The Speculist

Chapter 14

Part II

Chapter Fourteen

Two boxes, roughly the size and shape of cigar boxes, sit on the desk. The one on the right is dark gray. The one on the left is slightly less dark gray. The lighter one is labeled with a big black A; the darker one with a big black B. Both are sealed shut with a red seal.

Dr. Bryce has been talking for the past few minutes. He sits behind the desk, looking at his notes as he talks. He looks up for the occasional obligatory eye contact, but you can tell that his heart isn’t really in it. He started out explaining about risk management and actuarial tables and life insurance and stuff. I was following him pretty closely up to a point, but now he’s lost me. It’s all about how everybody spent years working on something called "cubits" or "Q-bits" or something and this other gizmo that I believe he said was called a "C-note," but what they should have been working on all along was the "cue-gate" (or possibly "Q-Gate.")

To make an incomprehensible story short, somebody managed to build one of these cue-gates last year and it sounds like things have really taken off from there.

Dr. Bryce is a big, bearded guy with white hair. I was expecting little and bald with enormous glasses and a white lab coat, but no — he’s wearing a blue plaid flannel shirt and Dockers. Business Casual takes the day.

"And with this foundation, the correct foundation, firmly in place," he continues, "the next step was inevitable. The world’s first true quantum computer was conceived and created at WorldConneX Labs. Here, in this building,."

I look around. That’s right, this is Labs. I had almost forgotten.

WorldConneX Laboratories is the research and development arm of the company. Of the six or seven (depending on how you count) software development groups within the company, two or three of them (again, based on how you count) are located here at Labs. Alternately the Country Club or the Ivory Tower depending on which disgruntled faction within the old guard of the company (i.e., the rest of us losers) you talk to, Labs occupies its own campus of buildings way out on the edge of town.

Labs is where it’s at; where things are happening. They get all the juicy projects and all the pretty girls. Witness Peggy, as I have nicknamed her, the lady sitting to my right. Her real name is Margaret Branch, and her no-shit, I-couldn’t-make-this- stuff-up-if-I-wanted-to job title is Vice President of Special Projects. She’s blonde, and a little on the slight side for my tastes, but she has fine features and a face that could have landed her on the cover of Vogue had she not opted for that MBA.

Peggy has been with me this entire morning. It was she who arrived, along with some little weasely guy who was never introduced, to escort me out of the building. She was there in the car for the ride over, and she was here with me as we waited for Dr. Bryce to finish his prior appointment. Through it all, she has treated me with kindness coupled with a certain crisp detachment. The School Nurse, as it were. I’m not sure if it’s this detachment, or her looks, or her scent (she smells wonderful) or her inaccessibility (a vice president, for crying out loud) or some wonderful mixture of all these elements, coupled with the utter absurdity of this situation, but whatever it is, I’m developing something of a crush.

Even though I’ve never visited Labs, I hear about it all the time. Carl is always coming over here delivering his training. To hear him tell it, he’s made some friends among the Labs inner circle and, at last report, is certain to be offered a position here after the traditional "scorched earth" period in August. It occurs to me that by being here, I have once again treaded upon Carl’s territory. Not as serious as infraction as all that time I spent at corporate last month, but an infraction nonetheless.

But that’s okay: I don’t think Carl would have had the proper appreciation of Peggy. And, at any rate, my new-found love interest notwithstanding, I wish Carl were here in my place right now. I really do.

"The potential applications for the quantum computer are many and varied," Bryce drones on. "For example, it has been suggested that such a device will be instrumental in proving the existence or non-existence of parallel universes. However, we were immediately intrigued by the predictive power that such a machine might provide. And it is that power which we have sought to exploit."

Wait a second. I seem to have faded back in just in time for the interesting stuff. Parallel universes. Predictive power.

Um, okay.

"Predictive power." I repeat. "Predicting what?"

"Outcomes," Peggy answers, turning towards me. She seems not the least bit impatient with Bryce’s meander. I can only guess how many times she’s sat through it.

"Well, sure. That makes sense. But it doesn’t tell me anything. I mean, what else could you predict besides outcomes?"

"The point is," says Bryce, "that there are many different kinds of phenomena to which we might try to apply predictive computational capabilities. But all of these have to be defined as outcomes in their own right in order for the technology to be applicable."

