George gave his customary ‘Bonjour’ greeting to the security guard, headed to the lift and pressed the 9^th floor button. Sitting down at his desk, he effortlessly switched on his computer and watched the 12 golden stars of the ERA appear before him.

“Things seem to be gliding along this morning,” was his first half-thought, as the results of the AI enquiry, provided by ‘Hercules © – The perfect AI tool for all your Policy Knowledge Needs’, which he had requested the previous evening, popped up on the screen.

“Piece of cake, this AI stuff,” he half-thought, again.

George needed the AI input for a briefing he was preparing for the Commissioner’s participation in a panel at the High-Level Meeting of next month’s World Economic Organisation, whose theme this time round was ‘Sustainable Economic Governance for All in a Changing World’.

Before he knew it, Hercules © had completed the briefing.

“Context, speech, possible questions and background, all nice and tidy,” mumbled George to himself “And, what’s more, all the right formatting for the briefing coordinator and all within the 900-word limit set by the WEO organisers for the 10-minute speech”.

When, knowing the Commissioner’s foibles, George saw that all he had to do was correct an accent on the Commissioner’s name to make the whole thing look like he had written it himself, he couldn’t hold himself back.

“Well done, Hercules,” he felt, rather than thought, towards the somewhat heroically named specialist AI tool that had provided him with such excellent material.

“My dear Hercules,” whispered George, “Who, of all the demi-gods, could beat you at task achievement?”

George was feeling a little queasy. By now, it was if he was sensing, more than feeling, what was happening.

Then up popped a second AI alert: ‘Sustainable Economic Governance for All in a Changing World – serviced by Perseus ©, The perfect AI tool for all your Policy Knowledge Needs’.

Perseus’ nicely furnished 200-word summary, which had exactly the same ‘Top Five Actions’ as Hercules had provided, but in a different order, seemed to have jumbled the arguments supporting its recommendations.

Instead of keeping interest rates low, while inflation was held in check, so that investment could grow and stocks and shares rise, in order to achieve GDP growth, as Hercules had so laboriously concluded, Perseus was now arguing that keeping interest rates high would achieve the same GDP growth objective.

Without realising what he had done, George had pressed the ‘voice’ button and Perseus was reeling off his recommendations on employment rates, productivity and earnings, causing George’s face to wince in pain.

Just as George, now completely fuddled, had taken all this babble in, another alert arose on his screen, this time with an even higher pitched voice:

“Sustainable Economic Governance for All in a Changing World – serviced by Jason ©, The perfect AI tool for all your Policy Knowledge Needs,” squeaked the talkative tool.

Jason rattled out the words interest rates, inflation and investment. Employment, earnings and productivity were thrown in too. Then George could just about pick out from Jason’s yelps crazed references to services, retail and trade balance. As Jason’s lurid briefing shone directly into George’s eyes, George began to panic.

“Oh, no,” groaned George, as another alert, now more like an apparition than an email message, flashed in his face.

“Sustainable Economic Governance for All in a Changing World – serviced by Ulysses….,” whined the computer.

The screen began to blur. George’s ears were buzzing. He began to pant, and beads of sweat appeared on his top lip.

“Sustainable Economic Governance for All in a Changing World – serviced by Bellerophon….”.

George flinched violently and woke.

“Agh! Oh Gon!” he yelled out, immediately stirring Patricia.

“Gon. Na. Can’t be. Bellerophon, not another one,” he muttered.

“What’s the matter, George? Wake up. It’s alright, darling,” said Patricia, clasping his hand and giving him a gentle shake.

George spluttered. “No. I’m sorry. Darling. Nothing. Just a nightmare. Sorry.” The two remained silent and drifted straight back to sleep.

+ + +

That morning, after the alarm went off and the bed-side lights had clicked on, Patricia’s first words were on the subject of the previous night’s disturbance.

“Darling, what on earth was all that about in the middle of the night?” she asked, in that same caring way George had come so much to appreciate from her.

“I’ll tell you. Give me a moment. Let me put the kettle on and I’ll tell you. Just a dream. Just a bad dream.”

Fifteen minutes later the tea was brewed and poured, and George was sat opposite Patricia at the breakfast bar, ready to tell her all about his nighttime delusion.

“That’s quite some nightmare,” Patricia concluded, having listened to George’s detailed description of the scene at the office, the briefing request and the way one bot after another appeared to come up with its own version of the same amalgamated interpretation of how to run the world economy.

“A whole host of opinions, which end up saying the same thing. Does sound horrifying”, she added, as George went on to explain that, though the ERA, as she knew, had embraced the technology, it was scary to think what would happen if we let the bots took over.

Patricia found it most unlike George not to be circumspect about these things. But, instead of giving him a jibe, when he clearly was in such a tender state of mind, she decided it would be best to offer him some words of encouragement.

“I know, George, you’ve been telling me about all the fantastic things you think this AI stuff can do for the administration. But, surely, a tool is just a tool and it all depends on what the architect and the builder are trying to build, wouldn’t you agree?”

George squinted and realised he was still not thinking straight. The nightmare had obviously disturbed him more than he liked to admit. In fact, the whole night’s experience had left him so unsettled, that he decided the best way to snap out of it was to get on the train and go to work.

“Change of plans,” he announced to Patricia. “I won’t telework today. I’ll go into the office instead. It will do me good to walk to the station.”

He had decided a chat in the cafeteria with colleagues about his new-found concerns over AI would probably help.

And then the ideal person to invite for coffee came to mind.

“I wonder what Lucija will make of all this,” he thought, as he served Patricia and himself a bowl of cereals.

[to be continued]