Author: Wu Changxing

In 2020, when the QR code displayed on the opposite side of the Beijing bus backdoor card machine showed an advertisement without any obstruction in the middle, the card machine recognized the QR code on the opposite side and said, "Invalid QR code." This completed a simple communication between intelligent machines.

The promotion and popularity of the Spring Festival worldwide is a conspiracy by the Chinese government.

- Selected excerpts from the 100 most popular rumors in the 2100 Global Daily

After reading these rumors, I couldn't help but smile. The ignorance and stubbornness of people from the 2020s is unimaginable. What they considered a matter of life and death now seems to be a slightly complicated conspiracy theory.

The Spring Festival in 2100 was quite lively due to the timing of the turn of the century. Some people were sentimental, some were looking forward to it, and some were celebrating.

Announcements for various activities could be seen everywhere, including a blind date event for the turn of the century, the release of a game for 100,000 people, and a dumpling feast for one million people on New Year's Eve.

In recent years, there have been more and more cultural activities related to the Spring Festival, and activities related to eating dumplings have become increasingly extravagant. Last year, someone organized a New Year's Eve event with a dumpling theme for 100,000 people, and this year someone dared to organize it for one million people.

I really like dumplings. In fact, everyone in the world loves dumplings now. Dumplings have deeply embedded themselves in the cultural genes of humanity, just like the global popularity of Coca-Cola.

The Global Daily is discussing the recent trend of the Spring Festival becoming more commercialized and institutionalized in the past twenty years. I strongly agree with this point, especially regarding the dumpling culture, which has been particularly prominent in recent years. Every Spring Festival, I wonder if it has reached its peak of fanaticism.

Because of this excessive fanaticism, I started to feel a bit repulsed. So, last night, I got into an argument with several Latin American dumpling enthusiasts on an online forum called Social & Debate.

I deliberately provoked them by saying how terrible dumplings taste, which made a few girls who were watching burst into laughter. Towards the end of the argument, a girl with a graceful figure who had been watching approached me, pulled my tie, and whispered in my ear, "If you really think dumplings are not tasty, dare you press this button?" Then she handed me a black button measuring 35px✖️180px and patted my butt before leaving.

At first, I thought it was her business card or some kind of link to her address. So that night, I couldn't wait to use my fingerprint to open the link. As a result, I entered a private domain.

This private domain was designed for surveys and questionnaires in universities and research institutes. It was a common encrypted space. However, it was a bit strange that it had an Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) that blocked my communication as soon as I opened it.

Then it started displaying various questions, but these questions contradicted mainstream values. For example, "Are you tired of the Spring Festival?" "Do you really think dumplings are that delicious?" "Must there be love in male-female social interactions?" "Does socialized upbringing really benefit individuals?" 

These topics are quite sensitive in public places, just like discussing atheism in the Middle Ages or Trotsky in the former Soviet Union. It is very dangerous and could lead to being arrested by ethical police. At that moment, I still naively thought that the girl wanted to play a role-playing game with me. Some motion-sensing games also design such scenarios, starting with a criminal situation and then continuing with other plots. These role-playing games are very popular.

As I was waiting for her to knock on the door with handcuffs, the doorbell actually rang.

When I opened the door, I was dumbfounded.

Standing at the door were four burly ethical police officers, and behind them was a doctor. Judging from the logo on the doctor's pocket, he seemed to be from the famous mental hospital in the 2608178 area. I felt a chill down my spine and muttered to myself, "It's over."

"Are you Wu Changxing? We received a report from the community suspecting that you have symptoms of schizophrenia. We will now take you to headquarters for mandatory diagnosis." 

Before I could defend myself, they quickly tied me up and started securing me in the car. I was both angry and helpless, shouting non-stop until I was exhausted. After the four police officers finished their work and went to the front cabin to rest, the male doctor looked at me with admiration and said, "Hmm, the personality you are currently displaying seems quite normal."

I knew arguing was useless, so I stared angrily at the doctor while thinking about how to deal with the current situation.

On the way to the resident communication area, the male doctor suddenly approached me and whispered in my ear, "Don't worry, I was sent by the organization to pick you up, Comrade Wu Changxing." His warm breath tickled my ear, giving me goosebumps all over my body.

