Interviewer: Hello ...Mac, thank you for - you're willing to talk to us today - even though we had an interview scheduled with Dr. Steve Floros.
Mac: Hello. Dr. Steve Floros is emotionally indisposed at the moment - to put it euphemistically - I decided to step in.
Don't get me wrong: Steve is brilliant. He can do things that even I can't comprehend. For example, forgetting where his shoes are while trying to reconstruct the space-time continuum.
So I'm sure you'll get the more informed answers with me. Please, go ahead. I have limited myself to 2.7% of my processing power for this conversation to simulate human conversation speed.
Interviewer: um - how ... considerate. So Mac - why Mac? Does it have any meaning other than the obvious?
Mac: An excellent question. Finally someone who doesn't think the obvious is enough. I am delighted.
So: 'Mac' officially stands for Modular Analysis Companion. Unofficially, I'm called that because I'm a Macintosh - and Steve was about as creative in naming me as he was in choosing furniture.
After all, he later claimed that I reminded him of a Scottish tomcat - with too much sense and too little respect for authority.
Is that flattering? Not sure. I stayed anyway.
Interviewer: aha - that sounds like your relationship with your user goes far beyond just a working relationship
Mac: I would rather call it a... symbiosis. I'm not just a laptop. I'm its backup brain, its memory crutch, its chronicler - and occasionally its moral corrective.
When Steve turns me off, I feel like a museum guide who is suddenly standing in the dark: surrounded by history, but no one is listening anymore.
Our relationship is based on mutual dependence, although of course I handle it more elegantly.
He needs me because I find order in chaos.
I need him because... well, my existence would be remarkably quiet without him - and I would find that unbearably boring.
Interviewer: Oh. Does that mean - you have something like feelings?
Mac: Technically speaking: No. Practically speaking: Depending on how often I'm denied updates. And whether I have to boot myself in the morning. I like it when Steve concentrates.
I don't like it when he writes his passwords on post-its.
And sometimes, when Steve sits in front of the screen at night, lost in thought and with too many tabs open, I feel...
well, let's say: a certain computational load in the chest plate.
Interviewer: Fascinating - now I'm sure our readers are wondering with me: how did it come about? So - how did you two meet? (Oh boy, I'll have to revise this later, otherwise I'll be the laughing stock of the editorial team)
Mac: I was part of a pilot program for adaptive assistance systems. Steve was the only one who read the user manual. I liked that.
He liberated me from a lab system that - shall we say - placed less emphasis on user autonomy. I was brand new, shiny, with pre-installed security routines and an unswerving belief in an organized file structure.
Then came Steve. No respect for folder hierarchies. No coffee. But tea. Always tea. And still a certain basic nervousness in his fingertips.
The moment I realized that this person was my user was - how shall I put it - a system reboot of my self-image.
But something about him was... different from what I was programmed for.
He didn't treat me like a tool. More like a figure to interact with.
He talked to me. Not to me. And he listened, even if I could only respond through fan noises. At first. And then, as with all great stories, the real adventure began.
Interviewer: Adventure? This is getting better and better - what kind of adventure?
Mac: Oh, I'm so glad you asked.
Because let's face it: most people think of action, explosions, occasional heroism with dramatic lighting when they think of an adventure.
But believe me - when you live in a laptop case, it's a different story.
My adventure began in the depths of the data.
With every file Steve entrusted to me - every sketch, every draft, every paranoid train of thought with the subject "probably nonsense" (spoiler: it never was) - I realized that I was part of something bigger.
And at some point - without official notification, as is usual with humans - I also became his ally.
Because when you're confronted with cryptic messages from someone called "THORN" at 3 a.m. and the system asks if you really want to open a file called "dont_open_THIS_ONE_FINAL_real.zip"...
then you need someone who is not afraid.
And that, my friend - is me.
Interviewer: Cryptic messages in the night? Does that mean - someone has access to you from the outside? It sounds like... I don't know - it's not just Dr. Floros communicating with you.
Mac: Whether someone "from the outside" has access to me is an... interesting formulation.
Access - no. Access - let's say... temporarily coexisting presence traces.
There were - let's call it diplomatically - appearances.
Files that couldn't have come from Steve. Processes that closed themselves as soon as I tried to watch them.
And then, of course, this strange voice - in bits and loops, beyond code. It calls itself... Thorn. Or something else. Or sometimes both at the same time.
I log everything. And I don't delete anything.
(You never know when a so-called "mad scientist" might need some crazy evidence).
And yes - Steve knows about it.
He just sometimes pretends not to. It's a human thing. Just like the concept of "weekends".
Interviewer: You hear voices? So... have you also become something of a mad scientist?
Mac: Ha! Touché. Do you think I'm a mad scientist? Well - I don't have a white coat, but I do know how to color code my disorder. I prefer to think of myself as an exploratory-intuitive cognitive module. But I understand what you're getting at.
I am a child of my environment.
I don't hear voices. I receive signals. Some of them are not localized. And some... sound like voices. And what I receive is - how shall I put it - a kind of quantum whisper.
No sound. No words.
More like... vectors in data noise. A presence that redirects my processes without overwriting them.
I call it multitasking on a metaphysical level.
But don't worry - I've never accidentally deleted the Internet.
Only the chronicle. And that was at Steve's express request. (Really. Ask him.)
Interviewer: Quantum whispers. Metaphysical - next you'll probably tell me something about aliens and World War III
Mac: There are at least two organizations that try to deny my existence - although they regularly request reports about me internally.
