I brought forward my idea of "rewarding" PRIDE-Σ to the Archbishop the other day. Outside of Cardinal Renus, if anyone was to understand if such a thing were possible to execute, it would be her.
"Hmm," she sighed quietly, folding her arms together, chewing on the idea. "We could implement a rewards system into its code. But for that to work, the AI would require a sophisticated set of emotions. Otherwise, the rewards would be meaningless. Without a way to experience 'happiness', what point is there to a reward? You see?"
I nodded.
"I think so. But is it possible, Archbishop?"
"Well," she sighed, "So far, we've kept ourselves from implementing such things into the code of PRIDE-Σ. Emotions are complex as-is. But recreating them and forcing them into the mind of a machine — you must understand that's another thing entirely. It would be a rather complex task. And then, even if we have the means to complete such a task, the thought of placing emotions into a piece of artificial intelligence at all — well, people started conjuring about dystopic visions of a robotic uprising the amount the Sons went public with PRIDE-Σ... It's silly, but..."
I didn't know what to say. I couldn't tell whether the Archbishop was supporting the idea or gently attempt to shoot it down. So I remained silent. She silently spun her teacup between her hands, thinking. After a few minutes had passed, I felt the urge to cut in to the Archbishop's silent meditation:
"So — should I look for an alternative method towards fixing the operating system?" I asked.
"I'll talk to Cardinal Renus about it," the Archbishop replied in a quiet voice. She kept her eyes glued on her porcelain cup. She looked rather sad. But her offer lifted up my heart — if only slightly.
"Thank you," I whispered, signing towards the Archbishop out of respect as I left her office.