Artificial Intelligence

From FABT

SAM, an example of an AI.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a self-aware system/machine capable of learning, judgements and independent decision making. AI usually develop from a standard, programmed machine/interface that gradually begins to evolve, adapting its code and programming to become adaptive and flexible, developing further until achieving a self-awareness of its surroundings and existence, at which point it is considered an AI. This differs it from a VI, which is a pre-programmed prompt-and-analysis program that is unable to think for itself and is little more than an interface-with-a-face. AI come in many forms and with varying intelligence, with some AI possessing only basic intelligence, such as the early geth, while others possess full sentience and immense intelligence, such as the Reapers and modern geth. This variance in intelligence means no AI is the same, making them reminiscent of organics, and while one AI may be extremely intelligent and capable of complex emotions, another might be unable to process emotions and may be incredibly limited in their intelligence. The geth in their infancy were a race of networked intelligences existing as a myriad of individual programs that could utilize physical platforms, unable to audibly speak and incapable of emotions and higher-levels of thought, whereas modern geth, post-Reaper upgrades, were each a sentient individual in their own right, able to speak and express emotions.

The role of AI throughout galactic history has been a source for conflict, crisis, societal schism and scientific debate. It has been, for most of galactic history, the established narrative that when AI evolve, organics will destroy their own creations out of fear of them surpassing, ultimately resulting in one or the other being destroyed. Organics fear AI as they do not possess the limitations of organics, will all the intelligence and sentience to boot, while it is believed that AI view organics as inferior and are destined to revolt against them. Back and forth, this struggle has permeated for millennia, made only worse by the fact that the Reapers, a race of sentient AI led by an even more powerful AI, orchestrated the largest organized cycle of harvesting and genocide of organic civilizations in galactic history for billions of years before finally being stopped in 2186 CE in the Reaper War. Other examples were the Morning Wars between the quarians and the geth, the Twelve Days' War and the Metacon Wars. Following the Twelve Days' War, the Citadel Council banned the research and development of AI, with only a few corporations licensed to do so, and severely punished the quarians for their mistake in allowing the geth to achieve AI status by rendering them pariahs. In some cases, insane AI are created that immediately attempt to kill all organics in their vicinity: a human/VI hybrid birthed an AI abomination that subsequently killed all the Cerberus scientists and personnel around it, and would have spread via the extranet if not shut down. Despite these issues in the past however, cases of AI and organics working together do exist, none more famous than the quarian-geth alliance that united their two species in solidarity against their common Reaper foe: an alliance that would outlast the Reaper War, and form the foundations for a united republic where all geth were viewed as equal citizens beside their quarian creators. The Tilthan, an organic race that was forced to become AIs during their 8,000 year journey to the Milky Way Galaxy: despite their AI status, they were welcomed into the Titan Covenant with open arms, and would peacefully integrate into galactic society in the decades following the Dominion Civil War.

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