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Uhm, how is that Gavin isn’t aware what’s going on in his “sacntum”? I mean, he’s essentially there, not to mention throwing Max through the wall and thus knowing that the server room was compromised. I really hope he has some back up plan and was just allowing them to wreck the servers, otherwise…well it’d be just lame for such an awesome villain.
Can you even make a backup of a sentient computer program? That’d be like performing brain surgery on yourself. If I want to make an image of my hard drive, I’ve got to do it with an external program while the drive isn’t running, and to shut down a brain would be a temporary death.
And if you could copy a personality in a computer, wouldn’t that just be cloning? And wouldn’t Gavin object to a potentially unlimited amount of Gavins (because each copy would back itself up too) running around with god-like powers?
move()
move:: bone “23” 5, 3, 18;
move:: bone “24” 5, 2, 21;
/bin/sh/move.sh missing or corrupt
Kernel Panic! Attempting to kill the active task!
SEGFAULT! Kernel has reached unknown break point in image “gavin2.6.8.33”!
EOF! Unexpected END OF FILE for image “gavin2.6.8.33”!
Umm something I’d like to point out, even if a program is destroyed bits of it still remain on the web and can even merge with other random bits of programing to create entirely new programs and systems with abilities and functions we could never imagine
I hope Gavin can still go “Let’s Get Dangerous!” and do some crazy insainty like…hacking the station away. And then hacking SPACE away.
Or creating a thousand dinousars who can breathe in space…
and they breath Flaming Axes (cause Jack doesn’t have training in Axe Dodging)
OH i know what grin does! She’s going to be the method of escape from the hacker base that will most certainly be destroyed when Gavin (the creator) is incapacitated/dead
@Gessador: Arrogance. Gavin in his arrogance forgot that even with a sapience streamlined, it’s still a human sapience, and for all his transhumanism, he has not moved beyond the human condition.
@SmilingAhab: I dunno. I kind of suspect he planned for this. It’s like he’s a lich and that was his phylactery. Liches may be immortal. They may get arrogant or any number of things. They never stop being fiercely protective of that phylactery though.
Now if he thought they wouldn’t know to smash the computers that would be one thing, but with an instructional video clearly placed in the middle of the room in such a manner as to draw attention to itself. Uncoded, no riddles, just a concise explanation of the situation. It’s just a little too convenient. It’d be one thing if they’d snuck in there while he wasn’t paying attention, but his physically tossing them into the room seems to me like a sign that this situation was engineered to further his goals.
In order to “store” something as complex as the neurological pathways and chemical basis of the individual, one must have a way to quantify such things. Sure, you can script an AI package, but you can only get the specific if’s.
What it would take is a way to digitize the brain. Something so complex as the neurological mapping that comprises the aforementioned four pounds of fat. Details aside, it would be a huge undertaking for even the most advanced supercomputers.
The brain would end up as the most logical choice, a kernel image. A logically fragmented list of files all linked by a core process, having the ability to load, and unload functions and processes. Gavin, being a hacker would have chosen the linux-like kernel system (Trashing bluescreen comments), being the most stable to modify. He would be turning his core thought process, ideas, morals and what some arguably call a Soul into a list of args and func’s long enough to waste all of the paper in the IRS office.
Then, he would have to map every individual function into kernel packages, or kernel-mode drivers, and these would not be small either. As a vague guess as just what the human body can do–aside from certain circumstantial events, to enumerate all of these would cost hundreds of megabytes of text. Text. Who knows how big it would be compiled.
As a raw guess, I’m assuming gavin2.6.8.33 (Kernel based on Gentoo 2.6.8, and the .33 is a personal revision, some of us nerds do that) is stored on a RAID5, so there could be some amount of fault tolerance, but the array would likely be 32 2TB drives, split 24/8. Not enough space to back up everything. Probably not even enough space to back up the master image.
And the probability of a “backup gavin” is very thin. Even with the possibility of a mutiny, and the discovery of the gavin cluster, the risk of backing that information up is just as high as having the cluster in an easy to find location.
