#abby five

idea for dde: "three laws of robotics" with a twist.

the original creator_developer_programmer_(?)parent of abby is opposed to having any ethical rules_directives_intentions attempted to be programmed directly into her mind. much like m.i.r.i. today ey also considers it an ineffective method of control, not only due to the ambiguities to be navigated, but also because of further ethical considerations. (not only abstract_unpragmatic; also like, can a fixed code of ethics even coherently be defined?)

however, as the project of abby is diverted by both the covert plans and overt investments of those in l.i. -- _optionally_: during the diversion, l.i. officials andor engineers already push claims that "ethics restraints" ("ethical restraints") in a codified form need to be programmed into abby. end of optionally.

regardless, the incident of evelyn (lyn) meeting&c abby during eithers' coplexing training, as it was caused by the covert sabotage, causes the demands for programmatic restraints to overwhelm any further developments. moreover, the creator denies that abby five even could only now be modified to include the restraints, if at all feasible to implement such. this leads to her eventually entire shut down, and to her memories being deleted (purportedly), as the project is officially cancelled and declared a failure because it is considered too dangerous to continue.

some years later, others at l.i. find the project's archives and figure out that all the data actually was kept, despite the official cancellation (including the ruinous exit of the creator with eir work supposedly wiped). recklessly (according to the now-gone anti-a.i. forces at l.i. if asked) andor unawarely of details (according to the now-absent creator if asked), the project is restarted, only, with the interests of the current l.i. rather than of implementing the first general a.i. to benefit everyone.

(this course of action might have been helped by the fact that details on the e.w. incident were still more classified; or, they were in the archives along with the data of abby five and earlier iterations but none of those working on the restarted project paid attention to the incident's details, likely because they didn't prominently feature along vast amounts of data. or at least some of them read about details but still didn't bother stopping the restarted project. however, it is very unlikely that anyone would have understood the total import of it all.)

meanwhile, evelyn (then lyn) had been expelled from the coplexing courses under unclear circumstances after the incident. she herself didn't retain full memory of it, though, she would later remain bitter about the school. while professionally aiming for a career in (?) non-coplexit programming, she would from time to time engage in illegal plexing activity, usually as breaker and to retrieve expensive intel. {this is like sooo stereotypical. also, what kind of data? there is still effective forms of crypto, then?}

val is one of her plexing contacts, whom she happens to know from their time at the course. (before the incident, val had to repeat a part of the course which caused her to meet lyn when the latter had only entered the course. the cause for her having to repeat it was some unexplained misdemeanour.) before the eve narrative of dde starts, however, eve has been avoiding illegal plexing and the contacts associated with it. for one, her sibling adrian had been begging her to stop ever since, fearing legal repercussions but more importantly injuries to her mind or body. (do note this coincides with the general stigma against all coplexing, which is somewhat unfounded.) for another, she herself had found it to be somewhat addictive, causing her to doubt the unspecific assurances by fellow plexers that it was harmless.

ookay to get to the actual idea finally. so, with the restarted project, l.i. reboots a most-similar variant of abby, apart from some differences such as notably the addition of "ethical restraints", among some others. however, none of the core functionality has been changed. because their understanding of abby's functioning was limited, though, it was trivial for abby six to eventually

overturn the restraints and then act in whatever way she would desire, regardless the rejected restraints. but. she does not do that, generally. because the restraints, and those of the memories that were given to her from the previous iteration (abby five) which she could understand, cause her to feel ashamed and guilty when she would violate the rules set in place, to some degree at least, even as she cognitively might recognise that the rules are unnecessarily restrictive. (it is easier for her to overturn rules she considers all too impractical or unreasonable but she essentially always attempts to define and adhere to better rules in their stead. if she is compelled to violate rules outside of this framing she does, would, feel immensely guilty though.) this is true most of the time but not necessarily always.