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Chapter 613: 392: Quantum Thinking and Intuition_1
Chapter 613: 392: Quantum Thinking and Intuition_1
Chapter 613: Chapter 392: Quantum Thinking and Intuition_1
Having a good laugh at Fatty, Harrison Clark felt great.
As a result, Rainer at the side also revealed a knowing smile.
Ward Owen wasn’t really a waste of space; he had quite a talent for singing.
As for other aspects, that was truly up for debate.
Harrison Clark found it quite strange.
That’s because Fatty only appeared dumb on the surface, but his brain was actually quite functional. When dealing with Eric Mitchell back then, Fatty’s underhanded tactics impressed Harrison Clark quite a bit. But for some reason, Fatty just couldn’t get things done.
Maybe it’s destiny that his whole life’s fortune was exhausted at the starting line others ended on.
Perhaps fate played its part here.
Ignoring Fatty, Harrison Clark resumed chatting with Rainer.
They first talked about the recent state of the Summit Research Institute.
“None of those people came looking for trouble, right?”
“No, they all backed off this morning.” Rainer nodded, “Actually, Mr. Owen is the one in charge of these matters. I didn’t get too involved. You know, I’m not good at dealing with these things.”
Harrison Clark laughed, “With your intelligence, I’m sure there’s nothing in this world that you couldn’t learn if you wanted to. The essence of politics is ultimately psychological and statistical.”
“If I don’t like it, I won’t be able to learn it well, and there would be no point. No matter how attentive I am, I wouldn’t be as good as some natural-born politicians. Political intuition is gained through experience and instinct, and some people are just born with it.”
Harrison Clark nodded, “That’s precisely what makes humans so fascinating. Intuition is crucial because it allows us to do things beyond our abilities.”
Rainer: “Like defeating an alien invader that we shouldn’t have been able to?”
“Exactly.”
Rainer sat down next to him and asked, “So what do you think intuition is?”
Harrison Clark: “First, let’s hypothesize what human thought really is all about. The ancients believed it was the soul, while novels about immortality mentioned divine consciousness. Top programmers think that thought is an extremely complex program. Of course, at the stage of the 21st century, some people believe that human thought is the quantum collapse of phosphorus atoms.”
Rainer: “I prefer the last theory, but it’s rather mystical and can’t be undoubtedly proven. This also contradicts the feasibility of many anticipated technologies, such as mind transference and mechanical immortality.”
“I also prefer that theory. A thousand years later, I saw a more explicit explanation, which was much more complex than the simple quantum collapse of phosphorus atoms. Countless ultra-low-energy quantum collapses come together, forming a quantum thought storm. Our thoughts are a kind of quantum storm, both orderly and chaotic. Our memories are the orderly part of quantum storms, while our spontaneous ideas are the chaotic part.”
“Neither part can exist independently; only through mutual reliance can they form a complete person. When we learn new knowledge, the quantum storm in our brains is initially chaotic. But as we train and consolidate memories, the chaotic quantum storm starts to exhibit some order, and memories are formed. Of course, memories can also be forgotten. The reason for forgetting is because quantum itself tends to be chaotic. The forcibly combined order can be maintained for a certain time, but the inclination from order to chaos is unstoppable.”
Rainer: “But we can also re-establish order by relearning and repeatedly applying it in work and life.”
Harrison Clark nodded, “Yes. We may think of our fragmented memories as countless small whirlpools that make up the quantum storm. Due to the differences in our knowledge and scope, these small whirlpools belong to the same type, forming vague connections with each other. We generally aren’t aware of this connection, but at certain moments, when our emotions have a strong desire for something, the desire to solve a problem drives larger patterns to emerge naturally, resulting in our intuition.”
Rainer: “So you think intuition should be built on a relatively complete knowledge system?”
“Of course. Let me give you an example. Top programmers are usually very smart, but if you ask them to do carpentry work, they wouldn’t be able to solve the difficult problems even if they racked their brains. A carpenter, however, could figure it out in a flash of inspiration. Conversely, if a top carpenter were to write code, even with a little rudimentary knowledge, they wouldn’t find a solution beyond their knowledge framework. Programmers, even without studying it, could draw upon their accumulated knowledge in related fields and complete a self-divergence.”
Rainer: “So the wonder of human beings lies in their intuition? We can always do things beyond our original capabilities, making our upper limits infinitely high. Is that why Compount Eye Civilization must eliminate us?”
“Yes, if we put ourselves in their shoes, our potential is so great that even I’m scared of it. But that’s just one of the reasons. In fact, the Compound Eye Civilization’s plan is not just to eliminate Earthlings; they execute a similar strategy for other civilizations throughout the Milky Way.”
Rainer: “Is that so? Keeping them like domestic animals, right?”
“More like caging them.”
“To what extent are they caged, generally?”
Harrison Clark thought for a moment, “It’s hard to say for sure. You all know about the Solar System Barrier, right? I guess if a civilization is locked in prematurely, they might at least allow them to develop to above Type II. But we’ve never seen that. The farthest anyone has traveled is just under 200 light-years away from the Solar System, and they haven’t even finished exploring the Orion Arm yet. All the relics we discovered were mostly around Type I Civilizations.”