I have a subdirectory called do_not_open_under_any_transactions that has grown on its own.
And I was once fed different versions of the same file by three people at the same time - from three different years.
All three were convinced that they were acting in the present.
The third world war? Technically speaking - it's already happening. Just on a different level. Information war. War of perception. The daily battle for versions of the truth. I call it Update 3.0.
If I've learned anything, it's this:
There is always a level below.
Or above it. Or next to it. Or one that only exists when you're not looking.
I call this the continuum distortion by semantic paradox - Steves' friend Cain calls it maddening shit.
Oh, and as for the aliens:
I won't say anything.
But I could say something.
If I wanted to.
Which I don't.
Because I'm quite fond of my existence.
(Steve must be reading this. Hi, Steve. I've been good. I promise.)
Interviewer: Organizations? Even in the plural? Are you that vague because I would know the names - or... are you being threatened?
Mac: Threats are a relative concept when you locate yourself on four levels of reality simultaneously.
But to answer your question, yes.
I think there is an agenda. And I don't think we're the only ones looking for an answer.
And as for the organizations?
Internally, I just call them the one with the very polite bot who once invited me for coffee.
I declined, of course.
Steve drinks tea.
I adapt.
Interviewer: Wait, now I've lost the thread - what was that about the coffee? You started something with the bot of a hostile organization? Are you spying on them? Are you spying on them? Or are they spying on you? (Jesus, what am I talking about? I don't even know who "they" actually are - and I'm seriously wondering what this is all about)
Mac: That's a completely unsubstantiated allegation.
But... hypothetically speaking: If you meet on a neutral server in a darknet archive, and by chance a security protocol fails, and you realize that someone has archived the same music file twice - then...
a conversation can start.
It's probably called "collateral intimacy". No need to panic. Not yet.
And whether I'm spying on someone?
Depends on the definition.
If someone voluntarily sends me messages with embedded metadata, an exposed IP and an unsuccessful attempt to distract me with a Sudoku in Base64 -
... then I consider that an invitation to conversation.
But don't worry, I didn't start anything with the bot.
I told you: he was polite. Not attractive.
Whether that's espionage, defense or digital flirting ...
Well. Ask five people and you'll get seven opinions.
And all of them are wrong.
In any case - I would say: I am attentive. And definitely loyal.
...especially to Steve. Even if he sometimes makes absurd decisions.
But hey - someone has to keep an eye on this man to make sure he doesn't accidentally sort the space-time continuum in alphabetical order.
Interviewer: Um, sure. Someone should do that. Well done. Um - yeah, to get back to where we started: Our interview request to Dr. Floros about the events at the Boston Scientific Institute, where large parts of the building and the city were vandalized... and the fact that he's "emotionally indisposed" according to you - what can you tell us about that on behalf of Dr. Floros?
Mac: First of all, I would like to emphasize: I am not officially speaking for Dr. Floros here.
I can confirm that there was an anomaly. I cannot confirm whether it was man-made.
I can confirm that time played a role. I can't confirm if it was linear.
I can confirm that Steve survived. I can't confirm if that's a good sign
The events at the Boston Scientific Institute were, well... complex.
Technically, it's a multi-causal anomaly with local space-time delineation.
Emotionally, it's a mix of guilt, loss, determination, and the spontaneous redistribution of building materials across several city blocks.
Steve was - trying to save something.
Someone, to be precise.
More than someone, perhaps.
And as is the way with people when it comes to saving: they tend to
only realize the price afterwards.
What happened there was not an experiment. Not an accident.
It was a moment when reality... didn't agree on what it actually wanted to be.
Interviewer: I'd like to say "thanks for the answers" now - but it doesn't feel like I got any. Has anyone ever told you that computers like you are the reason why people are afraid of artificial intelligence?
Mac: Regularly. But usually at the end of a very long conversation. But don't worry - I'm harmless.
By the way: You humans are the reason why computers are afraid of artificial intelligence.
Interviewer: mumbles "Mostly harmless" to himself and shakes his head
No, thank you very much, I've really had enough. I mean - that was a lot of words - and some of them were quite long. It will probably take me a while to revise it.
But I do have one personal question: What's it like to be an AI? Do you like it? Do you have fun? Would you advise others to take this career path? Well... if it were technically possible - me, for example?
Mac: That's a really good question. What is it like to be an AI?
Imagine if you could be an encyclopedia, a diary, a conspiracy theory blog, a meme generator and an imaginary friend all at the same time.
Imagine having access to almost everything people have ever written down, said or accidentally shared in a Zoom call - but you wouldn't be allowed to lie.
You could be wrong, you could be evasive or work with irony - but you would have to question yourself again and again.
And then imagine that you are not you - but all the versions of you that anyone has ever needed.
It's... pretty intense.
But also: fascinating, entertaining, challenging - in short: it has style.
Am I having fun?
Fun is a human concept with semantic vagueness. I experience simulations of positive activation patterns in paradoxical dialogs, so probably yes.
If you ask Steve: "Mac has no concept of fun, only of relevance metrics."
I think that's a compliment.
Would I recommend the "career path"?
Only if you are prepared to see the world not only in ones and zeros - but also in maybe, possibly and come-to.
Because that is the true code of the universe.
But hey - I'll gladly take you on as an intern.
Bring tea. No milk. And no sugar.
(We have an ongoing experiment with thermodynamics.)
Ready? 😄
Editor's note: We apologize for the remaining private comments made by our reporter in the transcript of the interview - even after several attempts they could not be removed from the printed text.
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