THE DOCTOR IS IN: A Sci Fi Short Story

2049 Space Station Prometheus

Bethany tweaked a single line of code in the programming of her AI whom she had named Doc Elisa. Then she ran her experiment for the 2,495th iteration.

The results flashed in 90 seconds. Failure again.

Bethany patted her stomach bump, at eight months pregnant the bulge on her slight frame appeared as if she had swallowed a basketball. “I’m not giving up,” she whispered.

Bethany’s personal AI, whom she had named Assistant Ian, announced “Time for your mid-day protein supplements.” This announcement always amused Bethany, mid-day having little meaning in space. Yet as Assistant Ian was developed by the film industry in Hollywood, he insisted on using Los Angeles time in his clock measurement algorithms.

Popping two protein supplements into her mouth, Bethany considered her options once again.

She had originally founded an AI research company with military contracts for designing AIs that could anticipate enemy movements from information provided by a myriad array of spy satellites and boots on the ground. Life had been going well, the research on this project advancing, when Bethany’s first pregnancy had ended in disaster.

The medical AI used to assess her baby at birth – she could never bring herself to use the name she had chosen for the baby boy – had determined the baby at-risk for developing a serious (therefore expensive) physical health condition later in his life. This assessment meant the baby had been “eliminated” per government law.

Subsequent testing of Bethany by a diagnostic medical AI had determined that any baby Bethany might conceive could carry this same physical health condition risk. As the government only allowed conception with the mother’s own eggs, she was thus deemed unlikely to have a baby that would be allowed to live after birth.

As a scientist, Bethany had refused to accept this verdict. Instead she had convinced one of her military contract companies that she could invent a medical AI that could “see” into the future and predict events with enough certainty that decisions could be based on these predictions. This AI, for example, would be able to determine which wounded soldiers could successfully be returned to the battlefield.

Bethany’s actual goal was to create a diagnostic medical AI that could think – that could reason beyond its programming to ascertain within a statistically significant range the likelihood of future events. And one of those events would be the likelihood of a baby developing a serious physical health condition later in life, regardless of the assessment by standard medical AIs, the ones only relying on programming.

That goal had brought Bethany to this solitary space station. After conceiving a second time through the government sperm banks, she had set up her base in space, where existing communication channels would be less likely to interfere with test results. The more important reason she had chosen to isolate herself in a small laboratory circling the Earth? She didn’t want anyone to know she was pregnant.

With the help of Assistant Ian, who was connected to the programming of a standard medical AI, she had monitored her own pregnancy. And when the baby was born, she could keep the birth secret until she had to return to Earth.

Yet when that time came, she wanted to increase the odds for the baby to earn the right to live. And for this she needed to have developed an advanced diagnostic medical AI that could prove even to the skeptics that the AI had the ability to detect the future.

Bethany had started with the premise that such an advanced medical AI could run all the possible physical health scenarios after “reading” the genetic makeup of a newborn. Then Bethany’s Doc Elisa AI could factor in all medical information on the possible anomalies found in the newborn’s genetic makeup. Once that medical information input was added to the newborn’s genetic makeup, Doc Elisa could calculate the probabilities of any of thousands of possible scenarios. The result could be a “healthy score” that would meet the government’s “life rights” standard.

One month later in Earth time, still without succeeding in her goal, Bethany’s daughter Penelope came into the world with the help of Assistant Ian. Bethany wiggled Penelope’s tiny fingers and toes, and vowed she would not allow this second child to be “eliminated.”

Yet four months from now the AI development contract would expire and Bethany would have to return to Earth. Would that return be the death sentence of her baby?

Three months later

The iterations of the programming for the Doc Ellisa AI were now in the stratosphere. Except for the nursing of her baby, Bethany had spent every waking moment working on her experiment, sleeping the barest minimum of hours necessary for mental and physical health.

Helpful as always, Assistant Ian had warned her that there was only one month left before the space shuttle would arrive to take her home. It was now or never to provide the proof to enable baby Penelope to live.

Watching Penelope shake a makeshift rattle that Bethany had fashioned out of oddments in the space station, she was reminded of a classic movie she had once seen in which a British code breaker had discovered a solution based on a baby’s shaking of a rattle.

What if she uploaded into Doc Elisa a video of Penelope at play? Would this additional information of the baby’s physical movements enable the AI to make the needed calculations? And since the government completely trusted AIs, if Doc Elisa gave the baby a passing score, the government would have to accept the assessment.

Minutes later Bethany had uploaded a video. Hesitating only for a moment, she pushed the button to start a new iteration of Doc Elisa’s AI program.

Then, 90 seconds later, Bethany braced for yet another failure announcement.

Instead, Doc Elisa announced, “This baby meets the government’s ‘life rights’ score and is entitled to live!”

NOTE: This short story is in the same sci fi universe as the screenplays THE MOTHER SIEGE and THE TRUTHFINDER and the TV pilot script THE UPHEAVAL.