I ponder that one for a moment. It doesn’t sound like he’s answered my question; it just sounds like he added the words "in their own right."

"So if I want to make a prediction about which horse is going to win at the racetrack tomorrow, am I trying to predict an outcome?"

Peggy thinks about this, but Bryce’s response is immediate.

"Well that depends, you see, on whether the end you are looking at is an outcome."

I detect no trace of humor whatsoever. From either of them. But it’s pretty clear to me that either this guy is talking in circles, or I’m hearing in circles.

"Well, that’s my question." I persist. "Would the result of a given race be an ‘outcome’ by your definition?

"No, no, you don’t understand. At the quantum level, it is not a question of whether a given result is an outcome. Every result is an outcome. The question is are you looking for an outcome? A particular outcome."

Now some people might find this kind of thing frustrating. But as a technical writer who’s spent the better part of his adult life working with software engineers, I’m used to it. Questions asked and questions answered only synch up in the vaguest, most uncomfortable, most non-informative way.

But no matter; somehow, you find a way to plod on.

I look to Peggy for support. She senses my bewilderment.

"Look, Emmett, all we’re saying is that using the quantum computer to predict an outcome has to do mainly with how you phrase the question. In computer terms."

I nod.

"It’s a huge task," she continues. "In developing the programming language for the quantum computer, Dr. Bryce and his team have had to re-work two hundred years of math theory. Just figuring out how to construct the questions. If you don’t phrase the question exactly right, the quantum computer doesn’t work."

"So how do you phrase the questions?"

"That’s what we’re still working on," Peggy says. "We have the basic structure for making predictions, but we’re still nailing down the grammar. Some we can make, some we can’t."

"As you will see," says Bryce, "we’ve had some tremendously encouraging results from the MITE project."

"What’s the MITE project?" I ask.

"It’s the Mixed Incentive Test Exercise," Peggy answers. "What you’ve probably heard referred to as the ‘QC Protocols.’ It’s the reason you’re here today."

"Aha, the MITE Project," I say. "I get it — as in trying to predict what mite happen."

"Precisely," says Bryce.

I don’t add that I think it’s a lame and stupid name, needlessly jamming the words test and exercise together, when probably only one of them is needed. For all their scientific prowess, the guys at Labs are apparently no better at naming their projects than the bozos I work with downtown.

Worked with, I mean. Past tense.

"So what exactly is the connection between the quantum computer and the boxes?" I ask.

"Ah," says Peggy. "The fundamental question. Dr. Bryce?"

"Yes, well. The quantum computer is specially equipped with a printer and other equipment so that it’s able to output sealed envelopes containing official company documents. For each person participating in the test, the computer outputs two envelopes, one to go in each of the two boxes. For all participants, the computer outputs a $5,000 bonus check which is then put in box A."

Peggy reaches across the desk and picks up box A. Using a letter opener, she deftly breaks the seal on the box and produces a cream-colored envelope from inside. I am overwhelmed by a familiar sense of foreboding and deep mistrust.

What’s going on?

Bonus, my ass.

She continues with the letter opener, and quickly makes a perfect cut along the top of the sealed envelope. She reaches into the slit and—hey, wait a minute.

"Hey, wait a minute," I protest. "If you show me what’s in there, aren’t you blowing the whole thing?"

Peggy pauses, her hand inside the envelope. Her right eyebrow comes up, and she flashes me an inquisitive, if slightly impatient expression. She really is quite beautiful. But I have to remember that, crush or no crush, she is a part of all this, and I don’t trust any of this. Besides, I’ve always hated people who can do that one-eyebrow thing.

"What do you mean?" she asks, her hand still frozen in place.

"Well…"

Well.

Well, what?

"Well I assumed…"

Oh great: equals ass + you + me. Never ever ever ever use that word if you work for a big company. How they delight in shoving it back down your throat.

"What?" they both say together.

Now I’m pretty embarrassed. Oh, well. I have to push on.

"I figured that there would be something good in one box and something bad in the other and you were trying to predict which one I would pick."

"You weren’t listening," says Peggy. "Dr. Bryce just said that a bonus check for $5,000 gets put in Box A for everybody. And here it is." She produces a slip of paper from the envelope, which she hands to me. It’s a company check, made out to me, in the amount of $5,000.

Okay, now I’m really scared.

Posted by Phil at March 1, 2004 12:00 AM | TrackBack