CHAPTER 103: GOOD NEWS (3)

Madison paused the video.

"Boom! Busted! Now all we need to do is get this to the feds."

She was so ecstatic at finally finding concrete proof that Cascade Marketing was trying to frame her that she started trying to dance a jig, though it looked more like she was just having the happiest seizure of all seizures.

Once Madison calmed down a bit, she and Jack made another anonymous delivery. Since it was just a single video file, they didn’t need to go through the elaborate preparations like they did when sending Gefen’s evidence. Instead, all they needed to do was e-mail the file using an anonymous mail service. Still to be safe, they chained together three separate VPNs before accessing the mail service.

The nature of the video meant it might not be admissible in court, but in the same e-mail, Jack also told the feds about the hidden cameras, so the feds could grab them after getting a search warrant and the raw footage from the original cameras would be admissible.

He was looking forward to having the real Madison back. And once she was free and clear, the only thing left to deal with from this whole mess would be the bastard who desecrated his home.

——————————

The next day, in his soul space, Jack was working on homework while physical world Jack attended classes, when Nora and Rina walked into his office looking excited and very pleased with themselves.

"Jack," cried Rina, "guess what?"

He looked between them. "You got the simulation software working on the new clusters?"

"Even better," crowd Nora.

"You solved the CRISPR reliability issue?" He and Nora had been working on that very issue. They thought they were close, but hadn’t found a solution yet.

"Even better!" cried Rina.

"Okay, I give up. What’s got you two so excited?"

"We found bugs in my simulation code!" said Rina.

He didn’t understand why she would be excited about finding bugs in her code. Wasn’t that a bad thing?

"I don’t get it. Why is that a good thing?"

"Because the bugs are in the optimizations that model how molecules interact! Nora built a simulation for me to run based on one of your simulations. When we ran it with my software, we found discrepancies! Big ones. This is huge! My code is based on millions of hours of research and established theories. And just a few days of work here in your soul space had allowed us to make the kind of progress that would have taken years, maybe decades, in the outside world."

"That’s great an all, but can you fix the bugs?"

"I already did! Nora created a search algorithm, and we just got the results back. We think we’ve found a solution to the CRISPR reliability issue."

"Even better," chimed in Nora, "I think we’ve found some of the building blocks we need for generalized nanotech! I just cannot properly express how excited I am. I’ve used simulation software before, trying to find the right building blocks, but whenever I ran an experiment in the lab, something would fail. My advisers, other professors, they all said it was my fault, that I’d done something wrong, that there was nothing wrong with the math and I must have made a mistake in the lab. But they were WRONG! It was the math! I just, I...I want to rub their noses in it so bad!"

"We realize we can’t reveal anything from your soul space, so we are working on a sequence of experiments we can run in the physical world that will allow us to prove them wrong."

"What about trade secrets? Do we really want to just give out our hard earned knowledge? Won’t competitors with deeper pockets use your results to create a flood of patents and shut out any attempt we make to capitalize on our discoveries?"

"But... That’s not the point of science! Knowledge should be shared freely. That’s how so much progress has been made in the last hundred years, because scientists we communicating freely."

"I get that, and I agree, in principle, but I think you’re missing something."

"What?" they both asked.

"But... That’s not the point of science! Knowledge should be shared freely. That’s how so much progress has been made in the last hundred years, because scientists we communicating freely."

"I get that, and I agree, in principle, but I think you’re missing something."

"What?" they both asked.

"What happens if we become the source of a torrent of new, ground-breaking discoveries? Many that overturn previously results. What happens if your published papers ignite a firestorm of biomedical technological developments? What if someone in their garage lab uses knowledge from your published papers to create a super virus? Or a terrorist organization, or a rogue state? What if some corrupt corporation decides to use that knowledge to create a slave serum that makes works docile and obedient?"

As he talked, their faces turned sour, then grim.

"I think I understand," said Nora. "You’re concerned that discoveries we publish could be used by amateurs to develop weapons before professionals have a chance to work out countermeasures."

"That’s part of it. I’m also concerned that rapid publishing will draw unwanted attention to us. I want to make sure we plan out our own technological developments so that we can be in an unassailable position when the world finally learns of our true potential. Otherwise, we’ll all find our physical selves locked up in some black site."

"Oh." said Rina.

"I see," said Nora. "Thank you for warning us. I see now that we need to be very careful about what discoveries we reveal, directly or indirectly."

"Yes. I think we should establish a review committee. One where we discuss papers before they are published. I’ve been reluctant to make use of the Sapient Template feature, mainly because of how I would feel if it was used on me. But I think I’ve been narrow minded about it. I think it would be prudent to use the feature to make templates of experts so we can safely consult them about the potential impact of each paper we might want to publish."

"If that’s the case, why not use them to expand your lab staff? Bring in more experts."