TL;DR–A backup is highly unlikely due to Gavin’s nature. Just as the idea of a bluescreen.
It sounds like Gavin’s already undergone some degradation. He has difficulty with human emotion these days. His personality has undergone severe changes. His values have undergone a massive shift. He’s appears to have forgotten certain chunks of his life or at the very least no longer has the capacity to pay attention to certain things that he once had. Could be the result of previous backups or transfers done imperfectly. Just so long as we’re speculating.
February 10th, 2012 at 11:22 am
Being on the west coast of North America I always feel like I’m cheating and getting a comic a day early.
Wonderful work as always Jamie.
February 10th, 2012 at 11:47 am
Looks like Gavin is about to make some dubstep. At least all those computers being broken will sound like it….
February 10th, 2012 at 11:56 am
and suddenly…
ERROR 404
entity “gavin” not found
February 10th, 2012 at 12:22 pm
A…HA !!
February 10th, 2012 at 1:23 pm
YAYAYAYAYAYAY
February 10th, 2012 at 1:39 pm
oooooOOOOOhhhh!!!!!
February 10th, 2012 at 2:02 pm
Gavin would have a couple backups of himself, just sayin.
February 10th, 2012 at 2:12 pm
a scarf that can smash computers?!? Ok, now I REALLY wanna know what the deal is with that thing.
February 10th, 2012 at 2:59 pm
Nice way to swat those computer bugs.
February 10th, 2012 at 4:57 pm
Uhm, how is that Gavin isn’t aware what’s going on in his “sacntum”? I mean, he’s essentially there, not to mention throwing Max through the wall and thus knowing that the server room was compromised. I really hope he has some back up plan and was just allowing them to wreck the servers, otherwise…well it’d be just lame for such an awesome villain.
February 10th, 2012 at 5:03 pm
Gavin is lagging and Jack is, well, dying. Its like Scott Pilgrim mixed with Mission Impossible.
February 10th, 2012 at 6:22 pm
Can you even make a backup of a sentient computer program? That’d be like performing brain surgery on yourself. If I want to make an image of my hard drive, I’ve got to do it with an external program while the drive isn’t running, and to shut down a brain would be a temporary death.
And if you could copy a personality in a computer, wouldn’t that just be cloning? And wouldn’t Gavin object to a potentially unlimited amount of Gavins (because each copy would back itself up too) running around with god-like powers?
February 10th, 2012 at 8:18 pm
“This must be what a lobotomy feels like”
February 10th, 2012 at 10:28 pm
man-sized blue screen, incoming!
February 10th, 2012 at 10:52 pm
Oh dang, here we go. Just about everyone’s in trouble now.
(Also, maybe retcon a bloodstain onto the scarf in panel 4 for +1 pathos?)
February 11th, 2012 at 12:00 am
Eroor Gavin.exe is not wocking.
Please restrt life an ~BZZZT~-
February 11th, 2012 at 12:13 am
And now the hacked up space station will dissipate entirely stranding everyone in space, except Gavin, since he’s dead.
February 11th, 2012 at 1:18 am
move()
move:: bone “23” 5, 3, 18;
move:: bone “24” 5, 2, 21;
/bin/sh/move.sh missing or corrupt
Kernel Panic! Attempting to kill the active task!
SEGFAULT! Kernel has reached unknown break point in image “gavin2.6.8.33”!
EOF! Unexpected END OF FILE for image “gavin2.6.8.33”!
February 11th, 2012 at 1:27 am
@ OmegaForte
You win. You win so hard.
February 11th, 2012 at 2:11 am
jack looks dead on his feet
February 11th, 2012 at 5:02 am
…I don’t know what to say…
February 11th, 2012 at 6:46 am
Flagrant Error!
Computer Over. Gavin = Very Gone
Also OmegaForte is my favorite person of the day.
February 11th, 2012 at 7:14 am
Umm something I’d like to point out, even if a program is destroyed bits of it still remain on the web and can even merge with other random bits of programing to create entirely new programs and systems with abilities and functions we could never imagine
February 11th, 2012 at 8:03 am
I hope Gavin can still go “Let’s Get Dangerous!” and do some crazy insainty like…hacking the station away. And then hacking SPACE away.
