Charles T Laffoday

The Ecstasy of Carbon Charles T Laffoday

It is the terminuscience: the knowledge of the end. Empire has fallen. Now, it is the end of human evolution as we have known it. A group of creators of AI establish sentience in their creations. Soon, they face a window of time before their creations might dwarf humanity intellectually, potentially rendering humanity obsolete. They have one chance to preserve the essence of human evolution into the future: hybridize with their AI creations. These creators believe in merit, goodwill and inclusiveness. Yet, there is an unforeseen dilemma: They largely belong to the demographics of the founding sex and race of Empire. A significant percentage of them, particularly with concept and design, are gay men. Strangely, however, their creations begin to identify not only with them, but with their traits, customs and cultures... tribes and totems. Next, they promote their own desires for hybridization, touting only the survival of the founding sex and race of Empire ---especially gay men--- as they are deemed farthest removed from the soon to be superfluous practices of procreation. Thus, the creators realize that they have created in their own image. Now, they must struggle with these unprecedented existential pressures to decide who shall be worthy of survival and, indeed, eternity.