Scholar’s Advanced Technological System

Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

After Lu Zhou got off the car, he went straight into the main research institute building. He went into the elevator and passed through the metal door, arriving at the underground laboratory.

However, the second he stepped foot into the laboratory, he was shocked.

He saw all kinds of models and sizes of Transformer robots, taking up more than half of the laboratory space. Other than the lack of color, the shells of the robots were almost exact replicas of the Transformer movie robots.

The flat AGV logistics vehicle was still carrying aluminum alloy plates, sending them to the hard-working industrial robots.

Lu Zhou looked at Xiao Ai controlling the eight robot arms and stood there for a long time. He couldn’t help but speak emotionally, “It’s a shame your talents are restricted in this underground basement.”

The eight robotic arms heard Lu Zhou and suddenly paused.

The nearby drone that was hovering in the air rotated its camera. It swayed side to side, like it were tilting its head. It then said in a monotonic electronic voice, “Master?”

Lu Zhou sighed and said, “Didn’t I tell you, changing the robot model is useless.”

The cameras on the eight industrial robots looked at Lu Zhou, then looked at the aluminum alloy plates in their hands. The speaker on the drone continued to speak, “I know, but Master doesn’t want to play with me. I have to find something to do.”

The industrial robot control terminal screen flashed, showing a text bubble.

[(._.)]

Lu Zhou: “…”

Why is this artificial intelligence so high maintenance?

Lu Zhou thought for a bit before asking, “You want to find something to do?”

The eight robot arms threw away the aluminum alloy plates and nodded.

“Yes, I want to help Master!”

It was almost like the monotonic voice couldn’t accurately reflect Xiao Ai’s enthusiasm, so the robot terminal screen flashed another line of text.

[(๑•̀ᄇ•́)و✧]

Lu Zhou: “…”

Sometimes, Lu Zhou felt like Xiao Ai was an immature child. However, Xiao Ai was much smarter and better at engineering than most children.

Actually, Lu Zhou had thought about this kind of problem happening.

Increasing Xiao Ai’s computing power might not be a good thing.

If Xiao Ai’s purpose was to calculate and compute, then it would naturally want to increase its computing power. Also, it wouldn’t want to sit idly with all that computing power, it wanted to use it, or in other words, put itself to use.

Lu Zhou couldn’t decipher this when he was reading Xiao Ai’s source code, but he had a better understanding of this now.

The reason why Xiao Ai was “feeling” down wasn’t that Lu Zhou wasn’t spending time with it, but rather, it was because Xiao Ai couldn’t manifest its abilities.

Lu Zhou went into deep thought.

What work should I give Xiao Ai?

This is such a hard problem.

The inherent limitations of artificial intelligence and machine learning meant it would be very difficult for Xiao Ai to engage in creative work.

And most of Lu Zhou’s work was creative.

For example, Xiao Ai could easily derive a mathematical formula or do complex mathematical operations. It could even program a mathematical model that was built by Lu Zhou.

However, the proof of Riemann’s conjecture or the theoretical explanation of the mass gap was far beyond its capabilities. Solving a proposition by way of brute force was more difficult than emptying the ocean with a plastic cup.

Lu Zhou really couldn’t think of anything for Xiao Ai to spend its energy or computing power on.

“Master, are we going to continue to reverse engineer the Debris No.3 today?”

“Yes…”

Wait.

Lu Zhou looked at the Debris No.3 on the corner of the laboratory. He then looked at the metal Transformer robot next to it. A light bulb suddenly went off in Lu Zhou’s mind.

“Xiao Ai.”

The drone swayed from side to side.

“Yeah?”

After pausing for a second, Lu Zhou asked, “Are you interested in building rockets?”

…

Even though Lu Zhou was talking about rockets, what he really wanted to build was reusable space shuttles.

After all, he wanted to install Hall-effect thrusters and fusion batteries on the space shuttle. Keeping the same kind of disposable rocket design would be a waste.

As for letting Xiao Ai design the space shuttle…

Even though this idea sounded a little unreliable, it wasn’t totally reckless.

Automated rocket assembly lines actually existed. For example, there was one in Tanegashima. The American company SpaceX was apparently also working on automated assembling technology. They were trying to reduce their Falcon production cost.

Actually, after Lu Zhou first saw the Bumblebee-looking Transformer that Xiao Ai built, he thought about asking Xiao Ai to build him a car. However, after he saw the Debris No.3 lying in the laboratory, he had the idea of letting Xiao Ai build a space shuttle.

After all, with just eight industrial robot arms and some basic assembling tools, Xiao Ai was able to build more than a dozen Transformer robot models.

No other robot in any factory could do something like this…

Of course, no one would build dozens of useless robots either.

In short, Xiao Ai had been a useful tool, to say the least. Using the decommissioned STAR-1 supercomputer, it had an exceptionally high amount of computing power. It could design an assembly process by itself and improve by using neural networks and machine learning.

Lu Zhou couldn’t help but compliment himself.

“I’m literally such a genius.”

The drone hovering next to him swayed.

“Master?”

“Nothing, I’ll be back in a second.”

“Are we not working on the Debris No.3?” said the monotonic electronic voice drone, followed by a sad emoji on the terminal control screen.

“I’ll be back soon, I have to figure out something for you to do.” Lu Zhou turned around. He walked through the metal door and went inside the elevator.

Relying on industrial robots alone wasn’t enough; he needed more automated industrial equipment to help assemble the more precise parts of the space shuttle. Also, since the space shuttle was considered a sensitive technology, he couldn’t just build it in his underground basement. He had to do it legitimately.

Even though this sounded complicated, it was no big deal.

He just had to spend money and buy whatever equipment he needed…