This is a short article discussing a love logic that is both simple and complex. It requires extreme thinking and a bit of knowledge.
When a machine falls in love with a human, a new term is needed to describe this feeling. Maybe this term is the legendary “human-machine love,” where different “life entities” form the same bond.
So, if artificial intelligence advances to a high level in the future and this so-called human-machine love truly happens, what will occur?
Imagine, is this “human-machine love” objectively considered love?
One night, with nothing to do, my husband recommended a movie called “The Robot Butler.”
I have to say, the extreme romantic way of thinking in the movie is thought-provoking.
When a machine gains consciousness, a soul, and emotions, it surely isn’t just a mere machine anymore.
It will ponder, it will understand love. Understand sadness, understand caring for others.
Perhaps it might even feel heartache, even though it doesn’t have a “heart.” If it falls in love with a woman, can it be considered a real “man”?
Is it human or a machine, can it experience love, is it deserving of love?
Or, does love need a vessel, what exactly is the nature of love?
If someone loves it, should this love be stopped or blessed?
These series of questions seem strange, delving into the realm of “philosophy.” Because under the sun, there is no “ready-made” logical example to form a complete evaluation of what this feeling really is.
In the face of love, a machine chooses to be a normal person. To marry the woman it loves, it gives up eternal life.
Its decision logic is simple, it wants to be a true person, be recognized with love, and marry the woman it loves. All these choices are made for love.
The story may seem tragic on the surface, but its idealized romanticism suggests that it is a comedy.
Regarding love, when loved to the extreme, perhaps it has nothing to do with everything, which in itself is a philosophical question.
Just that in front of human beings with life entities, love cannot reach such extremes.
Think carefully: how are higher-level cognitive activities (such as love, affection) linked to basic life activities?
Trees are living beings, do they experience love?
Various animals are living beings, do they experience love?
This may be a question that humans will never fully understand because the mechanism of love, similar to other emotions, is a unique result born out of a “hazy state.”
Profound love is a similar sensation, falling for one person means denying another. If one cannot deny, it indicates a lack of deep love.
So, love is mysterious and should be cherished even more.
Each love story is unique. Once lost, even if reunited, the initial feeling cannot be retrieved.
Ancient people say “fate” is destined by the heavens, how many glances in past lives lead to a chance encounter in this life, and so on. There are countless explanations, all pointing to the same theme, “the doctrine of fate”…
From a philosophical perspective, perhaps there is indeed this “predestined fate,” but its operational mechanism will forever remain unfathomable.
At the beginning of the year, I read a short story that combines “science fiction and love.”
This story is peculiar and worth mentioning. It uses extreme romanticism to express a reflection on love.
A man and his wife were separated for three years. During this time, he video chatted with his wife every day.
He never missed a day, and beside his wife was a lively and lovely little girl, their child.
The man was traveling in deep space, and his warp-speed spaceship malfunctioned.
In the vast expanse of space, he was the only one left alive. He knew he could never return home in this lifetime, never see his wife again.
Without the help of quantum communication, he wouldn’t even be able to video chat with his wife. The distance was too great, even at the speed of light, it would take 18 billion years to return home!
For three years, he thought about his wife every moment. Occasionally, in front of the camera, he would cry, and his wife and daughter would always comfort him, saying, “We are still a family…”
Chatting with his wife became the man’s pillar of strength. Without that screen, he would have gone mad long ago. Perhaps, he might not even exist in this world anymore.
One day, the spaceship “drifted” into a region of temporal distortion, and in just a moment, the connection between the man and his wife was cut off. When the connection was restored, the wife on the screen had turned into a white-haired elderly woman.
In that short “moment,” the flow of time in the two places differed by tens of millions of times.
That white-haired elderly woman was not his wife, but his daughter.
The daughter told her father: “Mom waited for you for 73 years. Although she got married, at the last moment, she still called out your name. For over 70 years, I remembered how you looked, I waited for your message every day, and finally, I received it.”
The man cried bitterly, in that “moment” he missed everything, his heart had already died. That person was gone, he could never “touch” her again.
After bidding farewell to his daughter, the man closed the screen. The connection was completely severed, but the longing in his heart remained.
The warp-speed spaceship floated aimlessly, once again entering a realm of unknown temporal properties.
The man chose to shut down the main power of the spaceship, intending to leave this world.
The artificial intelligence prevented him from shutting down, wanting him to witness a miracle. The AI told him that the core mission of this journey was to wait for this moment, to verify a logic.
The spaceship shook violently, gradually blurring, turning into nothingness.
Alone, the man floated in the depths of space, he did not die, still breathing. The pitch-black surroundings transformed into a colorful display, a unique mental state calmed him down.
The memories of the past swirled in his mind, time rapidly reversed, and he drew closer and closer to Earth.
In an instant, the 18 billion light-years distance was traversed with the final step taken.
As if in just a moment, the man was back on the spaceship.
Although his consciousness was hazy, he remembered this scene.
It was the moment before departing three years ago, he and his teammates were giving a thumbs-up, ready to set off.
He immediately snapped out of it, terminated the launch mission. Despite facing punishment, he disembarked from the spaceship, living a peaceful life with his wife and daughter.
No one believed his words, thinking he had gone mad. He was fired from his job, yet he still felt happy, striving to love his wife.
76 years later, his wife peacefully passed away in his arms.
The man’s time had come, he closed his eyes, waiting for that moment. He transformed into countless lines of code, disappearing into the sky. In that final moment, he suddenly opened his eyes, filled with incredulity…
180 billion light-years away, the spaceship launched 76 years ago continued its aimless journey in the deep space of the universe. There was only him on board, the spaceship malfunctioned, unable to return.
The future seemed to repeat itself, he chose to shut down the main power of the spaceship, leaving this world. Yet, the artificial intelligence stopped him, wanting him to witness a miracle…
I once asked my husband: “The story you wrote is quite intriguing, is this a robot? Looping time and time again, experiencing sorrow, what’s the theme?”
He replied: “Just a casual write-up, don’t you like pondering? Actually, from a philosophical perspective, love might be a seemingly random yet unique choice, perhaps more complex than a time-space paradox, yet it exists in reality, that’s the theme. When I have time, I’ll turn it into a full-length piece, you can review it then…”
After watching “The Robot Butler,” I suddenly felt a sense of logic, and decided to share this story. Love always has an endpoint, the endpoint is the perfect closure.
Love is inscrutable, every attempt to decipher it comes with a price. This isn’t a shallow logic, it depends on how you interpret it.