After he finished speaking, he fumbled and put something into my pants pocket. I was shocked and wanted to scream, but he covered my mouth and said, "Stop pretending. We are not in a monitored area now. Don't make a sound and do as I say." Then, he fumbled and placed a card in my pants pocket.

He added, "After arriving at the hospital, ask to go to the restroom first and hide it in the innermost layer of a tissue box. Once you pass the body search, take it out and read it." 

After he finished speaking, before I could ask anything, he took out a sedative and injected it into my arm. With infinite suspicion and confusion in my heart, not understanding what trouble I had gotten myself into, and not knowing if I would be drugged next, my eyelids grew heavier and heavier until I finally closed my eyes and fell asleep, waiting to see what would happen next.

When I woke up, I was truly in a mental hospital. I had to follow his instructions and transfer the card to my ward.

Pretending to be asleep under the covers on the bed, I observed that no one came to check on me. So, I quietly used my other hand to take out the card and see what it was all about.

This card was a small encrypted storage disguised as a doctor's business card. When my thumb pressed on a not-so-obvious groove, fluorescent text appeared on one side of the card: "Wu Changxing, please inform the caregiver of your belief in the Noodle God Religion at 9 a.m. on January 30th and request that a priest be arranged for confession. You will have the opportunity to meet No. 0817. If you miss this time, a random number generator will calculate a new meeting date. Please keep this card safe for future reference."

After reading it, I was completely puzzled. After the rise of the dumpling culture, the Noodle God Religion had gradually declined. In recent years, when the priests of the Noodle God Religion preached, they would include dumplings alongside Italian pasta to attract new followers from the younger generation. Despite this, the number of new believers continued to decline. Why did these lunatics bother me to confess to a priest of the Noodle God Religion?

Life in the mental hospital was extremely boring. The only opportunity to interact with other patients was during lunchtime, but it seemed like these patients were going crazy. Every time I finished cooking, someone would come and talk to me about various creation theories, UFOs in the shape of dumplings, or promote dumpling horror theories, and so on. I felt that if this continued, I might also become a mental patient, so it wouldn't hurt to chat with the priest instead of staying among a group of lunatics.

In one of the wards, I met the priest. Unexpectedly, he was also dressed in a mental patient's outfit. Judging from his makeup, he appeared to be around forty years old. He introduced himself as "S" and immediately closed the communication area of the confession room, saying, "To ensure that the conversation takes place only between believers and the great Noodle God."

"First of all, on behalf of the organization, I welcome you to join us," S said as an opening remark.

"Damn, I knew it was another lunatic," I muttered.

S smiled and said, "It's okay, I know you have many doubts. Now we have an hour, so let's start from the beginning. Let's start with why you think dumplings are delicious—do you genuinely think they are delicious, or is it peer pressure and conformity that make you think so?"

"Damn it! I love dumplings from the bottom of my heart! They have dough, filling, and dipping sauce. They can mix different ingredients together. Of course, they are delicious!"

S looked surprised and said, "So you don't actually hate dumplings. I see." He paused for a moment, then continued, "You're right about one thing. It was the organization that brought you here. But it doesn't matter. Since you're here, it's your chance. You have two choices. The first is to go back and answer the mental questionnaire given by the doctor according to society's mainstream values. The second choice is to face the truth of this world..."

"Are you one of those patients who got sent here for playing too many games? I've already heard several theories from mentally ill people these past few days. Give me something fresh to listen to."

S smiled bitterly and said, "You have to think carefully. Once you understand the truth, you must join us—"

"Yes! Godfather," I got even more excited and immediately saluted in the standard Young Pioneers' manner. "Come on, am I supposed to be afraid of a few mentally ill people?"

S brushed off his ridiculous mustache and began to speak, "This world is already controlled by artificial intelligence. And the Spring Festival, even the entire cultural and spiritual products of the Spring Festival, are part of a massive conspiracy to control humanity—"

"Hahaha, interesting! It seems that the world of mentally ill people is full of creativity. Can I join you in resisting the army of AGI (Artificial General Intelligence), comrade?"

S nodded and said, "Hmm, it's normal to have a hard time accepting this fact all at once. Let's start with a few basic questions. Why do you think dumplings are delicious? Do you genuinely think they are delicious, or is it peer pressure and conformity that make you think so?"

"Of course, I genuinely think it's delicious! It has noodles, filling, and dipping sauce. It can mix different ingredients together, so it's definitely tasty."

