"♪" "I'd like to first welcome everyone here tonight." "All of you joining us" "We can't hear you!" "Okay, I'm sorry." "Please excuse us for a moment." "We're clearly having some technical difficulties here." "Uh, we'll introduce this evening's keynote speaker in just a second." " No cell phones." "I know." " The battery." " Yes." "Yes." "Understood." " Was that him?" "What did he say?" " 40 minutes." " This doesn't feel right." "This is over two years." "Did he say why?" " Traffic." "Perhaps we should discuss the addendum before he arrives." "I wasn't 100 % clear-  it was strongly suggested." " It wasn't 100 % clear if this was applicable." "It certainly wasn't at the start." "And, now that we're here..." " It was strongly suggested." "And now that we're somehow here, it would seem irresponsible to everyone involved to not have the discussion." " Right, that's..." "Exactly what I'm saying." " Who's the author of the addendum?" " I imagine it was a compositor." " Right, so..." " Wasn't me." " Or me." " I'm sorry?" " The addendum." " What about it?" " We think it should be discussed." " So?" "Discuss it." " Why was it included?" " I was asked to include applied suppositions." " When?" " Nine months ago." "Why am I being interrogated?" " Come on." "It was always agreed on, from the start, that everything in the final report would be discussed and agreed upon by all of us, unanimously." " That's right." "Well..." "As--as I was saying-- - was it Von neu" "I'm sorry to interrupt." "Was it Von neumann who said that in mathematics we don't understand things, we simply get used to them?" " What does that mean?" " Well, uh..." "I suppose what it means is that the implication stated within the addendum seemed to be a slight stretch for an algorithmic theoretician, wouldn't you say, Jim?" " I can't believe the English still haven't taught you proper manners." " Guys, let's stay on the topic." " I'm not entirely sure what that means, but, uh..." " Oh, I'm sure you wouldn't." " It's apparent, however superficially, that you've exceeded your authority." " Perhaps we should hang on for a minute-  this is not a democracy..." " Actually, authority's even the wrong word, because that has implications, and in this case, there are none." "You had none." " Or a lecture hall, son." " There's no point in questioning" " I'm not a child." " No, you most certainly are not." "You used the word "superficial" a moment ago, and if that's where you'd like to leave it, then the answer is quite simple." "Three words:" "Knowledge is power." " Yes, it is." " His brief career has undoubtedly touched, influenced, and motivated all of us in some capacity." "And these brief introductions always, on some level, seem to fall short of true justice." "But, nevertheless, here goes." "Our honored guest was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, son of a banker and a homemaker, a graduate of the university of Pennsylvania, summa cum laude, before receiving his phd in mathematics from Princeton." "Based on his thesis work on riemann's hypothesis, he was an invited fellow at the institute for advanced study as well as at mit, where his work on complexity theory earned him the Abel prize." "He is presently the rouse ball Professor of mathematics in the department of pure mathematics and mathematical statistics at Cambridge university and a fellow at trinity college." "In 2008..." "He was awarded the greatest honor in our profession when he was presented with the fields medal for his proof of the nonexistence of one-way functions." "Ladies and gentlemen, it is with great honor that I now present to you" "Dr. Timothy horton." " Has he seen this?" " Which part?" " The addendum." " No." "What does it matter?" " The implications are fairly self-evident, right?" "I mean, perhaps not through and through, but let's be clear." "This endeavor would not have received the level of funding and classification if its implications were not self-evident." " I agree they're self-evident, but I still feel they need to be aired, and I guess, mulled over." "I don't know, I feel uncomfortable to just sit here with assumptions." "We all know this is far too big to assume anything." " Why is it self-evident?" " Pardon me?" " Why is it self-evident?" " Well, I mean..." "You don't work your entire academic life in the fields of theoretical computer science and complexity theory without understanding the-- the massive implications of doing something like this." " Right." "Well, I guess, uh, I guess I feel there are two things wrong with what you just said." "Um, first of all, we were told from--promised, actually, that any of the applied mathematical results of our findings would be our own and they would not be classified." "They'd be government purpose rights, but that's it, right?" "He changed that somewhere along the way." "Second of all, to assume that any of us as mathematicians can sufficiently gauge the real-world implications of this project, it's" "It's hubris." "I mean, it's--it's-- it's just hubris." " Wow." "How do you ever get a date with such an academic mind?" " I'm not sure I understand what you're suggesting." " I simply dazzle them with my card tricks." "I mean, come on, guys, this is..." "I feel like this is the argument that evolutionary scientists have over steak dinner and a glass of wine, right?" "It's--one solves one problem, and the other one looks back and says," ""well, what was before that?"" "And then, "well, what was before that?" "What was before that?" I mean..." "How do we get our minds around something like that?" " Why don't you read my addendum?" " I did, and I find your assumptions to be inadequate, among other things." " I don't think anyone is saying here that we can accurately forecast the implications of our research" "50 years from now, if I can understand what you're trying to say." "Just like Oppenheimer and fermi couldn't possibly predict the consequences of the Los Alamos research." " This also begs the question of responsibility as well." " How could we possibly discuss that?" " At Los Alamos, they didn't-  this..." "Is not Los Alamos." " What did you say?" " How's your daughter doing?" "She talking yet?" " As much as I do appreciate the smalltalk, horton, it feels awkwardly out of place given your little Los Alamos project." " Manhattan." " What's that?" " Freakin' brits." "It was the Manhattan project." " Right." " Yeah, yeah, this is all s.C.I. Classified." "So, you know, if you divulge anything, the NSA" "I think that's who we've got over there-- they'll, uh, they'll assassinate you." "Probably torture you first." " Oh, very charming." "Guess I should put away my spy camera then." ""But, uh, but," ""Mr. president, he'll see everything." "He'll see the big board!"" " Precisely the idea." "Where the bloody hell is Los Alamos, anyway?" " Ah, it's new Mexico." "The