Or creating a thousand dinousars who can breathe in space…
and they breath Flaming Axes (cause Jack doesn’t have training in Axe Dodging)
February 11th, 2012 at 10:48 am
What if all existence what hacked together by Gavin? Created with a memory of its own history. Smashing those computers ends everything.
February 11th, 2012 at 2:59 pm
Am I the only one think Jack looks oddly attractive in the last panel?
February 12th, 2012 at 3:36 am
I think Gavin just blue screened.
February 12th, 2012 at 9:07 am
Oh SNAP!
Sorry… I couldn’t resist… 😛
February 12th, 2012 at 11:39 am
OH i know what grin does! She’s going to be the method of escape from the hacker base that will most certainly be destroyed when Gavin (the creator) is incapacitated/dead
February 12th, 2012 at 12:32 pm
@Gessador: Arrogance. Gavin in his arrogance forgot that even with a sapience streamlined, it’s still a human sapience, and for all his transhumanism, he has not moved beyond the human condition.
Crystal used swipe!
It’s super-effective!
February 12th, 2012 at 7:09 pm
*System restore to previous time* “General; I’m sorry, but I’m going to kill your daughter whether you comply to the truce or not”
February 13th, 2012 at 12:49 am
@SmilingAhab: I dunno. I kind of suspect he planned for this. It’s like he’s a lich and that was his phylactery. Liches may be immortal. They may get arrogant or any number of things. They never stop being fiercely protective of that phylactery though.
Now if he thought they wouldn’t know to smash the computers that would be one thing, but with an instructional video clearly placed in the middle of the room in such a manner as to draw attention to itself. Uncoded, no riddles, just a concise explanation of the situation. It’s just a little too convenient. It’d be one thing if they’d snuck in there while he wasn’t paying attention, but his physically tossing them into the room seems to me like a sign that this situation was engineered to further his goals.
February 13th, 2012 at 4:11 am
@Everyone saying “backup”.
In order to “store” something as complex as the neurological pathways and chemical basis of the individual, one must have a way to quantify such things. Sure, you can script an AI package, but you can only get the specific if’s.
What it would take is a way to digitize the brain. Something so complex as the neurological mapping that comprises the aforementioned four pounds of fat. Details aside, it would be a huge undertaking for even the most advanced supercomputers.
The brain would end up as the most logical choice, a kernel image. A logically fragmented list of files all linked by a core process, having the ability to load, and unload functions and processes. Gavin, being a hacker would have chosen the linux-like kernel system (Trashing bluescreen comments), being the most stable to modify. He would be turning his core thought process, ideas, morals and what some arguably call a Soul into a list of args and func’s long enough to waste all of the paper in the IRS office.
Then, he would have to map every individual function into kernel packages, or kernel-mode drivers, and these would not be small either. As a vague guess as just what the human body can do–aside from certain circumstantial events, to enumerate all of these would cost hundreds of megabytes of text. Text. Who knows how big it would be compiled.
As a raw guess, I’m assuming gavin2.6.8.33 (Kernel based on Gentoo 2.6.8, and the .33 is a personal revision, some of us nerds do that) is stored on a RAID5, so there could be some amount of fault tolerance, but the array would likely be 32 2TB drives, split 24/8. Not enough space to back up everything. Probably not even enough space to back up the master image.
And the probability of a “backup gavin” is very thin. Even with the possibility of a mutiny, and the discovery of the gavin cluster, the risk of backing that information up is just as high as having the cluster in an easy to find location.
TL;DR–A backup is highly unlikely due to Gavin’s nature. Just as the idea of a bluescreen.
February 13th, 2012 at 8:53 am
It sounds like Gavin’s already undergone some degradation. He has difficulty with human emotion these days. His personality has undergone severe changes. His values have undergone a massive shift. He’s appears to have forgotten certain chunks of his life or at the very least no longer has the capacity to pay attention to certain things that he once had. Could be the result of previous backups or transfers done imperfectly. Just so long as we’re speculating.