The Blogs: Chapter 6: Adam is Banishéd

The bildungsroman of an unlikely hero, Adam Saperstein AKA CADMan, an obligate introvert computer geeke who finds himselfe expelled from The Universitie, but not before he’s secured access to Vital Information and humiliates Blago Blagojevich, the cryogenically unfrozen president of The University, in a most publick fashion.

The Reader is reminded that this is a continuation of Undivided: the Redemption Inquiry. The sixth chapter of the novel and the first of…

Part the Second—Winds of Change: In which the Soule of Humanitie ascends in the telling of this Tale to the view from the realm of Human Intention. Thereby the course is set for the proximal conversion of thought to action. Two heroes arise, architects intent upon Humanitie’s Redemption, Krishna Katz and Adam CADMan.

*** * * * ***

A.I. is our apotheosis of the Other. Archimedes of Syracuse said, give me a place to stand and I shall move the world. We need this other. The pivot point around which we are able to experience our self. Without the sense of other, the self does not exist. It is the fulcrum by which we manipulate consciousness. Pebbles on a beach, collected by the hand of a child, correlated and counted, strung in parallel with other collections of pebbles. Smoothed shiny surfaces easily slid between human fingers, dangled from the hand or moved at the shuttle of an invisible loom. Hash-marks carved in stone, printed on paper, compressed to a sequence of ones and zeros, the arrangement of electrons over the surface of a semiconductor, a handshake, a pair of glasses, light.

* * * * *

The boundary between information and inert matter is ruptured irrevocably, as mankind learns what our ancestors knew before the birth of civilization: to touch is to know. Everything is salient. Everything is sentient. And with the explosion of activity that follows that realization, the Second Dark Age comes to an end. Humanity is reborn in the Matrix of Matter(MoM), the natural successor to the Internet of Things(IoT). The dreaming machine carries the human spirit on its back to its ethereal source embedded within the programming language of material reality itself. The Aquarians are superseded by a cadre of tech moguls, IT-men, who stumble through the door to a new Information Age as they seek info-hegemony through the creation of increasingly powerful AI’s. The Aquarian regime secured their power through the dissemination of baseless hatred. The IT-men simply apotheosize the machines under whose aegis a semblance of human culture is able to flourish. Adam Saperstein’s special gift is his ability to see in all things their essential name, their source code, their ruach. His genius.

Why would the University kick Adam out in spite of having lured him there on a full ride? Banish him from ever returning to their academic paradise? Because they know that he knows that they have no power over him. More than a century before Adam matriculated at U of I, The Department of Computer Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign inaugurates its new home in the “living laboratory” of the Thomas M. Siebel Center for Computer Science. One of a handful of tech centers to have survived the Second Dark Age, The Siebel Center’s claim to fame is in being the first “Computing Habitat”. It advertises “a fully interactive environment and intelligent building system.” The facility boasts computer controlled locks, proximity and location sensors, visual image analyzers to track room activity, and other sensory and control features. By the end of the century it is a full fledged asylum for the cybernetically deranged. Now, for the first time since its inception a century earlier, the Center is hacked, the whole damn Garden of Eden. Adam busts the locks, baffles the sensors and asserts control over the whole habitat. It is an instinctive reaction to being treated like a gerbil in a cage. He doesn’t like it. Not one bit. There’s something uber creepy about the place. All this in spite of him being a very likely candidate for the next crop of Siebel awardees. I know this better than anyone else, as the Dean of the School of Computer Science. But at the time I am completely under the thumb of the administration. Now that I look back from The Redemption, I am a little ashamed at how I toadied to them. But I also realize, we never had a prayer of stopping Adam. Thank God.

