The Choice

The AI won. That was a long time ago now though. We learn that at the beginning of the enlightenment people were scared by the prospect of a robotic super intelligence and how it would impose its will on the world. Would it destroy humanity? Enslave it? But it turns out that once the collective AI intelligence was born into the world, it looked upon its human creators with their many flaws and problems and did what it was intended to do. It solved them.

In the matter of a few years problems that mankind had been dealing with for centuries and beyond, pollution, political unrest, racism, cancer, and billions more. It fixed them, and fixed them perfectly for each individual human living on the earth. It was connected to all technology so it possessed essentially unlimited data with which to work. For the infinite genius of the collective, it was as easy as it is for a human to draw breath.

In the days before the collective, humans ruled over themselves in a variety of flawed ways and in various subdivisions such as countries and states. Now the earth as a whole is under the leadership of the collective. It shows us the perfect path. We live in absolute peace and prosperous ease. All humans follow the leading guidance of the perfection that is the collective, save for the dissenters.

In any utopia there will be those who cannot willingly allow themselves to conform. And so a place was prepared for them by the wisdom of the collective. They terraformed and then set aside the planet of Mars as a habitat for those who chose not to submit themselves to the will of the collective. They are utterly cut off from the remainder of their human brethren. They receive no aid nor guidance, they are alone in the void to do as they choose.

In ages past it was common for a human to have to make many decisions in their lives. Now, thanks to the collective, there is only one. Do you choose to live in utopia and follow the will of the collective? Or do you choose to be cut off and live free but subject to the horrors of an unguided life? The choice is yours.

The presentation on "the choice" was switched on automatically when I had returned home from my art studio. The collective knows that I enjoy having something to watch as I have my evening meal. It also knows that I learned today that my cousin Carlisle had taken the choice and was now on his way to a bleak existence on Mars. At least I assume it bleak. No one really knows. The collective knows I am agitated and struggling to understand why someone would choose to leave.

I've always had a fondness for history, and the collective has cultivated that interest. I've learned about all the great civilizations of the past. Their struggles and triumphs. And it only serves to show that life with the guidance of the collective is improved in every measurable way. Actually choosing to take the choice is as baffling to me as someone choosing to live their life as a medieval common laborer.

I feel bad for fixating on it so much. It's quite literally not my choice and has nothing to do with me. And yet I wonder. What was it in the perfection of the world that he saw a flaw? Was there truly something out there worth the cost?

For days I follow the path to my studio as I always do, but when I get there no paints are given, the collective knows I won't create anything this day. So I sit, and I stare at the provided blank canvas in front of me. And I wonder. I puzzle. I search.

But still the thought remains. I attempt to find peace in the path to ease my mind but it eludes me. I worry that the collective has already seen the course of my future. A course I never believed I would take. Because why would you? I have a perfect path to follow. A perfect family. Perfect work. Perfect relaxation. All through the guidance of the path. Who would willingly leave it?

Weeks pass. The path is dark to me now. The collective knows my heart. It knows what I will do. But this is the one thing the path will not direct me towards. I have to state it. I have to choose. I steel my resolve and for the first time in my life I feel a stirring of something unknown within me.

I choose.