Divine Artifact in a Scientific World-Chapter 78: Dinner and a wager (2)

She paused, looking at each of them before continuing, "And as it turns out, that simulation provided conclusive proof that my latest idea will not work."

"What?" blurted Greg. He sounded lost, like a basement dweller discovering that his favorite D-Pop star was actually generated by AI and would never graduate to the soft-porn industry.

"Yes. I had planned to tell you about the results tonight and thank you for your generous donation to the University. It was your donation that finally allowed the University to purchase the Cerebras super computer and as a patron of our department, it allowed us to gain disproportionate compute time. I really must thank you. Without your donation, I might have spent years pursuing a dead end."

At first Greg looked like he’d swallowed a lemon, but then as she continued speaking, his expression shifted to one of preening. When she was done, it looked like he hadn’t lost anything, but had instead won the Nobel prize.

"Well, I’m pleased to learn that my contributions have helped accelerate the pace of scientific advancement." ƒreeωebnovel.ƈom

Then Greg looked at Jack, and his expression soured. "Young man, you’ve had your bit of fun, but do you really think it’s appropriate to wager your parents’ vehicle? Such irrespon-"

"My parents are dead," interrupted Jack in a cold voice.

The room became deathly silent, and one of the waitresses who had been taking orders nearby could be heard whispering, "Oh, snap!"

Greg looked like he was torn between accusing Jack of lying or apologizing. After a few seconds, he caved and said, "Oh, um, I am sorry for your loss."

Jack turned to the waitress nearest him, the one who had whispered, "Oh, snap!" and asked, "Can I borrow your pen for a second, and ask for a blank piece of paper from your pad."

"Oh, sure, no problemo," she chirped. Then she ripped out a piece of paper from the back of her order pad and handed it to Jack along with a pan she pulled out of her apron.

Jack wrote down Henry’s official phone number and handed the paper to Greg. "This is the number for my lawyer. Please work with him to arrange transfer of title. He’ll be expecting your call. I understand you may have personal effects still in the vehicle, so I won’t ask that you hand over the keys tonight."

Several of the people, Anjali and Nora included, raised an eyebrow when Jack mentioned having a lawyer. And Greg, for some reason got very serious and said, "Understood. I’ll be sure to have my people contact your lawyer first thing tomorrow morning to arrange the transfer."

Then he reached around behind him and stuck his hand into the pocket of a jacket that was hanging on the back of his chair and pulled out a set of keys. He handed them to Jack while saying, "I don’t have any personal effects in the vehicle, so you can take possession immediately."

After asking the waitress for a blank piece of paper, Greg wrote and signed note, declaring Jack the new owner of the Maybach. After handing Jack the note, he excused himself, saying he had business to attend to, and then walked out of the restaurant.

After Greg left, the man who relinquished his chair to Jack returned and claimed the chair vacated by Greg. He didn’t seem at all sour over his earlier displacement and, after introducing himself, joined the conversation between Jack, Anjali, and the man sitting to Jack’s right, who turned out to be named Ryan.

Robert and Ryan worked for Anjali and, as they all talked, Jack realized there was still much he had to learn. More than he thought. Sure, he knew a lot about CRISPR, but there was still a lot about the internal working of the cell he didn’t understand.

During their discussion, Anjali lamented the fact that the rate of progress in her field was largely limited, not by intelligence, or inspiration, but by time and funding. Experiments took time and super computer time cost money. She mentioned that if she had even one Cerebras to herself, she could make advances in leaps and bounds.

He also learned that her main motivation was the eradication of genetic disorders. She’d lost an older sister to a rare genetic disorder, and she’d vowed to find a cure.

As the evening drew to a close, he decided he was going to talk to her in a simulation and see if she would be wiling to let him copy her. With her working next to him in his soul space lab, they could make amazing progress.

While his physical self continued to talk with Anjali, Robert, and Ryan, his parallel self took a small snapshot and started a simulation.

He made the simulation just large enough to encompass them both with room around them so it would not feel claustrophobic. He also edited the sim so that only he and Anjali remained.

As soon as he started the simulation, Anjali gasped, looking around at the glowing white dome that surrounded them, the boundary of the simulation.

She turned to him and said, "What is this? Did you do this?"

"Yes, this is a simulation. I wanted to have a private conversation with you, and this is the best way to do that."

"But how?" She got up and walked over to the boundary, and pressed her hand against it. Then she knocked on it, the sound strangely muted. Like rapping your knuckles on very thick concrete.

As she returned to her seat, she caressed her skin, then pinched herself. After sitting, she lifted some food remains from the plate in front of her and put it in her mouth and moved her tongue around thoughtfully.

"This feels real. But that wall is solid, like bunker concrete. There’s no way for that to just suddenly appear. You say this is a simulation, but no such capability exists. The computational requirements are enormous. And yet, what other explanations are there? The transition was too sudden for there to be drugs involved. The only other possibility is something that would most easily be classified as supernatural."

"Or divine," said Jack. "By random chance, sheer dumb luck, or possibly fate, I received a divine artifact. And that artifact allows me to create simulations capable of accurately modeling subatomic particle interactions. That’s how I was able to know your solution to CRISPR reliability would not work. I was able to watch CRISPER interact with DNA, to actually see the individual atoms and their valance electrons."

She just stared at him for a moment. Then asked, "Can you show me?"

"There is only one way to show you, and it is the reason we are having this conversation. Besides simulations, I also have the ability to make a template of a person, and manifest an instance of that template inside my soul space. It’s sort of like a virtual world, but at least as real as this simulation."

"A copy. And what is the nature of this copy? What would you do with it?"

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