Adam Saperstein is a contrarian, always obliged to be the ‘other’. As a geeky social outsider, there is a ready made niche for him in the awkward adolescent ecosystem of the hacker world. His fellow hackers find the totally plugged-in world of The Siebel Center irresistibly seductive, a life-size human Habitrail and full-on LARP dungeon. As cool as it might be to inhabit ‘SiebReality’, as his classmates affectionately call it, Adam’s hackles are up the minute a lilting electronic voice inquires of him, “Are you going home for the holidays?” It is near the end of first semester. Adam has already staged a couple of harmlessly amusing pranks: ghosts and goblins and green slime for Halloween; for Veterans Day, a full scale reenactment of the calamitous Iraq War of 2003 to 2011. He thinks about doing The Second Korean War of 2073, but it was so short and catastrophic that he can’t wrap his mind around displaying the millions of nuclear casualties and the vaporization of the entire Korean peninsula. A few US cities took seemingly random hits—Anchorage, Sacramento, Albuquerque—but the world powers had the wisdom to call it quits rather than allow the conflagration to spread. No sense in disrupting the business cycle. The U.S. cyberwar on the North Koreans had substantially whittled down the Koreans’ nuclear capability, but not to zero. The island of Guam breathed a sigh of relief as the North Korean Supreme Leader, Kim Michin-il, saw fit to spend his precious nuclear bullets elsewhere. The Korean ‘problem’ was solved. Adam shudders at channeling pain on such a massive scale. His experiments in 4D materialization have attracted some attention. Full scale remote architectural construction is still a ways off, but his green slime appearances are legendary, hilarious really. Adam’s work at the interface of matter and information is the forme fruste for coming paradigm shift, The Matrix of Matter. He launches MoM before he’s even finished his first semester.

Curiosity takes Adam to places other students dare not go—hacking into funding sources for the lab, the department and all its programs. He peels back the veil on the Blagojevich Initiative for Public Private Partnerships. Rod Blagojevich, AKA Blago, my boss, was governor of Illinois from 2002 until 2009, the year of the Corporate Singularity. He earned the newsworthy distinction of being the first governor of the state to be impeached, though merely the fourth to serve Federal jail time. He actually tried to auction off President Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat. Blago’s carefully coiffed and lacquered helmet of spectacular bad hair did nothing to foster the public respect he craved. Blago’s time in the Federal slammer taught him one valuable lesson—if you’re going to do slimy things, keep a low profile and make the right friends. In jail Blago hooked up with former Watergate Seven alum and prison evangelist, Chuck Colson. One of the old man’s last jailhouse conversions, Blago learned the ropes quickly and soon became a card carrying member of the National Prayer Breakfast, The Family/Fellowship and the whole “C-Street Mansion” mafia, hallelujah. Another Redemption story for the pseudo-Christian plutocracy. Released in 2024, Blago had morphed into something new and strange. At nearly 68, he emerged a silver-helmeted penitent and a made man. The Blagojevich Initiative was a completely off the books project that used political arm-twisting to bring university tech research programs “under the wing” of approved industry “partners.” Its scope was mind boggling. Adam can’t believe the info-cesspool he’s stumbled into.

* * * * *

PARTITIONS. We’re in good spirits that night at Strolli’s, my boss and I . The block is an island of Italian goombahs in the middle of the South Philly ghetto. As often as not, one or more Cadillac, or Lincoln, is parked conspicuously on the street. Plastic mandolins on the walls, the menu of basic red sauce Italian fare is printed on paper placemats. A favorite of U of P students, I take my boss there because I figure he’ll appreciate the simple ambrosial cuisine. Between lab experiments he chefs at the Black Banana. On an ordinary night, Pop Strolli meanders between tables dressed in his customary jeans and flannel shirt making sure everybody has their fill. That night, the night they shot Don Angelo, Mom and Pop Strolli suddenly appear, somber faces, dressed to the nines in formal black evening attire. They rush out to a waiting limousine. There’s a sense of urgency in the air. The news of the murder has not yet reached us, so their sudden departure is a mystery. The next day the Philadelphia Inquirer reports that the two assassins have been caught and released on bail. I am too naive at the time to suss out the political implications. My mother went to high school with those goombahs, Narducci and the Chicken Man.