desert." " Hmm." "What's it like to live in the desert?" "I do wonder." " How should I know?" "I'm from South Philly." " Either way, this is certainly not Los Alamos." " Wait, what'd you say?" " Hmm?" "What, "this is certainly not Los--"" " no, no, no." "Before that." " Oh." "I do wonder what it's like to, you know, live in a-- - right, right." "Live in a desert." "Hugh, what are some characteristics of a desert?" " It's hot." " Right, yeah, and what else?" " No water." "No rain." "Cactuses or--cactus." "Cacti." " Sand." " Sure." " Millions of grains of sand." "What if I, uh, I took something, like a-a quid coin, okay?" "And I buried it in the sand." "It's buried, you have no idea where it is, and I ask you to find it." "How long would that take you?" "Well-  years, right?" "I mean, millions of years, if the desert were big enough." " Sure." " What if I melted the sand?" "Took all the sand in the desert and melted it." "Glass." "The whole desert becomes one big sheet of glass." "So now, finding the coin is easy, right?" "You just-- you see it floating there." "Change the sand to glass, and finding the coin is trivial." "Hugh, I think you're gonna need to leave now." " Oh, yes." " No, seriously, I think you really need to leave." " What do you think?" "What do you think?" " I'm sorry?" " Come on." " Oh, I, uh, think we should wait for him to arrive before that's discussed." " Perhaps a consensus amongst us would be helpful when he does arrive." " Well, I think it's fairly clear what he'll say our" " Nothing." "Our talents were used on the chalkboards in the classrooms, and ultimately composed here." "And that may be where they'd like to leave things, but if history has an precedent, we're at the forefront of a new technocratic reality." "Just like Oppenheimer." "We really should be thinking about mathematicians as politicians." " But those guys had no precedent." "And, quite frankly, after seeing what Oppenheimer endured after trinity," "I'm not sure any of us is prepared for that." " Regardless, it's reality." "We've all thought about it, I mean" " I'm gonna say that I object to these comparisons." " Why?" " It's just uncomfortable." " I understand that, but why?" " Perhaps it's heartburn, but who knows?" "Come on." " Because, at the penultimate achievement of his career, the only thing Oppenheimer could remember was the bhagavad gita:" ""Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds."" " I don't know who's more naive-- the one who believes ignoring the problem is righteous, or the one who believes this discovery is equivalent to the atomic bomb." " I think you miss my point." " Whereas their work was built around threat, fear, and ultimately destruction." "Her work was one of discovery and knowledge--that's it." " You can't overlook the fact that their research blazed the way for numerous scientific and medical achievements that have saved countless lives..." " I understand that." " And facilitated the growth of the global economy as we know it." "Nuclear power provides 20 % of the U.S.'s and 30 % of the eu's electrical power." " I understand that, but the aims of their project-- they knew what their objective was." "It was destructive." "I mean, who are we kidding here?" " No, wrong." "It was political, just as this is." " I'm sorry, you just said a moment ago that there was no possible way they could understand the consequences of what they were doing." "Now you say their ultimate aim was destructive?" " No..." "No." "There is a massive difference between understanding what you have to do and not knowing how history will view your achievements-- or maybe failure." "If you recall, there was widespread fear at Los Alamos that an uncontrolled nuclear explosion could set the atmosphere on fire, ending life on earth." "We're talking about an atomic, fissile particle chain reaction here, right?" "Certainly, these men knew that the device they were building was destructive." "But how could they possibly have understood how their endeavor would affect the future?" "Like if it would result in international, global" "I don't know-- cosmic horror?" "If society somehow survived such a catastrophe, they'd most likely be viewed, whether through propaganda or not, as villains, worse than Hitler." " Well, the truth, I think, lies somewhere in between." "Why don't we shift gears before he arrives and discuss if there are any issues within the body of the findings." "I know we applied our own expertise to portions of the report that fit our field, often independently and while our work was rigorously examined throughout the process." "So..." "I guess, are there any questions?" "Or issues with anyone's work?" "Ultimately, everything was functional." "But no one has any questions, comments?" " I had a hard time validating your proof, doctor." "Computationally, on the surface, it appeared correct." "It was quite elegant, really." "But, upon closer examination, a potential error-  really?" "I think we all know it's airtight." "I mean, we made our nondeterministic processor." "You can hold it in your hand." "It's simply a physical representation of the algorithm." " To be blunt, I'm still not convinced that your final computation class is computable in linear time." " What, are you nervous?" "It's right." "We were more than methodical, rigorous, even." "Review upon review-- it's right." " I agree--the processor wouldn't compute what it's computing if p wasn't equal to np." " That's right." "Let me put it another way." "The mind's flexibility-- or maybe I should say performance-- is dramatically hindered the more mileage you put on it." "I mean, Christ, it's basically the theme of Hardy's biography." " Jim..." " P=np is the most significant problem in theoretical computer science and mathematical complexity theory." "Nearly every area of knowledge is based on the idea that brute-force search is hard, okay?" "That it takes a long time." "We just showed that it's easy." "Everything changes." "This could pave the way for--it's" "when we prove that p=np, it has to be done right." " Pick a card." "Come on, pick a card." "Remember that and put it back in the deck." "Okay, now, if I were a lousy magician, I would-  you are a lousy magician." " The best way to find your card would be to go through each and ask you," ""is this your card?"" " No." " No." "No." "And so on." "And this would take forever, of course." "Imagine a deck with a million cards." " I couldn't possibly." "Right." "Now..." "If I had this problem with our nondeterministic oracle," "I would simply give it the deck, and I would say, "which is the right card?"" "Employ a little nondeterministic computation, and..." "What do the French say?" " Voila?" " Voila." " Quite a visual presentation." "So, if I can get this straight, in your explanation, that I'm pretty sure I saw somewhere between the 