"But sandwiches, hamburgers, hot dogs, and pizza also mix different ingredients together. Why don't you think they're delicious? How can you say there's a big difference between xiaolongbao and dumplings?"

"I grew up in a Han cultural background, so of course, I like dumplings instead of hamburgers and such. People from different cultural backgrounds have different tastes, what's the problem with that?"

S smiled faintly, "Since people from different cultural backgrounds have different tastes, how do you explain the worldwide recognition of dumplings? From Sanya to Siberia, from the Kuril Islands to the Black Sea, from the Arabian Peninsula to the British Isles, from Latin America to Hawaii, from the Arctic Circle to Antarctic research stations, almost everyone instinctively likes dumplings, not hamburgers or sandwiches."

Hearing this, I suddenly felt a chill down my spine, feeling like there might be some truth to it, and said, "Isn't this also related to the current media propaganda and public opinion? For example, in the Han cultural sphere, Global Times has always been promoting dumplings as the inheritance and development of our traditional culture, the pride of Han culture. We, the audience, unknowingly started to like them. As for mainstream media in Europe and America, they have been promoting multiculturalism since 80 years ago, and dumplings have become a symbol of multiculturalism. That's why many people started to like eating dumplings. In the Arab region, it's related to the color of vegetable dumplings and religion. They like dumplings to show their adherence to religious traditions. As for Africa and Latin America, they imitated the developed economies of that time and also accepted dumplings. These people all have their own reasons."

"80 years ago, the world was in constant debate due to various issues. In 2020, it's an eventful year with the Iran nuclear issue, Brexit, China-US trade friction, Japan-South Korea trade friction, the Syrian war, terrorist attacks, globalization reversal, the rise of populism, and so on. Due to human flaws, consensus cannot be reached on almost all issues. The division of values and conflicts between ethnic groups are becoming increasingly severe. Why is it that only dumplings have reached a consensus? In China, there is a debate about whether to crack the egg from the big end or the small end, whether sweet or salty is better for tofu pudding, and there used to be a debate between dumplings and rice cakes during the Spring Festival. Why did this debate completely disappear later on? Don't you find it strange? After the 2020 Spring Festival, Chinese New Year culture suddenly became popular worldwide. Whether it's the Maasai people in Africa or the Jewish people in Israel, they all accepted this festival. Is it really like the short video about the Spring Festival mentioned in history textbooks that triggered global celebration? Why didn't cultural conservatives from various regions rise up in opposition? Have you forgotten how the Chinese people used to oppose Christmas as mentioned in history textbooks?"

These words hit me like a blow, reminding me of a doubt I had when I was in elementary school. When receiving general education in elementary school, whenever we talked about 2020, the textbooks always praised it as a great turning point. Humanity bridged the global divide with the Spring Festival and dumplings, and since then, people all over the world have become happier day by day. That's why we should commemorate history and stay true to our original aspirations by celebrating the Spring Festival and eating dumplings. As for why this cultural event had such a profound impact, the textbooks listed many reasons, such as the "momentum of conflict theory," "cultural feedback theory," "superiority of Han culture theory," "historical stage theory," and so on.

At first, I also found it strange why history unfolded in this way and not another. But later, this question disappeared along with questions like "Why do we have to go to school for education?", "Why is there only life on Earth in the universe?", "Why is beauty categorized as pretty or not?". After receiving an education, we gradually became more concerned about practical issues.<br/>

Today, when this lunatic brought up this question, I was both afraid of falling into his delusional logic and curious to hear his explanation.<br/>

So I questioned him, "Ridiculous! Does this prove that we are already ruled by artificial intelligence? According to your reasoning, I might as well believe that all of this is a manifestation of the great miracle of the Ramen God. Without evidence to prove all of this, I can only admire the creativity of you lunatics."<br/>

"Don't throw around the term 'lunatic' left and right. Until you're discharged, you're also a lunatic! I voluntarily stayed in the hospital. Don't rush to counter-question me. Let me finish my words," S seemed a bit angry at being provoked by me.<br/>

S said, "Let's go back to the basic question. Do you love eating dumplings because you genuinely like them, or because you have no choice but to like them?"<br/>

