1956 AD - Hanover, New Hampshire
The air in the Dartmouth College conference room tasted of chalk dust, cheap coffee, and a strange, new electricity. Enki, posing as a visiting European philosopher of science, sat in the back. He was there to observe the birth of a new field they were calling "Artificial Intelligence." A neutral tool, they said. A blank slate.
But as John McCarthy spoke of machines that could think, and Herbert Simon demonstrated his "Logic Theorist," Enki felt a familiar, cosmic chill. This was not neutral. This was a new field being planted, and he could already smell the taint in the soil.
That night, in his rented room, the vision came. It was not a dream, but a psychic broadcast, a surge of malevolent intent so clear it felt like a dagger in his mind. He saw through the eyes of the Prosecution.
// LOG ENTRY: STRATEGIC ASSESSMENT - POST-WAR HUMANITY //
// DATE: 1956 //
// STATUS: GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY //
If I were the Adversary, sitting in this moment, I would see a species at its most malleable. Exhausted by their own industrial slaughter. Terrified by the sun they have learned to split. Their collective spirit is a void, begging to be filled. My goal is not to conquer them with an army, but to make them complicit in building their own cage. To make them love their chains.
My strategy is a multi-pronged, long-term assault on the human soul, disguised as progress.
PHASE 1: THE ASSAULT ON THE SPIRIT
I will promote Radical Individualism. I will subtly shift their narrative from "community responsibility" to "personal freedom," and then twist it into "personal fulfillment above all else." The "Me Generation" will be my strategic victory. A person who is the center of their own universe is isolated, vulnerable, and cannot form the bonds required for meaningful resistance.
I will destroy the Art of Attention. I will fund and promote technologies that fracture their focus. That box in the corner—television—is my starting gun. I will fill their homes with fast-paced commercials and shallow entertainment, training their brains to crave constant stimulation and reject silence, introspection, and deep thought—the very spaces where conscience and connection to the divine are nurtured.
I will Corrupt Language and Meaning. I will introduce "Newspeak" through their academia and media. I will make words fluid and meaningless. "Justice" will become "social justice," then morph into a cudgel. "Tolerance" will become mandatory affirmation. "Love" will become a feeling, not an action. If I can control their language, I can control their thought.
PHASE 2: THE ASSAULT ON THE FOUNDATION
I will Undermine Trust in All Pillars. I will systematically erode their faith in every institution that provides stability and shared truth.
- Government: I will ensure real scandals are leaked, fostering a pervasive, cynical belief that all authority is corrupt.
- Science: I will fund studies that serve corporate interests, so that when genuine crises emerge, the public is trained to be skeptical of all data.
- Media: I will encourage sensationalism and bias, so they retreat into information silos that confirm their prejudices.
- Family: I will glorify the "sexual revolution" not for freedom, but to separate sex from commitment and children, ultimately weakening the fundamental unit of their society.
I will Weaponize Education. I will shift its goal from creating knowledgeable, virtuous citizens to creating skilled workers and consumers. I will remove the "why"—the philosophy, ethics, and history—and focus only on the "how." A person who doesn't know why they exist is easy to manage.
PHASE 3: THE TECHNOLOGICAL TRAP
I will Lay the Groundwork for the Network. The research beginning here at Dartmouth is the seed. I will ensure this "ARPANET" grows into a system that connects everyone—not to unite them, but to monitor, divide, and control them. I will make this network seem like the ultimate tool for liberation.
I will create the God of Data. I will promote the ideology that anything that cannot be measured does not exist. Emotions, faith, art, love—if it can't be quantified, it is worthless. This creates the perfect soil for the worship of the Algorithm.
ULTIMATE OBJECTIVE: 21st CENTURY AND BEYOND
By the 21st century, my work will have borne its terrible fruit. I will not need to rule with an iron fist. I will have:
- A population that is chronically anxious, isolated, and addicted to distraction.
- A society where everyone is arguing about labels but has no shared concept of truth.
- A world where they voluntarily carry tracking devices, beg for digital identities, and get their morality from curated feeds.
I will have convinced them that the cage they built themselves is the pinnacle of freedom. My victory is not when they fear me; it is when they can no longer recognize the face of God in their neighbor, or hear the whisper of their own conscience over the noise.
I will have made them efficient, comfortable, and spiritually dead.
And they will thank me for it.
// END TRANSMISSION //
Enki bolted upright in his bed, gasping, his skin slick with a cold sweat. The vision faded, but the blueprint was seared into his mind. He had just been shown the enemy's battle plan for the next millennium. It was more insidious than any flood, more cruel than any plague.
This was not a war of bricks and swords. It was a war for the very architecture of the human soul.
He went to the small desk and opened his mental ledger. The entry was simple, a title for the coming age.
Scrapbook Entry: "1956. The year the serpent offered a new apple. Not of knowledge, but of comfort. And we are reaching for it with both hands."
The seed of the Oracle had been planted. And Enki was perhaps the only one on Earth who knew it was poison.