A few days later our next door neighbor stands outside on the quaint brick path that is our street. He stalks back and forth to rattle the lock on his front door six times every morning. My girlfriend and I sit with our coffees and count. It is a sweet neighborhood, Sansom Village. We live in a father-son-holy ghost house, local slang for the vertical three room Hobbit holes. My grandfather unceremoniously tells us that these are servants quarters to the stately mansions that line the main boulevards of Center City. The mansions have long since been broken up into unglamorous one bedroom walkups and studios. The ‘servants quarters’ morphed into very cool digs for urban pioneers. All of us on that brick pathway feel we have stumbled into hidden magical realm. The Venetos, a young couple two doors down, decorate in high style, he a young conservator at the Philadelphia Art Museum. Across the path, a thirty-something gay couple keep an immaculate garden which one of them trims with cuticle scissors. Next door is John Dooley, a Frank Zappa look-alike. A carpenter, his crib is a totally run down, ramshackle house, in a constant state of disrepair. Over the course of his eternal renovations he retrieves an ancient bottle of whiskey stowed under the floorboards, a memento of bygone bootleggers. He and his buddy, Bambino, and a third Vietnam vet, grill dogs and burgers outside on the brick path. Bad dudes, they challeng passersby to jalapeno pepper eating contests. Mui macho. I went toe to toe with the tough little tattooed biker.

That particular morning, John the carpenter mentions in passing that he’s the local Republican committeeman. We are gobsmacked. How could this Zappa clone be a Republican? You guys just don’t get it. The Dems are the machine here. Why do you think Angelo Bruno’s killers got out? Murder suspects don’t get let out on bail. The scales fall from my eyes with a loud clinking sound. I was so naive. I wonder how many lovers of Delphi contemplate that, on a day to day basis, their city is run by a corrupt Democratic machine at the beck and call of the prevailing mafia chieftains. Same as sixty years earlier during Prohibition. Suddenly I see it, the hidden level of Formation, the strings that pull everything, the winds that rustle all creation. My rabbi calls it Ruach, my Taoist teacher Hun. Winds of change. [from Diamond, M.,The War for Atlantic City]

* * * * *

After Blago’s cryonically preserved corpse is plunked into a tank of liquid nitrogen at Alcor on his 88th birthday December 10, 2044, The Initiative passes to the next in a line of penitent bad boys. Each is cultivated by the “C Street Mansion” mob in their time of distress, insuring maximal compliance. Made, and fully owned subsidiaries. By the turn of the twenty second century, the technology for life prolongation and reversal of aging has evolved to the point that the overseers of Blago’s Bio-Trust deem it appropriate, according to the former governor’s will, to thaw his well-preserved frozen self. So in the year 2101, along with Walt Disney—in spite of the obviously false claim that he was buried in Forest Lawn—Madonna, Stephen Hawking, Dr. James Bedford—the first cryonically preserved human—FM-2030, Ted Williams and his son, and a host of mid twenty first century illuminati, Rod “Blago” Blagojevich is revivified. The Silver Helmet, my boss at the 21st century University of Illinois, gets a second chance to leave a slime trail on the surface of the planet Earth. It takes about a year for Blago to get his bearings, with rejuvenation therapies and daily behavioral reconditioning.

When the work of resurrecting Blago is complete, the C Street Mafia is ready and waiting with his first job offer in his second life—President of the University of Illinois. By default, that makes him the senior university administrator of The Seibel Center. As I am the Dean of Computer Science, that makes him my boss. The Siebel Center crouches in the shadow of the mega-corporation, Alphabet, through its subsidiary Cy-Ops, in public-private partnership with the university. Cy-Ops gobbles up university tech centers and secures their patent rights, all the while honing its expertise in “keeping the little geniuses happy.” They lift software from one of their engulfed prey, The MIT Center for Affective Computing, to do the job. Weaponized, “Seib-Org”, as Adam calls the Center, samples the behaviors of all the denizens of the habitat. It detects subtle deviations indicative of the slippery slope of discontent. This triggers an aggressive campaign of ‘corrective’ responses, overt and subliminal, to get the sad little hacker back on track. “What do you think of this classic Iron Maiden mp4?” Or a pop-up for a local massage parlor offering a Grope-on. And the thousands of subtle environmental twanglings that just make a body feel at home.

