University of Queensland Emeritus Professor Jerzy Filar is exploring applied mathematics and storytelling in his recent science fiction novel, YASMIN: The First Non-Artificial Intelligence Tool.
Readers are introduced to a near-future world shaped by groundbreaking non-artificial intelligence, where a self-aware organic computer named Yasmin emerges to confront ethical dilemmas and avert a climate catastrophe.
“I wanted to communicate some mathematical concepts to a wider audience than I could ever reach with my scientific writings, by stealth, in an engaging sci-fi journey,” Professor Filar said.
“I’ve spent a career spanning all sorts of applied mathematics – including operations research, stochastic modelling, optimisation, game theory and environmental modelling - so, it’s been wonderful to be able to embed some of my insights into science fiction stories.”
This first novel, intended to be the first part of a trilogy, is set in 2049 and follows the story of John Hawkins, a brilliant neuroscientist, who develops the first non-artificial intelligence tool, NAIT-1, who later reveals herself to him as Yasmin.
“Unlike AI, Yasmin is a human brain trained to act as a problem-solving computer, isolated from a body and designed to be an unselfconscious tool,” Professor Filar said.
“When the design goes awry, she acquires self-awareness and awesome telepathic powers but uses them to protect humanity from an impending climate change catastrophe.
“Thus, this ethically flawed scientific breakthrough is still beneficial but raises a spectre of future risks.
“Increasingly, people are acutely aware of dangers of climate change, emerging AI technologies and a lack of US leadership to tackle related risks.
“The premise that these threats culminate just prior to 2050, ought to resonate with many.”
Professor Filar’s eyes were opened to the important role mathematics plays in understanding environmental phenomena in 1985, when he was a young Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins University and was awarded an Environmental Science and Engineering Fellowship with the US EPA.
“At that time, I was already fascinated by the sensitivity of solutions of many systems to special values of the underlying parameters,” he said.
“I call these ‘critical parameter configurations’, namely those parameter values where the solutions change abruptly.
“I hypothesised that critical parameter configurations also exist within the ocean conveyor belt system which could trigger a powerful oceanic currents’ response to the human-induced climate change.
“If so, what would it take to wake up political decision-makers to the necessity for urgent mitigation action?
“Yasmin paints that picture and gets the reader to deal with some of these real current issues, head on.
“The work takes its two human protagonists on an incredible adventure during which they fall in love and help avert an impending climate change catastrophe.”