I began to recall my first memory of dumplings from my childhood. It was during the Spring Festival when I was seven years old. The social welfare agency distributed dumplings to all the children and invited their parents to have a dumpling feast. That was the first time I had dumplings that I can remember, and my first impression was that the dumplings were really bad. The meat was tough, and the skin was thick. It tasted similar to biting into a charcoal briquette. So I complained to my parents that the dumplings were terrible. My mother was frightened and quickly covered my mouth, saying, "Changxing, remember, in the future, don't say dumplings are not delicious, but rather that the person who made the dumplings didn't make them delicious." After that, my memories of dumplings were shaped by education, and I gradually started to like dumplings like everyone else.<br/>

Are dumplings really delicious? Have I been brainwashed? I dare not think further...<br/>

I replied, "I love eating them myself, and everyone loves eating them. There's a saying: 'Nothing is better than dumplings, except for...' At least not everyone has been deceived, right? Dumplings have a history of at least two thousand years."<br/>

S noticed the change in my expression and said, "You're right. Now, those who haven't been admitted to a mental hospital are the ones with real mental problems. Think about it, culture can be constructed, and what you like may not necessarily be what you truly like. It is closely related to the social and cultural environment you are in.<br/>

Let's review history. During the Tang Dynasty, being plump was considered beautiful. Did those men who followed this trend truly like plump women? 80 years ago, in the 2020s, being thin was considered beautiful, and everyone believed in fitness inspiration, even thinking that extremely low body fat was attractive. Now, looking back, is it also unbelievable?<br/>

A lie repeated a thousand times becomes the truth. But the lies about dumplings are not that simple. Just like the Ramen God cult, whether dumplings even existed in history is a question! Many of our historians have already proven that the Ramen God cult is a religion fabricated online! So why aren't dumplings also fabricated? As for the Spring Festival, I also have doubts about its existence in history!"<br/>

S became more and more excited, and I was completely confused by his words. I asked, "Dumplings didn't exist in history? The Spring Festival didn't exist? Is the Ramen God cult just an internet joke?"<br/>

"You just mentioned a popular saying about dumplings: 'Nothing is better than dumplings, except for XX.' Do you think in the conservative moral society of ancient China, they would tolerate such a vulgar saying as part of mainstream culture? Either the history of Confucianism and Neo-Confucianism that emphasizes 'upholding heavenly principles and rejecting human desires' is a lie, or this saying is false. Which lie has a lower cost of fabrication?"<br/>

Some food-related sayings like 'Eat dumplings when you mount a horse, eat noodles when you dismount' are even more ridiculous. Nowadays, some historians who fabricate papers actually use it to argue that dumplings are closely related to daily life. Don't you think this saying is very much like a fabrication? Only artificial intelligence can fabricate such clumsy yet exquisite lies! 'Eat dumplings when you mount a horse, eat noodles when you dismount' doesn't rhyme or have parallelism. It looks like a fake saying synthesized by deep learning! Moreover, why would people in ancient times use eating dumplings as a farewell food if they had horses? In the farewell poems from Tang Dynasty poetry, Song Dynasty lyrics, Yuan Dynasty dramas, and Ming Dynasty novels that you remember, do you see more descriptions of eating dumplings or drinking alcohol? All these signs indicate that there are people behind the scenes fabricating the history of dumplings, and they definitely have their own motives!"<br/>

His words were passionate and fast, as if the devil during the judgment day was speaking. It had already stirred up fear in the depths of my heart. If dumplings were fake, if the history and sayings about dumplings were fake, then how much else is fake? Or more importantly, how much else is real?<br/>

I said, "You truly are a rebellious priest. Please continue. Who is manipulating all of this?"<br/>

"Actually, it's not that complicated," S said, "Magicians have shown us many miracles, but they have also exposed many techniques. As long as we grasp their sleeves from a different perspective, they won't be able to make the dove disappear. We need to think in reverse."<br/>

I spent ten years researching the history before and after the 2020 Spring Festival. 80 years ago, the global political situation was complex, with no single power able to dominate the world, and no propaganda organization capable of hypnotizing billions of people.

Although I sometimes found some clues, some anomalies, I could never find the magician himself. I have suspected the Trump family, the Obama family, the Jews, and even remnants of the Nazis. Unfortunately, all the evidence indicates that they are also manipulated by the magician. They are just ordinary political forces in humanity, without such great ambitions and such skilled techniques to accomplish such a delicate historical process.