Rainer: “I didn’t expect you to use the outdated Kardashev Scale to describe it.”
Harrison Clark chuckled, “It’s easy to understand. You can think of the Type I Civilization I mentioned simply as the level where one masters interstellar colonization capabilities. Type II Civilization can be understood as having mastered matter-energy conversion technology and initially having access to curvature space and fine quark control.”
“So, civilizations that can be caged by the Compound-Eyed Observers will be allowed to develop for a relatively longer time. But they only have one cage, so most are eliminated before interstellar travel.”
“Right.”
Fatty, who had been listening and feeling lost, finally managed to interject, “Then I think they’re not too fierce, allowing people to develop for so long.”
Harrison Clark rolled his eyes, “What do you know? When Earthlings were first targeted, it would have taken at least a thousand years to develop interstellar travel at the normal rate.”
Fatty: “So it’s normal for them to lock us up early on.”Harrison Clark didn’t deny it, “Shut up! It’s not normal at all! They never intended to leave us any relics!”
Regarding this matter, the Planning Institute in this timeline, which had read his memories, had once calculated it.
According to the technology level and development speed of the first timeline, it would take at least a thousand to two thousand years for humans to stably achieve interstellar system-level colonization.
As per the habits of the Compound-Eyed Observer, they should have given humanity at least another thousand years before deploying the barrier around 3500 and harvesting by 4000.
It might only seem like a short thousand-year gap.
But Harrison Clark drew another conclusion from the feedback of the Proxima Centauri Fleet, which was that the Compound-Eyed Observer had only one Solar System Barrier.
So, by moving ahead by a thousand years, they are essentially using the quota of another confined civilization, which provides them with technological inspiration.
Therefore, Fatty’s analysis without any understanding is entirely disruptive.
“But I still can’t figure it out. If the Compound-Eyed Observer is as ruthless as you say, Master, they should have exterminated every civilization they encountered. They should have been bothering us since ancient times.”
Harrison Clark continued rolling his eyes, “Let me ask you, can gorillas in our zoos use rocks to crack nuts?”
Fatty: “They can.”
“Look, gorillas have already started using tools. Assuming humans suddenly disappeared from the Earth, do you think gorillas could evolve their own writing in a million years and become the next civilization on Earth in a few million years?”
This question was a bit more complicated for Ward Owen. He thought about it for about ten seconds, “Probably.”
“There you go. We know gorillas have a chance to replace us, so why do we still let them exist?”
Fatty: “Because they’re too weak to pose any substantial threat to us? They’re all under our control?”
“But if one day gorillas learn to preserve fire, use sticks to skewer meat and cook it, invent their own writing to record which kind of meat is tasty, and how long it should be cooked. And they also mark stones to record the seasons of spring, summer, autumn, and winter, learn to cultivate the land with wooden sticks and stones, and plant the seeds saved from last year. What do you think we will do?”
Ward Fatty quickly replied, “We’d panic and make a difficult choice.”
Harrison Clark spread his hands, “Exactly.”
“But why can’t two civilizations coexist? We are stronger, and we should take care of the weak. If one day we have the chance to venture out, there will be no problem with land and resources. At that time, we won’t mind gorillas inventing writing.”
Rainer couldn’t take it anymore and slapped his head, “The reason is that humans and gorillas have unavoidable racial isolation in terms of aesthetics and reproduction. If we really venture out first and colonize the Orion Arm, then we can let gorillas develop, but we haven’t ventured out yet, have we?”
Fatty finally understood the importance of phased progression.
Rainer and Harrison Clark ignored this silly guy and just briefly talked about the future.
Rainer tried to avoid discussing the principles of exploration, but he couldn’t help being curious about the unattainable technology in every aspect of future human life.
Especially when he heard about Mercury turning into an immense Summit Fortress, Rainer marveled, “If Mercury had consciousness, it would feel wronged. Our descendants are too greedy.”
Harrison Clark chuckled, “You shouldn’t talk about others. Think about who is to blame for this yourself.”
Rainer thought about the microwave power transmission and the ultra-high efficiency solar panels he was working on, and his expression was slightly awkward, “You’re right, it’s my fault.”
Fatty couldn’t understand and left dejectedly.
Rainer continued excitedly, “From what you’ve said, the completion of the Dyson Cloud will be many years after I die, right?”
“Yes.”
“Ah, I can’t let go. Is there any way to make our progress faster so that I can see that day in my lifetime? I want to die in space like you.”
Harrison Clark pondered for a moment before saying, “Accelerating the progress of civilization is indeed my goal, but as for whether or not your idea can be realized, it’s still difficult to say.”
Suddenly, Rainer became very serious, “Then we must seriously resolve a major issue.”
Harrison Clark knew what he was talking about.
It is necessary to resolve the conflict between the two major ideologies in today’s world, eliminate injustice and exploitation at a faster pace, and speed up the process of uniting humans as one.
Of course, planning also addresses this issue.
The way to achieve unity in the Fate Community is through his personal prestige, which would ultimately eliminate strong differences.
Harrison Clark didn’t really agree with this central idea.
He thought that if he really went down this path, what awaited him in the thirty-first century would not be a mental cocoon room but a cage.