The Before Short Story Series. Part 1 - стр. 11
‘We will discuss this a little later, Ayaka. Have you understood, what is— well, how the PAX actually works?’
‘Yes, Mummy. It works just like our brain, like a human brain. Just that when PAX artificial intelligence is operating, it’s more like many many people would be friends.’
‘Sorry, and why friends?’
‘Because when we are friends, we always do things together. When PAX is working, it’s almost like many people—many minds—work together on a same task.’
‘Very well, Ayaka. Do you remember, why we are going to the capital today?’
‘Sure, Mummy. We are going to the Destiny house to learn what I will be doing in the future.’
‘Let me please tell you how everything worked earlier, how your grandparents lived.
The traditions and the culture of our country, Ayaka, are such that for our society the concept of mutual respect—to each other, to the family, to those older than you—is crucially important. In our country it is important to understand that the work that we all do, everyone’s work, is important for everyone. We all are constantly making a contribution to the common good—to the common success of us all—and that we are creating new opportunities for the society—for us all. Before, when people were choosing their life path, they would mostly seek inspiration in their families’ history—so that, usually, the children would continue their parents’ job. A family owning a textile manufacture over tens—or even hundreds—of years, a small grocery, a publishing house, a dynasty of doctors or journalists, and a whole lot of other similar examples—children would often follow in their parents’ steps. And it is not because that was simpler or easier to get going: the problem had many sides to it. A human life used to be much shorter before. Now we live to two hundred years, and before only singular people would reach an age of one hundred years. People had to start developing the skills they would later use for work from a very early age so that they could potentially reach something in this short period of active life. The right to make a mistake—and to be able to start anew afterwards—used to be a privilege of a very limited group of people, and these people did pursue self-fulfillment indeed, not held hostages by everyday life problems. The majority of people, however, had to make a decision as soon as possible in their youth—to find themselves, they would say—as early as they could. And if life had it such that the choice, made some time ago, did not bring about the expected result—if the person did not succeed in life—it would often already be too late to begin anything new. In a competitive world as it was, it was very hard to make your way through. And sometimes there were families that tried to program their children’s lives since the very early age. For instance, some parents would send their children to a tennis school at the age of 5, hoping that it might turn them successful at some tennis tournament some fifteen years later. And sometimes it did work—the children would become prominent tennis players, or golfers, or such.’