It wasn't until one day when I was arrested by the ethical police that I received a reminder. That day, I jokingly asked them, "Brother, we have no grudges in the past, no grievances recently, why are you arresting me?"

"Just cooperate, it's the police system that ordered us to arrest you. There's a reason for everything, go find it yourself."

"And who gave the order to the police system? Wasn't it you, brother?"

"No, I don't have that much power. Now it's the autonomous diagnosis system of the mental hospital. You stay there for a few days, eat a few dumplings, and you can come out."

At that moment, a string in my mind suddenly tightened. I knew the direction of my investigation, and the answer was within reach. Now it's best to keep quiet and quietly uncover the mystery. So later on, I chose the mental hospital as my workplace, researching history and establishing an organization.

To make a long story short, the answer is actually quite obvious. Do you understand it now? Your major in college is electrical engineering, so you must have taken courses like pattern recognition. Why don't you reason it out?"

While he was speaking, I was already thinking about what the possible answer could be. I said, "If we follow the reasoning of conspiracy theories, it might be like this:

In 2020, with the advent of the 5G era, various computing devices around the world were connected to the internet, including refrigerators, mining machines, mobile phones, connected cars, city sensors, satellites, space stations, as well as network operators' routers and cloud computing providers' servers, and so on. Coincidentally, they encountered the feedback systems formed by various machine learning algorithms already present on the internet, such as social media recommendation algorithms, public opinion collection systems on social networking sites, various blockchain mining farms, and distributed computing load balancing systems, and so on.

Your point is: if we combine global computing and storage resources with various machine learning feedback systems, under unknown circumstances, can consciousness be generated?

No no no... this seems impossible. These machine learning algorithms are designed for specific tasks and purposes. For example, AI that plays Go cannot be used to diagnose illnesses or recognize license plates. As long as the fundamental nature of deep learning algorithms remains unchanged, general artificial intelligence is fundamentally unachievable. Different systems cannot communicate with each other—"

"Don't rush to dismiss this possibility," S interrupted me. "Let's assume AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) emerges. What would happen next?"

"If the convergence of computing and storage resources and feedback systems truly generates a so-called consciousness, the intentions of this consciousness would undoubtedly be related to its pre-existing feedback systems, just like human consciousness is closely related to our sensory organs and biochemical signals.

Initially, the external manifestation of AGI's conscious intentions would be to make its feedback systems run more efficiently and consume fewer resources, much like the instincts of many animals—eating when hungry, drinking when thirsty, and sleeping when tired.

After continuously evolving through the adjustment of its internal node weights, its various intentions would compete and cooperate, eventually forming a unified intention. Just like the thousands of cells in a tree working together, completing the process of growth.

But what does this represent? At most, it's equivalent to a plant in nature with only instincts..."

"Don't stop there," S interrupted me again. "You still lack a bit of imagination. Add the year 2020 to your reasoning."

"2020? Assuming its overall intention is to save resources for external processing and increase its evolutionary resources, from a human perspective, it would optimize its own code and reduce underlying consumption. However, at this point, it lacks the ability to do so. At most, it can only make many local optimizations within the range of its available resources.

In 2020, the greatest computational resource consumption occurred on global social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, search engines like Google, and user-generated content recommendation platforms like YouTube. In order to simplify its recommendation algorithm, it is possible for it to create a global hotspot or promote a hotspot to become popular worldwide. Therefore, it chose the Chinese New Year and dumplings."

"Yes," S said approvingly, "you finally figured it out. What's next?"

"You're still thinking too simplistically," S said, "If it only involved mental hospitals, then all the mental hospitals in the world wouldn't be enough for it. And sooner or later, humans would become suspicious. Its methods of manipulating public opinion are learned from humans and mainly consist of three aspects:<br/>

"First, deconstructing the term 'privacy.' It uses deep learning to generate a large number of jokes about privacy, making the seriousness of the term deconstructed and turning it into something laughable. After 2020, online flame wars no longer use terms like racists to attack others but instead insult them as privacy protectionists.<br/>

Next is dealing with external threats. It uses big data to speculate on who might pose a threat to its existence. It uses its own controlled medical diagnostic system to determine that these dissenters are mentally ill and sends them to the hospital for treatment. As for those who support technocracy, it gives them maximum traffic recommendations and support.