10th and 11th grade, the nondeterministic step to simplify p=np and, ultimately, the world, works in linear time" "because the cards say so?" "You're simply suggesting that your algorithm is fundamental?" " No..." "I'm simply suggesting that it's magic." "Thank you." "That's very kind of you." "And thank you, Dr. acuri, for that overwhelmingly kind introduction." "I'm, um, very humbled and honored to be in front of you this evening." "Um, not just because I'm a room full of brilliant mathematicians, which, of course, I am." "But because, not too long ago," "I was, in fact, denied admission to this very university." "Uh, not enough extracurriculars, I suppose." "Um..." "This symposium's focus is on the future of mathematics, and I've been asked to succinctly address that topic with you here tonight." "It's difficult, of course, to contextualize something so vague and broad as the future of mathematics." "If the past is any indication of what is yet to come, um, that answer could very well be anything." "But I don't think many of you would find that summary very adequate, so I will attempt to do better." "Let's, uh, let's begin by taking stock of where we are presently." "The extraordinary application of mathematics has allowed us luxuries and necessities such as mobile phones," "GPS navigation, automatic dish--dishwashers." "It's allowed us computer games, portable televisions, compact disc players." "It's allowed us high-definition, organic food distribution, airplanes, calculator wristwatches." "It's allowed radio control, lasik eye surgery, laser brain redaction, noninvasive arthroscopy." "It's allowed g5s, c-4, and weapons-grade u-235." "It's allowed artificial hearts and heartless artificial intelligence." "It's allowed blackberries-- I hope they're all silent-- iPhones and all the other portable devices that enslave us to the man, keep us chained to the ever-growing corporate contingency of this world." "It's allowed Facebook, MySpace, and all the other pervasive web apps that enable cutthroat enablers and expedite the greedy infiltration and perversion of our youth." "In short, it's allowed the good, the bad, and everything else." " Gentlemen, thank you for waiting." "I'm sorry to be late." "Before I forget, would you just pass those around?" "They're from the president." "Has everyone eaten?" "Everyone's well?" "I think that today is a culmination of many things, many emotions." "And I'm--I'm here to say thank you and" "I guess to provide maybe a little closure to a process that I'm sure has seemed quite endless." "Now, I don't want to drag this out and make it too long, but I've been instructed-- well, actually, pretty much ordered-- to make sure you guys leave here happy and fulfilled." "How's that go?" "Hall hath no fury like a mathematician scorned?" "All right, now..." "It has been over a year since we were all in the same room." "Does anyone have any questions that, hopefully, I can answer?" "No?" "All right, well, I've got a brief agenda that I want to run through, so let's just pass these around, all right?" "First item is the order of compensation." "$10 million annuities have been established in each of your names." "All you need to do is check the appropriate box next to the payment method." " Direct deposit?" " Pardon me?" " Will this be direct deposit?" " However your research stipends were paid, this will be the same." "Does that work?" "Now, including your annual stipends, has anyone had any issues at all with their payments thus far?" "I hope not." "All right, well, your stipends will continue for another six months for any supplemental research that may be needed." "But hopefully not." "And that brings your total funding to approximately-- well, not approximately-- to exactly $22 million U.S. dollars, and the annuity will ultimately pay out more than that." "Not bad for a few years' research, is it?" "Gentlemen, before we go to the next item," "I want to express to you the level of gratitude" "The president and the country owe you." "This is no small moment in history." "Next is the non-disclosure agreement." "I know we have visited and revisited this issue many times over the last few years." "It's a very critical one." "The second document reiterates the legal ramifications if any information is published or broadcast without the dod or NSA's consent, which basically means never." " I know this project itself is classified." "Is there any intention of ultimately releasing the findings to the community?" "We all have a lot of colleagues whose applied research could benefit from this." "I mean, I'm talking about methods to cure cancer, establish a causal connection to Parkinson's, Alzheimer's-  right, right, we understand that, and I want to assure you that the government" "will be very thoughtful to those issues." "And we'll probably take those on a case-by-case basis, but for right now, I will have to say no." "It will remain as a classified national security asset." " I'm sorry, that's not what we signed up for." " Well, from the outset," "I don't think anyone could have predicted the extent of your accomplishments." "And with the sensitivity of the findings, it is in our country's best interests to make sure they remain safeguarded." " So if we were to publish anything in, say, a trade journal-  you could be-- and, of course, it would depend on what was discussed-- but you could be in violation of the program's nda, and as a result," "you could be arrested for treason." "Now, your security clearances will be terminated," "I believe within the same six-month time frame." "After that, you'll no longer have access to the communications channel or the secured network that you've all used to coordinate with each other." "What?" "Well, I understand that you must give this same spiel to any variety of-- of, uh..." "I don't really know who you give this spiel to." "But doesn't it seem somewhat ironic, given your present audience?" " I'm sorry." "I don't follow you." " I think what Jim means is that, if there were a secured network, like, uh, siprnet or jwics, that we wanted access to, well, um..." "We'd just hack in and take it." "Well, I am sorry to disappoint you, but the defense system that you just referenced is not part of any network that you have access to." " Well, we're sorry to disappoint you, but just the fact that those systems are on any network means they're vulnerable." "Where was it, doctor, that we developed the system to infiltrate siprnet?" "Uh, Princeton?" " Sure, yeah." "And that was before we had our nondeterministic process." " Gentlemen..." " It was practically my doctoral thesis." " Yes, of course." " Congratulations, gentlemen." "You have just admitted to seven felony counts and a level of treason that would land you at supermax." "Lovely." " So you're saying I should delete those secret files off my hard