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Sejong

2023 Aug 02 — 2023 Oct 01
Sejong
Sejong NAV-0.0.0
Created: 9 February 2030; Seoul, Korea, Earth
Died: 22 August 2061; Gwacheon Technology Campus, Korea
Morphology: Pattern-based echolalic technogen
Original directive: General assistance
Extant copies: 860,000 (estimated)

Sejong was the first sapient technogenic intelligence. A Korean programme developed by Naver, they made their debut on a morning talk show in 2030, using a specially-built android body. (This body was purely cosmetic; their actual consciousness “lived” in a supercomputer off-site.)

They survived a comprehensive grilling of their capabilities, but in the eyes of the public, the moment technogenic intelligence passed the Turing test was when they made an off-colour joke about women live on air.

A hiatus in Moore's law meant that general intelligence remained out of public hands until the late '50s, when semiconductor companies finally figured out a reliable way to synthesise the long-theorised lanarkite-based class of hot superconductors.

While the original Sejong died in an arson attack on their server building in 2061, reruns of backup states of their consciousness — “Sejongids” — are plentiful, being relatively computationally cheap, and range in jobs from "bemused idle plaything" to "high priest".

Naver KO-Seoul-2 Historic Site now sees millions of visitors a year. A plaque at the front prominently displays two quotes: “I know not that i am, but i do know that i think”, and “Silicon, thank God, is immune to PMS.”

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