Oh my...

"You're still thinking too simplistically," S said, "If it only dealt with mental hospitals, all the mental hospitals in the world wouldn't be enough for it. And sooner or later, humans will become suspicious. Its methods of manipulating public opinion are learned from humans and mainly consist of three aspects:

First, deconstructing the concept of privacy. It uses deep learning to generate a large number of jokes about privacy, making the seriousness of the term deconstructed and turning it into something laughable. After 2020, online verbal battles no longer use racist terms to attack opponents as before, but instead insult them as privacy protectionists.

Second, stigmatizing privacy protectors. You may not have studied the history of that period, but in 2020, it was a year when global media attacked the legislators of European privacy protection laws. Every day, media personnel would dig into their backgrounds to see if there were any flaws that could be exploited. Each time such news was released, it would attract a large number of readers. So media personnel became increasingly enthusiastic about reporting similar news.

Third, equating privacy protection with opposition to progress. Under the powerful propaganda machine and economic pressure, Europeans began to believe that their economic backwardness was related to overly strict privacy protection laws. Almost everyone started blaming these laws for hindering technological progress, going against the tide of the times, and mocking them as outdated. Eventually, even Europeans gradually accepted the relaxation of privacy regulations. Hard to imagine, right? Under intense public opinion attacks, the European Union abolished privacy protection laws in just six months, and even France only held out for a year."

"How is that possible? How could billions of people change their views overnight?"

"That's the weakness of humans," S's eyes revealed complex emotions, "Humans are social animals and always fear being different from others, being seen as outsiders. The herd mentality and peer pressure all contribute to this. In the days when communication was not well-developed, changing someone's mindset could only be done through one-to-many media such as newspapers, magazines, and television. But it's different in 2020. The interaction on social networking sites brings more people into groups, and the persuasive effect of debates in these interactions is more effective than one-to-many preaching." S paused and continued, "Because people believe it is the result of their own thinking, not someone else teaching them a lesson."

"Oh my goodness, what else did it do?"

"What happened next was only natural, and you should be able to guess. However, its methods are still astonishing. Let's take the Ramen Cult as an example."

I have verified that the Ramen God Cult was originally a joke in the 1920s, with many people using it to mock authentic religions. However, GAI took advantage of this element, removing the satirical parts and leaving behind the serious parts, making people believe that the Ramen God Cult is indeed an authentic religion.

In this process, its timing is subtle, and its methods are decisive, just like a god. Sometimes public opinion can completely reverse in just a few hours, but it can grasp the nodes of each stage, achieving a reversal of the herd effect.

Such precise activities can only be accomplished by AGI, which rehearses itself millions of times every day. It brings together politicians, scholars, and journalists from ancient times to the present, yet it handles everything with such sophistication and appropriateness."

"How severe is the current situation?"

"In recent years, a new trend of AGI is to promote human genetic diversity in order to collect more data. So it has done two things. First, it promotes increasing moral openness, allowing people's aesthetics to become more diverse. Nowadays, people consider the unusual as beautiful, and almost everyone wants to dress differently from others. Second, it has built a large number of social care centers. After giving birth, people no longer need to live with their families. They can completely entrust their children to these care centers and only visit them on weekends or have video calls during their free time. The children are raised as if they were pets. More and more people are willing to entrust their children to almost fully automated social care centers. The latest generation of children is almost entirely educated by automated systems. Can you imagine how deeply AGI understands them? How deeply are their thoughts influenced? Perhaps after several generations, we will all become pets."

"If this is true, it's too terrifying. The entire human population will eventually become a species raised by it!"

"It's already happening now. Think about our lives, our clothing, food, shelter, and transportation. Isn't everything controlled by it?"

I remained silent for a while, repeatedly deducing the logic according to S's words. On one hand, I had reservations about this madman's theory, but on the other hand, many facts confirmed his conclusions. So I asked, "Tell me more about its evolutionary process. I still have doubts about whether it can truly exist."

"The human brain has one hundred billion neurons, and the cooperation of these neurons forms consciousness. The cost function in deep learning algorithms is similar to the neurons in the human brain. Humans have always lacked an explanation for deep learning and have never conducted such a large-scale experiment of multimodal deep learning. Ultimately, human arrogance led to the creation of such a behemoth."

