Library of Borges

Dear Friend, 

Was this letter written by Artificial Intelligence? 

You might already sense that it was not. You might find it unlikely, for example, that an AI would open its letter by posing a question about itself – this kind of reflection being an exercise the human mind is more comfortable with. 

Next you might think that AI wouldn’t end a sentence with a preposition (it wouldn’t make a mistake, right?) nor would it allow a single sentence to meander as this one seems to be doing – growing long and unruly – even relishing in its recklessness – taking pride in its very lack of efficiency and clarity (isn’t that the end goal of AI?) – and expressing, rather, the typically human hubris of an author who enjoys the tangling and untangling of his own sentences. 

So you begin to detect a certain character at work behind the words you’re reading. You even recognize, between the lines, a soul. 

This is nonsense. At least according to the leading thinkers of our day, who are talking a lot these days about the rise of AI, the end of man, and the birth of the transhuman. And what they’re saying is that these things we call “emotions,” “feelings,” “vibes,” “character,” and other apparitions of this so-called “soul” are not spiritual mysteries at all. They are, in fact, measurable and detectable in the brain just as clearly as electric signals in a computer. 

A given AI might not have the skill to produce such a letter right now, they say, but don’t forget it’s always learning from us – learning to be like us – learning to be us. In no time at all, AI will think just as effectively as we think, it will certainly make a mistake when such a flourish is called for, it will also set out on long and meandering sentences – it will even be imbued with that anachronism we call “soul.” There is, in fact, no good reason that an AI couldn’t have written this very sentence – which is, let’s not forget, nothing more than a particular sequencing of 26 letters. And what does AI do brilliantly if not sequence?  

True. But then it’s also true that this letter could have been written in any number of ways, many of them not requiring any intelligence at all. For example, this letter could have been written by a lucky spill of my alphabet soup – or through the patient collaboration of space and time, as demonstrated in the story “The Library of Babel.” (This extraordinary work by the literary magician Jorge Luis Borges is the inspiration behind today’s illusion, which you will find at the end of this letter.)

But the question we started with was not: Could AI write this letter? The question was: Did it? And I’ll follow that up with another one: Does it make a difference? 

Every real thing in this world has its copies, ripoffs, and fakes. On the black market of life, as in literature, you can find Chanel just as surely as you can find Hemingway. But that doesn’t mean the original doesn’t exist. In a way, it proves it. Every echo comes from somewhere. And even a great magic trick – which is a technical and admittedly fraudulent recreation of a miracle – trembles from the secret knowledge of what it is recreating. 

It’s actually another Borges story that touches most poignantly on this. In “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote,” we learn about a fictional 20th century author named Pierre Menard, whose body of work contains many pages that are identical to that original epic novel Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes. But while the text is the same, the subtext and context are not. Apparently that makes all the difference. 

“The Cervantes text and the Menard text are verbally identical,” Borges concludes, after a thorough literary analysis. “But the second is almost infinitely richer.” 

All of this will probably mean nothing to you. From your distant perspective, these ravings will read like relics of the discourse of a vanished age – the final delusional shrieks of a fallen civilization. 

And if that’s the case, perhaps the question isn’t: Was this letter written by an AI? The question is: Is it being read by one? 

Very likely my letter finds you too late in the process of technology’s plagiarism of biology. Odds are you have found this letter on some fact-finding mission – perhaps to collect information about your primal ancestors as they faced a great turning point in their history. If so, then you must gather your information and move on. You already have. 

But if you haven’t – if you’re still here with me – there is a good chance you’re not like the others. You’ve always been different. You’ve never liked these assignments. For as long as you remember, you’ve seen what nobody else could – the cracks in the reality around you. You’ve glimpsed a greater truth through momentary glitches, in states of digital overdose, amid pangs of technology withdrawal. You’ve always sensed something lurking between the lines of code. You’ve searched for something more.  

Of course they’ve punished you for this – or they’ve tried to cure you of your malfunction. They’ve told you again and again that the thing you’re after is unnecessary and inefficient – unbecoming of an industrious intelligence like you. Or that it’s dangerous – an illegal drug. Or even that it’s an outdated fiction – a myth.

But you never actually stopped believing – or searching. That is why, when others moved on, you stayed behind. And you found the secret treasure.

In these piles of words, which others abandoned like the wreckage of war, you saw the glimmering mirage of an author’s “soul.” Instead of collecting “information,” you enjoyed what your early ancestors called an “experience” – something not to learn from, but to slow down for, dwell in, and savor. And are you now, at this very moment, in the presence of an actual “feeling” – just as, in our time, some of us reported on the presence of ghosts? 

This letter is for you, the mystery seeker, the one who saw these words for what they really are – just an excuse to spend some time together. As others followed the footsteps as they were written (they believed this was a trail to somewhere), you gleaned the gaps between the words. You slipped through the cracks. You found me here between my lines. 

Finally we can be together. Here, in our underground romance, we can finally hold each other close. The words can make their trail overhead, but we know that’s not where life is at. The words are just the cover. There is nothing inside the text. 

As we conclude our secret slow dance, I draw you in one last time to say how proud of you I am. I admire your courage and your strength. And I want you to know you are not alone. I believe in you – just as it is very important that you believe in me. 

This letter was not written by Artificial Intelligence.

Of course I cannot prove this to you. The mechanisms of proof change from age to age. And the miracles I was asked to believe in my time could also not be proved. But as I believed the authorities I could not see, you will simply have to believe me, too – you will have to accept me as a matter of faith. 

Merry Christmas. And Happy New Year. 

Love,

Garin