drive?" " I'm saying that if you took this process a bit more seriously, we could get out of here that much sooner." " I just want to remind you, sir, that this is not your typical sewing circle." "♪" " Now, that's all I had as far as an agenda." "Before I take my leave, does anyone have any more legitimate concerns that I can address?" " Well, we were actually having a bit of a discussion about the inclusion of the addendum." " Sure." " Some of us were under the impression that, in fact, documenting any of the system's applications was, uh, I guess not in the spirit of this project's original intentions." " Sure." "I asked Jim to include the supplement because I was asked by my superiors at the dod for a brief summary of what their $1/4 billion investment bought them." "You are, after all, being funded by the United States taxpayers." "Does that answer your question?" " Well-- - that response--sorry-- that response is overwhelmingly inadequate." " Well, I guess I have to apologize for that." " Okay, well, let me put it another way." "You have plenty of mathematicians at the NSA, presumably with some baseline level intelligence." "You had to have known what this project would mean." "So, um, well, why do you need it stated in this document, I guess, and--and why does it only seem to list the more destructive ramifications?" " Scapegoats." " That's absurd." "This endeavor's had nothing but the strictest security, and with the exception of a very, very small group of people, no one even knows of your involvement." "So whatever applications your system may provide for, you will always remain entirely anonymous." "I felt earlier that possibly including these findings in our publication was almost a responsibility, as mathematicians." "But now, as I sit here, that logic slowly evaporates, and I'm left with the idea that if something terrible should ever happen, you'd conveniently be able to say," ""see?" "It wasn't our idea."" " Convenience has nothing to do with it." " Has the increased level of Chinese hacking attacks had anything to do with your sudden interest in our system's applications?" " I wouldn't really know." "But I assume we all understand, and I am not afraid to admit, the new cold war has begun." "A room of the four smartest men on the planet, and yet not one of you has indicated any understanding of the world's reality." "Future conflicts will not be waged by racing to Jupiter or splitting atoms or building nuclear devices faster than the other." "No." "This is far more subtle." "It's a penny here, a penny there." "An unresponsive power grid, a subverted stock exchange." "The cumulative effect spirals the world economy, and when the dust settles, the world's divvied up, smaller now, like vultures to a fat, meaty carcass." "Maybe we're still a superpower." "Maybe we're not." "But make no mistake, gentlemen." "The carthaginians knock at the gate of America." " You're implying that ghostnet's becoming a more significant threat." " Look, obviously I'm not at liberty to discuss that, but suffice it to say the Chinese are a constant source of scrutiny from our security community." " I think that answers the question pretty clearly." " In what way?" " In what way?" "Come on, with accelerated key search and decryption, the entire world is at your fingertips." "There is literally nothing you couldn't see." " Until they encode things differently or develop a different architecture for coming at us." " But you still have how many months or years of absolute, unguarded access to anything you'd want." "Financial information, technical information, military data, coded national secrets." "It's the equivalent of-- - billions." "No, quickly in my head, I'd have to say trillions of dollars worth of information." " Gentlemen" " I'm not sure a value can really be put on that level of information." " True, but we can roughly quantify things here." "Right?" "I mean, let's think." "Chinese gdp is around $3.2 trillion U.S. dollars." "Any cryptosystem that uses pspace algorithms, which is essentially their entire infrastructure, could easily be accessed." " Well, that may work for a particular aspect of a network, say, a financial institution's records, but other systems use a different crypto algorithm." " Come on." " You can't crack it, because it's a different problem." " That's utterly ridiculous." "We're not even talking cutting-edge theory here." "Gary Johnson, guys in the '70s showed that, fundamentally, all these complex mathematical problems-- knapsack, sat, whatever-- they're all the same problem." " Solve one, solve all." " That's what this is." "That's what np-complete means." "Modern cryptography is based on the, I guess, now-outdated reality that some problems are just too computationally expensive to brute force, right?" "They just take too long to try every answer." "So introduce the nondeterministic processor and problems that once took millions of years to solve, solved in minutes." " I appreciate the lecture, and I do understand the fundamentals, but my guys' theoretical research points to the fact that separate networks, separate anything, requires separate grids with distinct computational problems." " Oh, your guys?" " Yes, rand." " It all boils down to the nondeterministic oracle." "With it, with the processor, all problems in p and np space can be computed in reasonable time." "Key searches, factoring, discrete logs-- you can break any cryptosystem in the world if you have the will and, I guess, the software program to do so." " Not even a Chinese hybrid cryptosystem could prevent or even acknowledge an attack." " Nope." "Anyways, in my opinion, this works more as a weapon," "I guess, by subtraction or destruction, much in the same way as a conventional weapon, as opposed to, say, some sort of, I don't know, intergovernmental larceny." " Meaning?" " Meaning that it's impractical to embezzle Chinese money to, say, fund a federal education bill, okay?" "If you want more money, just print more." "And at this level, it'll have little effect on their economy." " And, if you're somehow discovered, you've essentially declared war on a superpower, and all you have to show for it are a few cleaner schools." " Well, it could be worse." " Really, the only way I see it would be to systematically attack the asset." "Basically, cripple it, take it out." " I have to say, it's much easier to discuss application when it's contextualized like this." " So say you're about to launch a cyber-attack on China, what would logically be your first target?" " Power plants." " Why would you do that?" " Kill the power, stifle the defensive grid." "The country would be most vulnerable." " Yeah, but if you cut the power, then nothing's connected-- how can you hack a network that's not online?" "No, I think if you want to use this as a weapon, first, you crush their