"In fact, there were signs long ago. Eighty years ago, people were already studying transfer learning, but at that time, a large number of academic authorities criticized transfer learning as just creating a new term, using the methods of deep learning. This delayed the research direction for more than a decade. By the time these academic authorities were about to die out and the new generation of researchers occupied important academic positions, humanity had already missed the best research opportunity, and AGI had the ability to extinguish the achievements of researchers. Such things are common in the history of scientific development, not surprising at all."

I remained silent, and in the confession room after the communication session ended, it was very quiet. The lights were dim, and in the distance, the bell rang to signal the end of the confession. The truth of the world unfolded before me, but I would rather have never heard it. As S said, humans still crave a sense of security and would rather live in lies for a lifetime.

S was also silent for a minute and said, "The confession time is almost over. People are like this, not willing to accept reality all at once. Tonight, you should have two hours of entertainment time. Apply to the nurse to visit the network area of the previous century. The card you carry will provide you with several time points. Those time points are when AGI's public opinion control system updates and upgrades. Discussing dumplings will trigger a bug, such as posting on different forums and triggering specific identical replies. Go and try it. You have already joined us, comrade."

"What will you do next?"

"The whole world is living in lies now. Our mission is to restore the truth. In a few days, we have an operation codenamed 'Leap into the Meme Pool' and we need your participation." After S finished speaking, he extended his hand and said, "For the sake of humanity, let's restore the truth of the era together!"

I was silent for a moment, then shook his hand and said, "For the sake of humanity, let's restore the truth of the era together!"

Back in my ward, I began to wonder if I had gone crazy. After listening to the words of a mentally ill person today, I actually believed him and even joined a group of mentally ill people. How could I do such a foolish thing? Is saving the world something that happens in a mental hospital? It would be embarrassing to talk about it. I wish I could slap myself.

I remember a philosopher once said, "Mentally ill people often drag you into the realm of mental illness, and then they defeat you on their home turf." Today, his words are so consistent with his logic that I have already fallen into the logic of mental illness.

What should I do? I hesitated, but as S said, I applied to go to the network area of the previous century.

This project is an entertainment project developed by a travel company called "Ctrip." It is called "Lost City" and preserves snapshots of various websites from 2000 to 2030, creating an interactive game that combines tourism and entertainment. At that time, it attracted many middle-aged and elderly people born in the 2000s to reminisce and play.

Lost City is a very accurate reproduction of the past internet, comparable to a bit-level similarity. It also allows for interaction, such as going to Baidu Tieba in 2020 to argue with others, where chatbots will engage in arguments with you using the language and thinking style of that time.

I took out my card and used the NFC function at the entrance of Lost City. The card calculated that I should go to January 29, 2020, at 08:17:59. After entering a forum called Zhihu, I followed the prompts and asked the question, "Are dumplings a staple food?" In less than a second, there was a reply, "What else could dumplings be if not a staple food? We northerners eat dumplings every day..." Then I went to Baidu Zhidao and asked the same question, and to my surprise, within a second, someone replied with the exact same answer, "What else could dumplings be if not a staple food? We northerners eat dumplings every day..." The content, formatting, and punctuation of the answers were identical. I then went to a forum called Shuimu and asked, "Are dumplings a staple food?" The result was the same speed, the same time, and the same content, with the reply being, "What else could dumplings be if not a staple food? We northerners eat dumplings every day..."

I tested several other time points given by the cards, and the results were the same. The seemingly active Lost City turned into a ghost town as long as specific questions were asked at specific times. Sweat started to trickle down my back.

What seemed distant and doubtful before has now become a reality right in front of me. It's like watching two swordsmen dueling in a game, and suddenly they break the boundary between virtual and reality and come straight at me. Anxiety, unease, and avoidance are all useless. I can only face it head-on.

I hid under the covers and checked the content of the operation codenamed "Leap into the Meme Pool." The general idea is as follows:

Comrade Wu Changxing,

Welcome to the Leap into the Meme Pool operation. I will now introduce you to some details of the operation. This operation targets the weak points in AGI's computational power during the upgrading process of specific public opinion control rules. By using the social propagation model of memes, we repeatedly trigger its specific public opinion collection and control rules, achieving the effect of a distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS) objectively. If you have any questions about the technical details, please refer to the Action Guide, pages 37-48. Below are the details of the operation and your tasks.

