Son of the Stars

Chapter 188 Shut up
Let's stand up from the fourth dimension and move to about thirty minutes ago.

The preset Mars synchronous landing orbit is a relatively straight curve - unlike the Earth, the Martian atmosphere is not very dense. When landing from orbit to the ground, there is no need to consider the problem of the landing capsule skipping at the edge of the atmosphere due to a small entry angle.

However, if the entry angle is too large, there will still be difficult to solve high temperatures.

Therefore, Dawn 6 adopted an extremely small angle to enter orbit, making full use of the thin atmosphere of Mars for braking and deceleration, and then used attitude and cushion engines to allow the landing capsule to land smoothly.

The Dawn-6 landing module has a capacity of six people, which is the largest in the history of human spaceflight. The landing module is much taller than conventional landing modules and is somewhat top-heavy, so it must land sideways during landing - the attitude engine will slowly lay the landing module sideways after the buffer explosion.

In this way, the landing capsule can be used directly as the core building of the base for Mars exploration.

The entire landing activity basically does not require human intervention. No matter how well the pilot and commander cooperate, humans are still the most vulnerable and error-prone link in the entire landing activity. Compared with the fragile and low-precision human brain, computers are more reliable.

But after landing… it’s up to humans to start exploring. No matter how much training data is provided before, no matter how long the intensive training is, Mars is too unfamiliar a place for humans and AI. But unlike AI, humans will not make “AI nonsense” that ignores facts in order to answer questions.

"AI bullshit" is a chronic disease that exists in almost all AIs. It is completely different from lying when knowing the facts but choosing to lie - this is a chronic disease that is unique to AI. The AI ​​system is designed to "solve problems" from the beginning of training. For the entire system, giving answers is the most important core task.

But the priority of correct answer is not particularly high.

Although AI has become more and more accurate in handling various issues with the development of technology, the situation of AI telling lies with open eyes, which is jokingly called "AI nonsense", cannot be completely eliminated.

AI only needs to solve the problem, and everything else can be put aside - the most suitable condiment for pouring on muffins is 502 glue, don't worry about whether it is edible or not, just say whether you have answered it or not.

At this point in time, the Dawn 6 landing module is facing such a problem that is obviously AI nonsense.

"The underground water ice content is 45% lower than expected. The landing area does not yet have the ability to become a long-term base." The AI ​​of the lander lied with open eyes. It was obvious that nearly half of the core samples dug out were blue water ice, but it just said that the landing area was not suitable.

But no one has the time to correct the AI, let alone press the restart switch of the AI ​​system.

It has been half an hour since landing, and the five astronauts in the landing module are staring intently at the screen in front of them - the screen is playing the documentary "Record of the Establishment of the United Government".

This documentary is the first documentary produced by the coalition government after the Great Collapse. It records in detail the establishment of the coalition government and the people's fear of the Great Collapse at that time.

Documentaries are effective for the Great Collapse, but not all documentaries are effective. Documentaries about the wonders of plants and animals, industrial or architectural documentaries, and even those reality show documentaries with a sense of entertainment are useless. Historical documentaries, only historical documentaries can help viewers get rid of the impact of the Great Collapse and save their lives.

When "Record: The Formation of the Coalition Government" was filmed, people had not yet reached a consensus on "what kind of documentary can be effective". So the filming method of this documentary was greatly influenced by it - it includes many forms of expression. From the simplest lecture form, it gradually progressed to animation, live performance, hand-painted, interactive video and short play. Although it is only "a" documentary, the final film is eight hours long.

The five astronauts were doing nothing but watching the documentary in front of them. This was not because they were worried about the big collapse happening to them, but because they were following Zheng Yan's orders.

"The lander has been on the surface of Mars for thirty-seven minutes." Zheng Yan asked while watching the documentary on the screen and typing quickly on the keyboard beside her, "When can they continue their mission?"

After sending this message, it would take at least half an hour to get a response. She didn't know who on Earth had sent her the request and order to "watch the Record of the Establishment of the United Government", but according to her and Ruan Hongying's judgment, executing this order would not have a negative impact on the landing operation.

It's just a documentary, what's the problem?
But the situation soon changed slightly - for example, the landing capsule had completed the landing mission, but the command sent from the control center was still to continue watching the documentary. This made people feel a little confused.

Now this kind of suffering would be almost unbearable for any astronaut. It would be a chance to have your name engraved in human history alongside those of Yuri Alexeevich Gagarin and Neil Alden Armstrong.

Who wouldn’t want to be the first person to set foot on Mars? After so many years of training, everyone resolutely said goodbye to their loved ones and families to embark on this dangerous journey, and was trapped in a low-gravity environment for more than a year... Isn’t all of this just for this last step?

The Martian surface is right outside, just outside the airtight chamber. Although the gravity from Mars makes it difficult for everyone to move... it is not insurmountable.

Whether it was Zheng Yan, who was still in orbit, or the astronaut crew who had already landed on the surface of Mars, everyone was a little anxious - now was not the time to watch documentaries!
"The emergency broadcast systems in Shuangqu and Lakeside have been adjusted to fixed channels." In the building of the Academic Affairs and Logistics Center of Central University, Yang Weimin was manually controlling the channel switching with Lu Chen, who had just woken up.

The design of the emergency system has a bit of the Soviet-era clumsy and crude features. In order to ensure smooth operation in various extreme situations, it even retains a large number of physical switches and electronic transistors.

After using all their strength to pull several major switches, Lu Chen and Yang Weimin finally switched the channel signal, but it was not enough.

"The playback timestamp on the orbital module has been synchronized." Tang Qinglong, with messy hair, poked his head out from the machine room next to the operation room and said, "Start playing now... How long does it usually take for the playback to take effect?"

"Based on Xiao Lu's personal experience, it takes about ten minutes." Yang Weimin closed the knife switch in front of him, then shook his numb hands and said, "A large number of people should start to get better now..."

"The problem of the big collapse is easy to solve, it's just a problem of synchronization entanglement." There was a piece of dust on the tip of Mu Zhiran's nose, and she was wiping her face with a wet towel. "Brother Chen's empathy hypothesis has also been verified, there is definitely no problem. But... what should we do after this wave of illness is over? The disconnected power supply lines need to be repaired, and the waveform load device needs to be eliminated..."

Before Mu Zhiran finished speaking, Lu Chen interrupted her anxious voice, "These things have to wait until we get through the current difficulties - those astronauts in orbit can't watch documentaries for two whole days. We have to suppress the collapse of Dongyang as soon as possible, and then deal with problems in other areas."

Mu Zhiran finally wiped the dust off her nose. She rolled her eyes at Lu Chen and said, "Even I know that your way of comforting people is not only useless, but also makes people more anxious - if you can't speak, just shut up!"

(End of this chapter)