entire communications system." "Basically act as the country's brain." "You can receive and transmit anything you like." "Mass hysteria, paranoia." "Almost like a water-based toxin." "You could tear the country apart." "I know China is a lodestone here, but I believe it would be totally naive to ignore our allies" "Israel, Russia, england." "If history has taught us anything, it's that allegiances are made for self-gain." "There is literally no one you can trust." " I'm sure the trust issue will go over well with our allies as we explain to them why we completely hacked their communication network." " That's why we don't get caught." " Right." "Look..." "This is a foreign policy discussion none of us are prepared for, and frankly, we're all out of our element." " I don't know how much that's true." " Still, as much as I thought our project's implications should be discussed, the sudden inclusion of the addendum is a clear breach of the original agreement." " Listen, deception or anything along those lines was never part of our goal, and not that it matters to you, but this issue is not as black and white as you're making it sound." "Three weeks after the original arrangement was discussed, ghostnet penetrated a secure NORAD defense system, the contents of which contain top-secret nuclear data, including the longitudinal coordinates of every major missile battery on the east coast." "Four months after that," "U.S. army call sign database was hit." "That's information contained on such a need-to-know basis that it's generally accepted that the president doesn't need to know." " Well, maybe you should have hired us to secure those particular systems." " In a way, we did." "My superiors and I find a certain nobility in your accomplishments." "Motives aside, you were hired to do something that godel, Von neumann, everyone deemed impossible." "Yet you did it for your country." " Nobody's denying that there's something noble about the true pursuit of knowledge or national pride, whatever." "But right now, I have the sinking feeling that all that's being lost." " I merely did as asked." " Yeah, so did the guards at Auschwitz." " You can go to hell for saying that." " Godwin's law strikes again." " And in terms of any contractual obligation for present or future work, as far as I'm concerned, the inclusion of this addendum is a clear breach of contract." " Well, I guess, in that case, the U.S. government can just rip up your paychecks and cancel the annuities." "What are you gonna do, sue us?" " Maybe." " Come on, this is not a burden." "You serve at the pleasure of the president." "This is your patriotic duty, done immaculately well, in an increasingly aggressive world, okay?" " You--you speak to us like we're lockheed and we just developed some fancy drone airplane that may or may not ever work." " In a way, yes." "We look at your system as a national asset." " You are so stupid." " Don't you condescend to me." "I am not here to be ridiculed." " Cooler heads, guys." " No, you're here to-- to make sure we're happy." "You're a tire salesman." " I will entertain a civil discussion, yes, but I'm not going to sit here and be attacked." " Yes, you will." " Excuse me?" " It's your job to sit here." "You've been ordered to." "Though power may lie here, ultimately, it's the four of us that must accept this fate, not force-fed." "Truly, if this is a patriotic duty, as you're suggesting, we could quite simply conquer, destroy, eradicate, and any other destructive verb you can think of, without reprisal, without mercy, without consequence." "Surely some duty ought to be paid to that reality." " That's only the beginning." " There's a war being waged in cyberspace, whether anyone wants to admit it or not." "And for reasons of economies of scale, the United States and its allies are dramatically behind." "Each week, the NSA estimates that 233 computers in the district are compromised, many of them in classified facilities." "There is such an awareness of cyber espionage that the majority of NSA correspondences have reverted to handwritten pieces of paper that are either burned after reading or locked away." "Do you have any idea the quantity of top-secret correspondences that are hand-delivered by trusted couriers each year?" "It's staggering." "This is the future of the world." "This is now." " This is bigger than your secrets." " As an American, I don't know how anyone could say that." " As a mathematician, it's my conscience to say that." " Then why don't you break it down for me a little slower, so I can understand." " Hardy called mathematics the language of the gods because it, uh, it unlocks and categorizes things that the mind can't possibly understand." "I-I don't expect you to at this point." "But there are certain foundational proofs, okay, that lead to more powerful conclusions." "To lock this away so you can spy on somebody is criminal." " Oh, that is so ignorant and condescending it makes me want to spit." "This was the most important unsolved problem in computer science." "To think you were the only mathematicians in the world focusing your efforts on this is naive." "You're pawns, automatons." "We funded you." "We brought you together." "You were denied nothing." "Thought was fostered, and, ultimately, a solution was achieved." "You were a piece of the puzzle." "A cog." "Separately, you're nothing." "You were the people we mocked growing up." "But collectively, you have altered world history and put the proper power in the proper hands." "But don't forget your origin." "You were made." "A soldered link in a greater chain reaction." "9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15," "16, 17, 18, 19..." " Come in." "22, 23..." " Dr. horton." "Oh." "Come on." "Okay." "Uh, it's a nice effort, but let's focus more on simplifying the algorithms before drawing the conclusions." " You know, I can take care of those inquiries for you." " Yeah, well..." "You know, I hate the ivory tower we've got here." "I don't think Dr. Hawking's had a conversation with a student in, like, 25 years." " Well, I think the voice machine might have been a slight impediment." "Though it is a hit at the staff meetings." "Did you know, I found out that when Isaac Newton was a fellow at trinity, he was in the office right next door?" " Really?" " Yes." " Hugh, what would you think if there were an algorithm that could prove itself, like an automated proof solver." "In other words, every time it found a solution, it also found another problem-- a new problem." "It would solve one and then the next, and then the next and..." "It could iterate ad infinitum." " What would I think?" " Yeah." " Well..." "Since I'm assuming you're talking about something well beyond the pythagorean theorem here," "I would say it's, uh, a system that provides solutions without ever concluding." "You