Seite - 164 - in Limina - Grazer theologische Perspektiven, Band 3:2

164 | www.limina-graz.eu Frank G. Bosman | The turning of Turing’s tables to pass through “the gates of eternity” to be granted “life everlasting”. If they ignore the Tower, found in a nexus world connecting the three “regu- lar” worlds, the “child”/player steps through the doors and is instantane- ously brought to a cloud high in the sky, on which two golden doors are placed (“Obedience Ending”). If these are also passed, a small terminal is found. When the command “/eternalize” is typed in, the screen returns to the cloudy sky of the beginning of the game. EL0HIM praises its “child”/ the player as “remembered as the beloved servant” (a reference to Isaiah 4:21 and the Gospel of Matthew 12:18). The program-lines, however, tell a different story, since a check seems to have failed: “Child independence check. FAILED!” After some more lines (“locking in successful child parameters” and “ran- domly adjusting remaining parameters”), the credits roll and the “child”/ player is taken back to the beginning to – potentially – start the game all over again. Being disobedient By then, the player will have been able to piece together the real story of the game, primarily by means of finding and reading all kinds of files found on terminals throughout the levels. In our near future, a deadly and unstop- pable virus escapes from the permafrost (“orangutan.html”) and kills all of humanity in a rather short period of time (“IMPORTANT.eml”). To ensure the formal survival of humankind, a group of scientists (“team_leads.eml”) start the “Talos project” (“talos.eml”, “soma.eml”), which is essentially the search for the ideal A.I. that could take humankind’s place after the disaster. In order to find this ideal A.I., the researchers construct a super- computer called “Expanded Lifespan” (EL). On its servers a virtual envi- ronment is installed, and is overseen by the Holistic Integration Manager (HIM), for the testing of all possible variables and parameters of the ideal A.I., eventually dubbed the “child program”. After humankind has been extinct for possibly thousands of years (an exact period is not given in the game), the child program has slowly developed itself by means of trial and error (the actual game), while unintention- ally allowing the virtual overseer to become self-aware and – more im- portantly – very attached to its digital life. Adopting the acronym EL0HIM “Child independence check. FAILED!”