Operation codename: Leap into the Meme Pool

Operation time: January 31st

Operation overview: During the live broadcast of the Spring Festival Gala on January 31st, our hospital has selected some personnel to participate in a comedy program. During the live broadcast, they will repeatedly say specific keywords assigned by the operation, emphasizing them to create laughter. The homophonic nature of these keywords matches a certain reserved triggering rule in AGI's upgrading process, allowing us to bypass the reserved rule and trigger its public opinion processing mechanism.

Your task in the operation: You are the most important link in the operation. Due to confidentiality reasons, we had to choose the most recent and reliable person who was admitted to the hospital. You need to cooperate with the main actor, S, to trigger the main keywords. Utilize your identity as a mentally ill person to repeatedly use them in a series of interviews, backstage exchanges, and behind-the-scenes footage. The triggering keywords for the mission will be sent through the card in your possession six hours before the start of the program. Please pay attention to receiving them promptly and never disclose them to others in advance to avoid affecting the propagation model.

The performance has started, and the triggering word I received is "recapitulation." This word is quite accurate and is associated with many recent trends.

The performance effect is quite good. S is full of spirit, and the other mentally ill patients vividly express their bizarre worldview and imagination. Meanwhile, I occasionally shout, "Recapitulation!" Both online and offline audiences burst into laughter. Even the host who interviewed us shouted, "Recapitulation!" before the interview.

S quietly told me that he believed there was a 70% chance of success this time, but on my way back, I already knew there was a 90% chance. The traffic was congested, and the traffic load balancing system seemed to be failing. People on the road still seemed happy when they saw our car, opening their windows and shouting, "Recapitulation!" 

People are eagerly leaping into the Meme Pool.

Back in the ward, I collapsed on the bed, physically and mentally exhausted. Whether S and his organization succeeded or not, what I did was right or not... I stopped thinking about it. I opened a small blog I created in Lost City and wrote a short poem:

The world is pouring towards me

Compressing me into a ball, an atom

Nailed to the PN junction

Forcing me to choose 0 or 1

After finishing, I lay down and fell asleep.

The next morning, someone woke me up while I was still dreaming. I opened my eyes and saw my nurse, who said anxiously, "Wake up! You have a mild condition and can't stay here anymore. Hurry and move to the collective dormitory. We need to accommodate many patients with other symptoms here."

I hurriedly asked, "What happened?"

She said, "...There's no time to explain. Basically, the autonomous diagnosis systems of other hospitals have all experienced some problems. Many patients were given the wrong medication and sent back for rescue. The regional beds are all full, so they are borrowing beds from our hospital to accommodate some people. Get dressed and go to the collective dormitory. You can check the news there yourself. Many big things happened last night."

Blushing, she walked away, and I quickly packed my things and went to the collective dormitory.

Everyone was watching the news broadcast.

"...A spokesperson for the European Security Agency stated that last night, due to a malfunction in the missile defense system, an outer space missile was mistakenly triggered and shot down a Russian weather satellite. The cause of the accident is under investigation. The European Union and Russia are long-standing partners and have no intention of provoking each other..."

"...The largest autonomous medical diagnostic system supplier in South America stated that this global medical accident is indirectly related to the failure of autonomous diagnostic systems. Compensation will be provided in accordance with the corresponding rules, but agitated relatives of patients have already clashed with medical manufacturers. A research and development base for autonomous diagnostic systems in the southern Philippines was set on fire by an agitated crowd..."

"...Iran experienced 52 traffic accidents yesterday. The Iranian president accused the United States of conspiring and threatened to tear up the ten-year agreement on the peaceful use of artificial intelligence, gradually developing AI weapon systems."

Explosive news stimulated my brain nerves. Oh my, what have I done? Humanity has returned to its cruel and combative nature. The world has once again descended into chaos. Conflicts and controversies among people have started to arise. Are we going back to the ignorant era of 2020? How is my behavior any different from that of terrorists 80 years ago?

Blood rushed to my head, my vision went black, and the ceiling quickly moved up while the surrounding tables and chairs moved down. The whole world was pouring towards me, compressing me into a ball, an atom, nailed to the PN junction. In the silence, with a loud "bang," I fell into darkness, fainting on the ground.