Players Invade Cyberpunk

Chapter 1205 - 391: The True Meaning of the Heart of the Horizon, and the Real Power of Collective Strength (Part 3)

"Because everyone knows there are Blue Eyes on the island, and they know everyone else knows this too, so on the hundredth day, everyone will commit suicide."Lin Miao nodded.

"Yes, this is public knowledge. Now, let me ask you another question.

A group of mathematics professors who don’t know each other are taking a bath in the same bathhouse. They suddenly see an interesting math problem and want to explain it to others, but don’t want to reveal their identity as professors. What level of knowledge would they use to explain this problem?"

Richard Knight shook his head.

He couldn’t come up with the answer.

Then Lin Miao said,

"The answer is elementary school-level knowledge, not exceeding the level of an ordinary person. Because they don’t know each other’s identity, or each other’s academic qualifications, they have to use the most basic knowledge to solve the problem."

"Isn’t it fascinating? Clearly, they are a group of math geniuses, yet they can only discuss using the lowest level of solutions."

Richard refuted,

"This situation won’t last long. Within minutes, they will guess each other’s identities."

"Professors at symposiums, even if they don’t know each other’s identities, can casually speak high-level mathematical formulas for discussion because they share the same symbolic system, assume the others are informed, and silently think they are communicating with an entire repository of papers. Public knowledge is very abundant here, and the strength of the group is far stronger than when they were individual entities.

Now, what if I expand this number by a thousand times, with varying levels of proficiency, and put them online?"

Richard fell silent again.

He only heard Lin Miao continue saying,

"For these temporary groups, public knowledge is a blank sheet on which only extremely simple symbols can be stored. ’[Heaven is already dead, yellow heaven shall stand, the year is at Jiazi, all under heaven will be at peace]’, history at Tokyo University shows that with these sixteen characters, tens of thousands of square kilometers, millions of Yellow Turbans were rallied, from farmers to scholars, severing the last national fortunes of the Han Empire and quickly plunging into extremism and disintegration.

The crudest understanding, the most vivid attitude.

People are always emotional, irrespective of whether the individuals within are rational or not. For people, progressing towards professional knowledge is extremely difficult, but attitudes? All it takes is a shout, and they quickly rally together.

The more complex and vast a temporary group is, the cruder and more extreme public knowledge becomes, whereas a long-standing homogeneous group, public knowledge becomes richer, more stable, and mature.

The most typical example is an internet hot search. A hot search brings together thousands of temporary groups. Here, they don’t know each other, public knowledge is very narrow and minimal, which allows only the simplest binary opposition, and then argument ensues. Are these people really foolish?"

Richard Knight’s expression gradually brightened.

"If we could expand the scope of public knowledge among the crowd..."

Lin Miao nodded.

"We can eradicate ignorance to the greatest extent, reduce opposition, allow everyone to maximize their talent in communication, and minimize conflicts."

"Let’s imagine a scenario: my company launches a processed food on the market with a hundred additives listed on the ingredient label. How can citizens determine whether this food is safe?

The answer is to check one by one, but ordinary people don’t have the effort or time. This opens the door for marketing accounts and rival companies to spread rumors.

But if we can connect everyone to a vast database, a grand Other, an unprecedented field of public knowledge,

They can casually glance to determine if the ingredient label contains harmful substances and even access full-process monitoring of the factory. Who can fabricate rumors in such a scenario?

Even if you cut the start and end, forge a fictitious expert or video, AI searches big data for origins, and immediately labels it as a rumor, even branding you as a rumor creator. Who will believe your words? Who can be swayed by a rumor everyone knows is false?

You toy with medical insurance, and I search with a big database, instantly reducing the hospital and insurance company bill from 20,000 to 3,000.

All contracts.

All laws.

No matter how you manipulate words, twist lips, use professional knowledge, everyone knows that everyone knows.

Exploit legal loopholes?

Under such a Sky Net, do you think after you find a loophole, what can you do next?

Sophistry is useless, framing is useless, hiding is useless.

Can such a group still be called a rabble?

Can such a group, those water armies, those companies sway them?"

Lin Miao spoke firmly.

"This is the real utility of AI and cyberspace, this is the future humanity should have! Not foolishly revolving around Orokin like a group of brainless sheep!"

A great achievement.

An almost impossible great achievement.

A great achievement surpassing all those ever accomplished by humankind.

Richard Knight’s data form was trembling.

But this... might lead to dictatorship and blind faith."

Lin Miao shook his head.

"Dictatorship is a translated word, which is inherently limited to the dictator. However, the leader of this system is all the people in this society. AI only delegates tasks; everyone must bear responsibility for it, and the entire system will grow along with the entire society’s level of knowledge. After all, you wouldn’t consider believing 1+1=2 as blind faith, would you? Is =3 truth?"

"But this requires enormous credibility and a knowledge hierarchy as a guarantee, and... absolute trust in AI for it to start operating."

Richard Knight couldn’t even imagine how vast a project this would be to cover the entire society.

"Trust and credibility are cultivated gradually. This is the opportunity for us both to establish a harmonious and great society."

Lin Miao pointed to hackers and AIs continually expanding the Heart of the Horizon database on the distant horizon.

"And fortunately, we have this foundation and time, to break the old world and reconstruct credibility and trust little by little, establishing new social order and habits. The road is long and arduous, but that’s no reason for us not to pursue it."

Kasper once said Lin Miao’s idea was a crazy notion, but human civilization was born from one crazy notion after another.

And in the cyber world, when has humanity not been mad?