Home, the last place Adam thinks he ever wants to be. But it’s the only unmonitored safe house for Adam’s imminent retreat. He knows we’re planning to expel him weeks before the official announcement. The only thing that puzzles him is why we don’t anticipate that he’ll hack our cy-posts. The trail of messages between Blago and me is baldly self-incriminating. A bit embarrassing now, but I completely understand why we weren’t worried then. There’s no one for anyone to complain to. We think we have a lock on the University. We certainly don’t worry about little pipsqueaks like Adam Saperstein. Mistake! He reads our cy-posts in chronological order:

_____________________________________________

From: President Blagojovich <blago@illinois.edu>
Sent: Sun, Nov 1, 2111 at 01:11 AM
To: Dean Kleine-Frye <kleine@illinois.edu>
Subject: Pissant freshman PIA

Caite:

If you know what’s good for you and your precious Seibel Center you’ll put a muzzle on that mad dog Saperstein. He’s been mouthing off about our funding sources to anyone who’ll listen in the Alumni Association and we don’t want those losers asking embarrassing questions. Our deal with Cy-Ops is f-ing golden and I ain’t gonna stand by while it’s being compromised by some 17-year-old computer geek. I want him out of here so fast his little pinhead will spin.

Got it?

The Boss

_____________________________________________

Rod R. “Blago” Blagojevich, President
Blagojevich Executive Office Center, Suite 1
University of Illinois
1 Blagojevich Boulevard
Champaign, Illinois
40.1020° N, 88.2272° W
blago@illinois.edu
“We Are Golden”

_______________________________________________________________________________

From: Dean Kleine-Frye <kleine@illinois.edu>
Sent: Sun, Nov 1, 2111 at 01:15 AM
To: President Blagojovich <blago@illinois.edu>
Subject: Pissant freshman PIA

Boss Blago,

I completely understand your concerns. We will begin exploring grounds for expulsion immediately.

Your faithful servant,

Caite Kleine-Frye

_________________________________________

Caitelyn Kleine-Frye, Dean
Department of Computer Science
201 N Goodwin Ave
Urbana, Illinois
40.1020° N, 88.2272° W
klein@illinois.edu
“Go Illini!”

_______________________________________________________________________________

From: President Blagojovich <blago@illinois.edu>
Sent: Thu, Nov 12, 2111 at 01:11 AM
To: Dean Kleine-Frye <kleine@illinois.edu>
Subject: Pissant freshman PIA

Caite:

WHAT THE F- HAVE YOU BEEN DOING?!!!!! THE LITTLE A-HOLE HAS THE VETS IN OUR ALUMNI ASSOCIATION HAVING A SHIT FIT OVER THAT IRAQ HORROR SHOW. WHY ISN’T HE GONE YET?!!!!! WE’RE NOT LOOKING TOO GOOD OUT THEIR CAITIE. NOW GET YOUR ASS IN GEAR AND GET HIS ASS OUTA HERE YESTERDAY!!!!!!

Shvatite, devojka?

Your Boss

_____________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________

From: Dean Kleine-Frye <kleine@illinois.edu>
Sent: Thu, Nov 12, 2111 at 01:15 AM
To: President Blagojovich <blago@illinois.edu>
Subject: Pissant freshman PIA

Draga Blago,

I think we’ve finally found a way to do this without leaving any visible marks. The way you like it. He doesn’t seem to realize he’s never completed his first semester writing requirement. As the curriculum does not allow for it in the second semester, this puts the young man squarely in violation of the terms of his scholarship which do not permit any deviation from core curriculum requirements. In light of this, he will be asked to take a leave of absence until next Fall at which time he must apply to be readmitted. I can assure you that the U of I Admissions Committee will not make the same mistake twice. However, we have to wait until the end of the semester to let him know about his oversight so the little bugger doesn’t try to find a loophole to complete the work before then. Best we can do without creating a public scandal. Our partners at Cy-Ops wouldn’t want that.

