Explaining Christmas to developers as a system architecture story An architect who also wears the developer, maintenance, and support hats decides to build a system. He creates an OS with rules, constraints, and fail-safes. He checks the code. Everything looks good. He adds multiple types of AI. Some behave as intended, but a few start acting like bugs in the system. He sends the corrupted code to the recycle bin. He then creates a new kind of hardware, something like a self-replicating robot modeled after himself, with a special piece of software that feels close to AGI. He gives them simple commands to follow and places them in a perfect environment. But the bugs escape the bin. They infect the special software and corrupt the hardware. The robots stop following the commands. They trash the place. They forget about the architect. Some even question whether he ever existed. They write their own commands because they believe they know better. The architect allows the bugs to wipe out many of them, hoping they will notice that he is still present. A few understand, but most keep ignoring him. Over time, the system becomes more and more corrupted. So the architect sends a special robot with superuser privileges, wearing his maintenance hat. He tells the robots that instead of trashing the place and following their own corrupted logic, they should follow a simple optimized set of commands. Many finally get it. But the architect knows that to save them from the bugs and prevent them from being deleted, he must follow his own system rules perfectly. So he takes all the corruption onto himself. He lets the bugs send him to the bin. That satisfies the rules. Then he says, “Now that the rules have been fulfilled, I am adding a new one. Do what I do. Act as I act. Remember the architect. If you do, you will never be deleted.” And before leaving the system, he provides support software the robots can load to stay connected. Christmas is the architect sending the maintenance robot because he cared so much about what he created rather than throwing all of it in the bin and starting all over again. |