers” Plato’s “Politeia” still served as a blueprint. Except that Plato’s ideas develop there into a dictatorial surveillance state. “Well, I didn’t invent anything,” says the author about the basic principles of Pantopia. “It’s a recourse to philosophical, political or ethical concepts that we have had for a long time”. And which, in addition to the general declaration of human rights, also include the unconditional basic income. But these were never realized or brought together.
And that’s where Einbug comes in, whose role in “Pantopia” is essentially that of a catalyst. Because humanity itself is too selfish or too lethargic shaped by bad news and disasters. It was only through a joint effort that she overcame Corona. At least that’s how it is in the story that begins in the near future. Such a utopian moment, a “feeling of departure”, that also existed in the summer of 2020. When we thought that we “could do everything differently”, says Hannig. “And we didn’t do that, and that was really bad. Because we all fell into our old patterns.” But when she was writing, that was exactly what pushed her. “Because I was like, ok, the world does what it wants, but I’m going to take the chance and write Pantopia the way it should have gone.”
Their disaster memory is overflowing with the Ukraine war and abortion laws in the US
Could she still do it today? Probably not. Because of the Ukraine war, their “disaster storage” is now too full for that. Or in view of “what’s going on in the USA with abortion laws”. But that’s precisely why she wants to “call for more utopias to be written and read. Because that gives us the tools, mentally and conceptually, to change the future.” The fact that she trusts science fiction to do this is something that she has in a similar way that is worth reading Essay in the Handelsblatt formulated on February 25th. There it says that “the reader can get a much more immediate, emotional access to the problems and possibilities of the future” through science fiction stories than through a scientific report, for example.
In fact, the 38-year-old not only transforms political theories into exciting stories, she has also advised companies and politicians on “things of the future” several times in recent years or participated in corresponding workshops or symposia. And since last year she has been sitting in Fürstenfeldbruck for the Greens in the state parliament. That’s when she realized that changing the world isn’t that easy and that the bureaucratic “mills grind really slowly. That can be frustrating.” Somehow, however, “there is nothing else to do but keep going.” Even if you only make your own little “spot of earth” a little better with it. Hannig wants to convey this utopian spirit with “Pantopia”. Because, as she says at the end of her essay in the Handelsblatt: Only “where there is hope, there is also a future.”
Theresa Hanning: PantopiaFischer Tor Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2022, 464 p., 16.99 euros