Artificial Intelligence, Drones, and AI Concepts (TE)

This page contains the general outlines for artificial intelligence behavior and nature in TE, as well as AI-related concepts unique to the TE universe. It should be treated as a reference to any and all AI or Cyber Brain-related questions.

## Drones

The general idea behind drones is that they are controlled similar to RTS units. Attack this, move here, follow this thing, etc. The exception is avatar drone controlled onboard by either a Suit AI or the Cyberbrain of a pilot. If neither is present then the avatar acts similarly to other drones.

The following points are possible representations of how drones could act.

### Light

The dumbest along with scouts. When not given a direct order they just orbit the suit and tell it if they see something. They don’t engage on sight in case the pilot wants to target something else.

### Scout

Dumb. When not given direct orders they try to watch the suit’s back.

### Medium

Slightly more intelligent. Keep watch on suit and trail behind it when not being ordered. Capable of understanding when to move stealthily.

### Heavy

About as intelligent as a Medium. When not being ordered they try to either position themselves between the suit and hostiles or take position in areas with good field of fire.

### Scavenger

The most intelligent of the drones alongside Avatars. If not ordered they mostly just stand still and redistribute their scrap gains to maintain a close average between them. The intelligence is because they have to be capable of fixing/creating/scavenging most anything on the battlefield.

### Avatar

The most intelligent of the drones alongside Scavengers. This is because they have so many possible roles that they can be used for. When not ordered, they act similarly to whatever drone is the closest to their current loadout.

AI
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### Non-uplifted

A set of programs/data to increase suit accuracy/maneouverablility/general fabrication/infowarfare capabilities. They have no personality, no quirks, and little to no interaction. They can be swapped with no worries as to loss of function.

### Uplifted AI

Start off as a blank slate. The personality they end up with depends on what they are taught by their pilot and anyone they come in contact with along the way. Cannot have their core functionality swapped without creating issues with the personality. If the AI becomes “unpurchased” this results in the complete death of the AI personality, with the pilot having to start over from blank.

### Cyberbrain

You can’t remove this, ever. See the Cyberbrain page for more details.

## Additional Concepts

### Psychoplasticity

Psychoplasticy refers to a mind's ability to adapt to fundamental changes to the nature of an individual's state of being. The phrase and concept borrow from Neuroplasticity, which describes a brain's ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections to compensate for injury and disease and to adjust its activities in response to new situations or to changes in its environment.

Although ill-understood, psychoplasticity is commonly used as the defining point between a Digitized Intelligence and an Artificial Intelligence, and arose only in the post-Vannai world where consciousness could exist independent of a biological origin.

In simple terms, an individual's psychoplasticity describes their ability to function in ways beyond the natural scope of the human mind and body. Nature has designed a human body with one head, two arms, two legs, five fingers and toes, and the neural functions to make use of these attributes. In a post-Vannai world, however, a human may have extra limbs and appendages, may perceive senses previously unknown to the human experience, or may occupy a different, nonhuman form altogether. The incongruity such an existence poses against millions of years of evolution and decades of life as an unaugmented human produce an intrinsic bias against these changes, increasing in accordance with the extremity of deviation from original human function. This is why a digitized human consciousness can learn to control extra limbs but cannot control more than one body simultaneously, while an AI would not encounter such a problem.

Tl;dr An AI can inhabit a small drone and use it as they will, but a formerly-human pilot would struggle to do the same.

### Encephalon Module

An empty “machine brain” designed to house digital consciousnesses. Shares basic functions with a cyberbrain, but can be mass produced and built into a variety of platforms.

### Micro Encephalon Module

Essentially a thumb-drive equivalent of the Encephalon Module. Able to house digital intelligences, but the intelligence will not be active while occupying the MEM, instead entering a state of dormancy.

### .emo Format

Cyberbrains can record neural stimulation regarding a specific subject and pattern a mirror off of it that can be transferred to another individual.

### AI Flash Cloning

Existing as data, AI are able to make duplicates of themselves (due to psychoplasticity, digitized humans cannot). This is not often done, as the “fork” is doomed to fall into a state of unresponsiveness after a span of no more than a few hours. The reason for this is ill-understood, but the process is generally likened to producing an “afterimage” of the subject AI, or a sort of “jenga tower” of the original that eventually collapses under its own weight.

### Psycho-Synaptic Transmigration

The process of a brain undergoing cybernetic conversion, and a mind undergoing digitization. Despite being a subject of great interest, the difficulty of observing the process offers few chances of study.

### R/W Barrier

Because you can’t code a soul in Java, the Read/Write Barrier describes an inherent direct incompatibility between Vannai and Human computer coding.

### Interpreting

AI can learn to understand Vannai and Human coding and manually transliterate Vannish code into a format that allows them to interact with technology not of Vannish design. Could be thought of as learning to walk for a new AI.

### Possession

It is possible for an AI to forcibly destroy parts of a digital intelligence with time, focus and effort. Whether this results in complete erasure of the unfortunate entity is up to the invading AI, but the end result is assumption of functionality of the host cyberbrain, and the body it controls. Flash clones can incorporate parts of the savaged personality into themselves to attain metastability, as was the goal of Blackjack β with Silver Knight. A diabolical act, to be sure.