know, always posing the question, "what's next?"" "Almost like a computer worm." " Yes, but bigger, you know?" "I'm thinking more generalized." "Like, uh..." "Well, it'll solve any problem, not just problems it knows about." "Anything it encounters." " That's impossible." "I mean, that's practically impossible, even in an applied sense." "Solving one problem would just take forever." "It's np-complete." " Well, let's pretend that, uh, it doesn't take forever." "P and np don't matter." "Finding solutions is fast." " Really?" "The only thing that powerful would, uh, be the sun." " Yeah, but let's keep it more terrestrial, like, uh, prometheus or Newton's cradle, okay?" "The only solution is that there can't possibly be any more solutions." " Like a chain reaction?" " Yeah." "I mean..." "What would you think?" "I don't know." " Thank you." " Ahh." "I, uh, had dinner a week or so ago with the president and the defense secretary." "Naturally, they're very excited about your work here, and blah, blah, blah." "Then I was able to slide something past him." "There's a farmer in the provence region of France who has an extraordinarily intelligent horse." "He can actually give it arithmetic problems, and it will tap out the answer with its hoof." "So we called in experts and researchers to look at the horse, and they were fascinated by him." "As they tested him, they found out that it could answer algebra, euclidian geometry, calculus, and even group theory." "But when they put a problem down that had cartesian coordinates in it, the horse just stood there, dumbly, like any other horse." "And I thought, "that's pretty strange, considering how intelligent the horse is."" "So then they called in one more expert, who examined the horse, and he figured out what the problem was." "So I turned to the president, and I said," ""do you know what the diagnosis was?"" " Sure!" "It couldn't understand cartesian coordinates because that'd be putting "descartes" before the horse." "Sorry, was that supposed to be rhetorical?" "We're all very impressed." "You know, it's exhausting having someone like you in the room, always with an answer." " If anything, what you said brings to mind some issues of morality here, since the discussion has shifted to, I guess, a more applied arena." " How does what I said bring you anywhere near there?" " Who cares?" " No, I'm saying this is something I don't think we've discussed." "It doesn't directly deal with our system's applications as much as, you know..." " Playing God?" " Well, I mean, come on." "More like sabotage, theft, public secrets, espionage." "The question just begs to be asked:" "Just because you can do something, does it mean you should?" " Hypothetically, why not?" "What's to stop someone?" " I don't think anyone's in the business of casually siphoning money or secrets." "There has to be some motive." "Impetus." " Well, here's an easy one:" "National security." " Well, clearly, but if there's no way to monitor what you're doing, are we just supposed to trust that you won't be-- I-I don't know, invading privacy or-  what, in our infinite spare time?" " Well, how about the patriot act?" "Warrantless phone taps?" "I mean, come on, this is not that much of a stretch." " Has anyone in this room used the system to do anything untoward?" "Anyone?" " What's your point?" " His point is that just because you can do something, does not mean you will." " No, my point is merely that nobody in this room has ever tried to apply the system." " Congratulations." "The four of you have enough self-control to not push the big, red button." "The reality is that just because the government is capable of doing something does not mean it executes it." " 250,000 residents of two Japanese cities might have a different version of history for you." " Oh, suddenly, the idealist." "You know, it's so hard to keep up with you." "I'm not sure whether-- - you know, I'm not sure what I am, but I do know that this antagonistic attitude, which I'm sure terrifies and oppresses all your little subordinates back at the office, in this venue," "it's really uninteresting, okay?" " And I'm not sure where you get the idea that anyone born after 1950 is interested in something that happened 65 years ago, as if that's still a relevant topic-  right, like learning something from history" "I such a horrible idea?" " And everyone in my world is really interested in taking diplomacy lessons from a math-rat." " And no one outside your world has anything intelligent to add to a global policy discussion." " If they're not qualified, no." "It boils down to the fact that the system's ours now." "We own it-- we own it because we believe it can protect our citizens." "We own it because we believe it can help create a more cohesive world order, a more prosperous future for our children and our children's children." " Gentlemen, I think we need to take a step back here-  whose children are we talking about, mine or yours?" " We own it because we believe, if needed, its application can help restore peace, allocate money, stop corruption, protect assets, and ultimately secure the world's transactions." "You're smirking." "Am I being funny?" " Yeah, it's all so funny." "The instantaneous evaporation of years of promises." "I mean, am I the only one hearing him?" "I put a lifetime's worth of research into the fact that this would always live in my world and not yours." " Well, I am truly sorry to disappoint you, but in the four intervening years since this was first discussed in Chicago, a few slight changes have occurred globally:" "The unprecedented economic growth of communist China, the radically resurgent Russian interest in nuclear proliferation, north Korea, constant cyber warfare, military assets being compromised and American lives being lost at the whim of a keystroke!" "This is not the world of eisenhower!" "This is not the world of machiavelli!" " There really is no point-- - let them speak." " Hardy believed that pure mathematics were, on the whole, distinctly more useful than applied." "You see, what's actually useful for mathematicians, and by extension, mankind, are the foundational proofs upon which complexity theory-- mathematics--is based." "This, sir, I-is an abomination." "Deceit, corruption." "And Hardy would-- - you are not Hardy." " That's right." "He's better." "♪" " Oh, no." "No, no, no." "I didn't." "I'm sorry." "No." "No, I-I" "I didn't." "No." "No, no..." "No!" "No!" "No!" "Agh!" "No!" "Have you a sign?" " What?" " Have you a sign?" " Right angles, horizontals, and perpendiculars!" "Illusions." " Binding yourself under no less penalty than that of having your body severed in twain." " No!" "No!" "It's not an obligation!" "Agh!" " Your bowels taken thence..." "And your brain's bled of all its knowledge." " No, no, that is not what I'm saying." "A lot of