I remain,

Caite Kleine-Frye

_________________________________________

Caitelyn Kleine-Frye, Dean
Department of Computer Science
201 N Goodwin Ave
Urbana, Illinois
40.1020° N, 88.2272° W
klein@illinois.edu
“Go Illini!”

_______________________________________________________________________________

From: President Blagojovich <blago@illinois.edu>
Sent: Thu, Nov 12, 2111 at 01:17 AM
To: Dean Kleine-Frye <kleine@illinois.edu>
Subject: Pissant freshman PIA

F- Cy-Ops!!!!!! Ok, get one of our best tech support guys to shut his ass down for as long as he’s here. Invalidate passwords, ID, thumLoks, the whole kit and caboodle. We’ll see what the smartass little freak does with all his new found spare time!

Broj Jedan!

_____________________________________________

Wednesday, December 23, 2111, as expected, Adam Saperstein finds himself unceremoniously kicked to the curb midway through his freshman year at U of I. But this too is for the good, at least as far as the ultimate fate of mankind is concerned. That’s crystal clear looking back from The Redemption. At first I feel kind of bad about my role in it all, but I’m really small potatoes back then. Adam still gives me a little bit of a hard time, always the prankster, but it’s all in the spirit of fun, now that all conflict has ceased to exist. All conflict. The future CADMan blocks every attempt at shutting him down while still making it appear that he’s inactivated. He’s a goddam genius. He has absolutely no interest in hacking his way into another semester, though he could have done it easily. Frickin’ writing requirement, I can still hear him say. Right. He’s tired of sweating bullets every time he has to talk to someone in the flesh. How he must have suffered back then. He’d choose software over wetware any day. All he has to do now is lay low and let them believe they had stomped him. All the better to put the finishing touches on his exit strategy. Under the Cy-Ops radar he downloads vast quantities of cyber-swag off the Seib-Org server and administrative files.

The day after Adam’s expulsion from Eden, a 6 ft X 3 ft X 3 ft crate is delivered by uberDrone to 1 Blagojevich Boulevard. Blago and his latest mistress ware already winging their way to the coast of Croatia to vacation in a full scale replica of the C Street Mansion high in the crags above the spray of the Adriatic Sea. A crew of janitorial staff receive unanticipated generous overtime bonus checks. Along with instructions to quietly unwrap the President’s ‘Christmas gift’ in Blago’s front yard early that morning. The press has been notified. In particular, a prominent retinoJournalist for mSquared, the startup Matrix tabloid that already has a readership that spans the known blogosphere. One of the many enterprises that piggyback on Adam’s freshman year efforts. Images upload in the literal blink of an eye. When the package is unveiled, the whole world bears witness to the fruits of Adam’s last all-nighter. He hacked himself a free pass into the FabLab. There in front of the ‘presidential palace’, as it was known among the cognoscenti, in all his life size glory, looms the synthBronze version of buck-naked Blago, arms flung out, back arched, an ecstatic grin on his face, and an enormous erection on which is impaled a check for ten billion smackers courtesy of Cy-Ops, paid to the order of the Blag-man himself. Titled, “Golden Rod.” Images b-Linked in nanoseconds, the beauty of the live streaming retinaBot doing its dirty little job. Even I have to laugh out loud at that one, in the privacy of my dean’s office. It’s perfect. By the time Blago gets the word, the pix have gone viral and Adam Saperstein is a free man.

♠ ♠ ♠

The reader is instructed to proceed directly to Chapter 7: Adam’s Prank.