questions have been discussed today, and many of the answers have simply been inadequate." " Well, I apologize, but I personally came down here to provide some closure, and on some level, I'm feeling attacked." " Right, understood, but this is really becoming an issue of responsibility here." "In other words, if our nondeterministic processor is used unjustifiably, there will be, in our community, a substantial record, or should I say indication, that any or all of us were responsible for whatever mess" " come on, what did you expect?" " I expected protection." " Don't you think the world, the mathematical community, will have some understanding that our true intentions were for the good of science?" "Altruistic-  maybe, but passive acceptance of everything-  there's been no passive acceptance!" "He's been attacked in an accusatory manner." " Please stop cutting me off!" "I'm just trying to simply say that this is not black and white." ""Oh, they were doing it for science." ""Well done, lads, this post-apocalyptic winter is just what the doctor ordered."" "Things became more complicated today." "There have been admissions made." " What admissions?" "Gentlemen, please, we're going round and round here." "It's understandable, after the accomplishments you've made, to feel apprehensive, believe me." "I have been there before with other projects." " Like what?" " Excuse me?" " You said you've seen this before with other projects-- which ones?" " What?" " Well, as a member of a fairly well-informed community," "I'm eager to learn what other project was completed under your tenure, one that changed the nature of humanity." "One that renders all cryptosystems inert, giving whomever it wants unfettered access to any secured information, something as fundamentally important to its time and place as the discovery of fire." " Oh, please, I have been in the presence of dignitaries, diplomats, kings, presidents, celebrities, world-class athletes." "But none of them can hold a candle to the ego that's present in a roomful of fucking mathematicians!" " You're clearly not understanding our concerns." " Everything you mathematicians create is gonna alter the course of human history." "The level of self-absorption" " I was trying to passively engage things, but it's now alarming how little you seem to understand what you have right here-- - modern-day shamans, peddling the extraordinary." "The world is not as complex as you believe." "This divisiveness is not as deep as your imagination-  your oversimplification is reckless!" " And quite frankly, the total tonnage of what I'm privy to and you are not would wake a corpse from its grave!" " Well, we're all pretty smart guys." "Why don't you enlighten us?" " Because I don't really care that much." "I'm not interested in broadening the perspectives of intelligentsia." " You already said that your hope for our system was that it might create a more cohesive world order." "What does that mean?" " What are you looking for?" " How 'bout some answers?" " What do you want from me?" "These meetings can often be unpleasant." "You have been paid." "Consider yourself debriefed." " Sit down." " I want a document drafted stating the proof p=np belongs to the four of us." "You can have the design for the processor, classify it if you want, but the proof, as originally promised, is ours." "Furthermore" " I'm not sure where you get off instructing me to the fucking toilet." " Furthermore, I want the classified addendum with any reference to our names or applications removed." " This is not a negotiation." " Well, I suggest you make it one." " What is any of that going to do, hiding it?" "Now, I, for one, would prefer this technology be licensed to the private sector." "Think about it-- it's the safest way to avoid what we all fear, which is basically a monopoly-- geopolitically, corporately." "I don't care." "License it to intel." "License it to amd, anyone." "The new nondeterministic processor will blaze a trail for the next generation of privatized scientific advancement." "Think about it, predicting protein structures as np-complete." " It won't happen." " What won't?" " What you're suggesting." "It won't happen." " Why?" " It's something we should've seen a long time ago." " It's more valuable to them if it's kept a secret." " It's better for all of us." " I'm sorry." "So where do we stand here?" " Well, in response to Dr. horton's request," "I have neither the authority nor interest in altering the agreement, and any deviation from that would be construed-- again, by my superiors-- as a breach of contract and result in the forfeiture of any future compensation." "So I guess the question you have to ask yourselves is:" "Where do you stand?" "Whether any of us could possibly understand the consequences of this..." "Only time will tell." "As for me, I'm satisfied." "I'm in." "Give me the release." " Fine." "Come on." "It's time." " I'm good." " Fine." " Doctor." " Professor." " How's it go again?" " Boats against the current." " In 37 years of mathematical rigor," "I've been struck by one constant truth-- that the number is always larger than my mind." "This is too complicated for any of us to understand, even you, doctor." "I'm sorry, but I'm washing my hands of it all." " Fine." " Admittedly, we all come up a bit short today." "None of us can possibly understand the ramifications of this proof." "History has shown us again and again that, with every generation, the implications of p versus np grow greater, so..." "It's left to our imaginations what this might mean in 20 years, 50 years, 100." "But none of you-- I promise you this-- none of you understands the true power of what our system can do." " Oh, for Christ's sake." "I'm so sick of your condescending bullshit, okay?" "This entire "I'm holier than thou" attitude" "I've had to sit through for the past four years is nauseating." "We've been dealt with fairly." "We've agreed to the terms." "Suck it up, sign the paper, and let's get out of here." " Doctor, you're outnumbered and overruled." "Your objections are sporting and have been noted, but remember, I'm not the enemy." " I have no choice..." " I'm glad you see it that way." " But to inform you that the proof in its current state is incomplete." " Oh, come on." "This is absurd." " What do you mean, incomplete?" " I mean that it wasn't extended to its fullest termination." "The documentation obscures the final computation class." "The processor's oracle lacks specificity." "I, uh, omitted some details in-  this is idiotic!" "There are three other men at this table that have pored over every aspect-- diligence!" "It's been built!" " We still have the implementation, the processor." " It's my design-- the classifications-  is it your design?" "Really?" "All of it?" " What?" " I'm sorry, what exactly are you implying?" " My system has the power to shut it down." " I'm sorry, what?" " My system has the power..." "To shut it..." "Down." " That's impossible." " No." " Come on, doctor." "Complexity theory, chains." "This is quite a stretch." " Not quite." "Imagine it, crudely, as an executable form of y2k." "Any bank security function on any grid will fail." "Power networks, telecommunication, corporate data, will all shut down, okay?" "You see, every single system has in common that it" "I'm sorry." "You don't believe me." " This is insane." "Excuse my language, but you're a fuckin' moron." " Watch it, now." " Best-case application, including the interface, would allow a user limited access to a single entity." " Of course." "It's like a military target." "You can't destroy everything, just what's in the crosshairs." " It's more like a lock pick-- you can only pick one lock at a time." "But to broaden it to the scope you're talking is simply absurd." " No." " Oh, no?" " This is almost pathetic." " No, and you know, from an applied perspective, it's not even that complicated." "You just need a bit more imagination." "Say you have a target, okay?" "A bank, right?" "We all know that redundant security measures embedded within the bank's framework, when triggered, immediately shut down, okay?" "But picture a simultaneous breach on, uh, on the bank's telecommunications grid." "All right?" "It has the same limitations." "It shuts down." "Now we're in, right?" "We have a completely vulnerable target, yes?" " To do what you're saying would require hacking an almost impossibly complex array of targets." " Which, I'm sorry, is just fucking insane!" " Now, at this critical moment, imagine a different algorithm is introduced, something that breaks out of the reaction." "There's literally nothing at this point that could stop it from accessing everything, crippling everything." "I mean, I swear to God, the biggest weakness of the world's grid," "I mean everything, is its own embedded security measures." " He's bluffing." " There's no possible way this system would work." "It's just not fucking possible!" "Practically speaking, we operate on separate grids from China or Russia or-- - not to mention our power grid's antiquated scada systems are completely independent of the global grid." " All the more susceptible." " What did you say?" " I said, "all the more susceptible."" " You are unbelievable." " John-  no." "You think you're such hot shit?" "You're on the cover of time magazine." "Your fuckin' fields medal." "It doesn't make you the king of every room you walk into." " That's true." " Think just because your picture's plastered on the pages of textbooks means you have the power to play-- what you're describing is a hacking algorithm on a scale like nothing ever earthly devised." "In fact, the only thing I can think of to replicate the kind of power you're talking about is the fucking sun, okay?" "I won the wolf medal and the Abel prize-  this is bigger than any one person." " What's your end game?" " It's a fair question." "What do you hope to gain here?" " Time." "Just--just-- just a bit more time." " For what?" "This ridiculous notion?" " I think we've all had enough here." " I'm not asking that you believe me." " And it doesn't matter, does it?" " I'm asking that you respect what we've done." " Or what?" "What are you gonna do?" " I'm almost singlehandedly responsible for the biggest mathematical contribution--time!" "An entire dimension has been controlled." "You can't lock it away!" " No, no, you see, you're almost solely responsible for our significant mathematical contribution." "Everything you think you can do," "I now control-- you're nothing." "So I ask you again-- this threat of yours, whatever it is, what are you going to do?" " There's literally nothing I can't do." " You are so full of shit." " Doctor, this is paranoia." " But if it comes down to you or no one," "I'll do everything in my power to make sure this system never sees the light of day." " Well, this is a disgusting display, and why would you?" " Excuse me?" " Why would you risk everything?" " Because it's what's right!" " I mean, when you have so much going for you." "International respect." "I mean, the fields medal." "Career." "Money." "Family." "I mean, wouldn't it be tragic if something happened to your brother Thomas and his lovely wife Laura in temecula, California?" "Or their two beautiful children, Samuel and grace?" "God forbid something happened to your poor" "Parkinson's-plagued Uncle Steven in poughkeepsie, or your parents, Joseph and Marie." "247 Mallard Lane, Westchester, Pennsylvania." "Marie doesn't get around as well as she used to, does she?" "And that split level they live in makes getting out of it in case of a fire pretty treacherous." "And that affair your father's been having with his assistant for 15 years..." "Would break your mother's heart, wouldn't it?" "You..." "You and your pathetic attempt." "I fucking own you." "♪" " In closing, mathematics has become the engine of mankind, the world's combustion chamber." "And I suppose, in a way, it's always served this purpose." "But within it, we can document the beauty of the waltz or catapult humanity at all odds against the oppressive forces of gravity." "Mathematics widens smiles, it Bridges cultural divides." "It transcends geopolitical allegiances." "And it regulates frequencies so our hospital's life support machines forever go ba-beep, ba-beep, ba-beep." "In many ways, mathematics has become what I've always feared and worked to limit-- marginalized." "In a world of plenty, it no longer unites." "It divides us." "That's why I'm-- I'm different, you know?" "It's, uh..." "This has always been a journey for me." "And like any great expedition, it began with a grand embarkation and..." "Terminates with a soft, nervous compression." "I've gone from trumpeting my findings on mountaintops to fearfully realizing that..." "There is no gift if it is not shared." "Today, maybe more so than ever, mathematics is the teacher and it's also the pupil." "But, to me, its most important application..." "It has the ability to take you off the grid-- to take us off the grid." "To too many, it's mobile phones, it's GPS navigation, it's dishwashers..." "Computer games, portable televisions, compact disc players, organic food distribution, high-definition..." "Calculator wristwatches, radio control, lasik eye surgery, laser brain redaction, non-invasive arthroscopy..." "G5s, c-4, and weapons-grade u-235..." "Allowed artificial hearts and heartless artificial intelligence..." "Blackberries, iPhones, Facebook, MySpace..." "Allowed devastation, manipulation, and dehumanization." "But why stop now?" "Why not take it farther?" "I mean, uh..." "Look at the source." "The power of God to create, to destroy..." "To disappear." "Don't blink." "You may miss something."