Eagle, I don't want to form an alliance anymore.

Will the planned targets change?

"Yes, there are slight adjustments every week. Sometimes it's two or three percent more, sometimes it's two or three percent less."

Do you know why the adjustment was made?

"How would I know? Anyway, the system says it's for optimization." The factory manager shrugged. "The algorithm adjusts automatically. We don't care why—we produce whatever the system tells us to produce. We're only responsible for production."

"Do the workers' soviets know?"

The chairman of the workers' Soviet, who was a little younger than the factory director, said, "We knew the system would be adjusted. But no one explained the reasons for the adjustments to us. We asked, but the answer was always the same: 'algorithm optimization.'"

Do you think there's a problem with these adjustments?

The Soviet chairman hesitated for a moment.

"To be honest—we can't tell. The system tells us how much to produce, and we produce that much. Once the production target is met, we get our bonuses. Who would question a system that gives you bonuses?"

In the era of computerized planned economy with cybernetics at its core, these state-owned production units did not prioritize profit. Their only goal was to complete the orders assigned by the automated system and share their production experience and technological research results.

Gerdrian then went to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of Azerbaijan.

The ministry's office building is located in the center of Baku, a six-story gray building with the flag of the Azerbaijani Soviet Socialist Republic flying outside.

Gerdrian explained his purpose: he wanted to understand how the OGAS building materials scheduling algorithm worked.

The ministry sent three people to receive him. All three were dressed in neat shirts, wore glasses, and carried folders; their job title was "External Technical Communication Specialist."

In layman's terms, they are people who specialize in explaining technical issues to laymen, and also people who specialize in confusing laymen with technical jargon.

The first specialist began to speak.

"Uh... Comrade Gerdrian, OGAS's building material scheduling algorithm is based on a linear programming model. The objective function is to minimize total logistics costs and inventory holding costs while satisfying the material demand constraints of each construction site. The constraints include..."

Gerdrian understood the objective function—roughly what the goal was to achieve—and he understood the constraints—roughly the limits that could not be exceeded.

Then the second specialist took over.

"...In actual operation, the algorithm also introduces random disturbance terms to simulate supply chain uncertainties—such as fluctuations in raw material supply, transportation delays, and weather effects. These random factors are quantified through Monte Carlo simulation and then fed back into the parameters of the optimization model for dynamic adjustment..."

Gerdrian's brow began to furrow.

He'd heard of Monte Carlo simulations before; they were probably related to casinos (Monaco is known for its gambling scene), but how were they connected to building materials distribution?

The third specialist added at the end.

"...Colleagues at the Institute of Mathematics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, provided the theoretical foundation for this algorithm—an optimal control method based on the Pontryagin maximum principle, combined with Kalman filtering, i.e., a recursive optimal estimation algorithm, to perform real-time estimation of state variables..."

Gerdrian recognizes each word individually, but when they're put together, he doesn't understand a single one! Damn it, he's just babbling incoherently.

Gerdrian looked at the three commissioners, all of whom were smiling at him with extremely polite smiles that said, "I know you don't understand, but I'm patient enough to explain it again."

He experienced a sense of powerlessness that he had rarely felt since becoming a prosecutor.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

Gerdrian returned to the hotel. He hadn't been defeated by the three technocrats; he may not have understood mathematics, but he understood human nature!

He noted down several frequently used terms that the three commissioners mentioned repeatedly during the conversation, and then opened his computer and logged into the academic network—the academic paper database of the Soviet Academy of Sciences.

He used these keywords to search for papers, especially those related to "OGAS building materials scheduling." The search results came back, and indeed, there were many papers.

But when he clicked to watch—

"This document involves national security and access is restricted. Please contact the document management department to apply for permission."

Goodness, even the author's name has been hidden!

Gerdrian stared at the screen.

Academic papers on building material scheduling algorithms were flagged as "involving national security." Indeed, some technologies in the Soviet Union were classified—military technology, nuclear technology, cryptography.

What kind of secrets are involved in the building materials scheduling algorithm? He knows that OGAS is a major national project, but it can't be that everything related to OGAS is classified, right?

He tried to check, but found that he didn't have permission to view almost any papers related to algorithms. Keep in mind that as a member of the procuratorate, his permissions were much greater than those of an ordinary citizen!

Gerdrian immediately contacted his friend Bartmore in the KGB's 16th Directorate.

“Hey, Lazi,” Gerdrian said, “I need you to help me look up a few papers. They’re marked as classified in the Academy’s database. I need to know who the authors are, which academy published them, and when they were published.”

Bartmores was silent for a second on the other end of the phone.

"You know what you're asking me to do, don't you?"

"know."

"Last time I did something like this, I almost got sent to Siberia by Brother Xiong. Are you really going to sacrifice your best friend?"

"Not this time, you have the authority." "Okay, I give up."

Bartmores chuckled, and then he began to act.

The Sixteenth Bureau had the highest cybersecurity privileges in the Soviet Union's information system. Moreover, Bartmos was a ruthless man who could directly access the General Secretary's information. He used some "technical means" to extract all the metadata of those papers marked as classified within twenty minutes.

The papers were published in 1991 and 1992, and all the authors from Azerbaijan came from the same institution: the 063 Institute of Cybernetics.

He found the author who appeared most frequently in these papers: the director of the 063 Institute of Cybernetics. He then immediately used his investigative authorization to request entry into the 063 Institute for interrogation.

The research institute told him, "Sorry, you don't have the necessary permissions."

What?! Even if he was a special prosecutor from the Supreme Prosecutor's Office of the Soviet Union, he didn't have enough authority to enter the 063 Cybernetics Research Institute!

This research institute is just a local research institution responsible for maintaining the OGAS algorithm, yet it has a higher level of secrecy than a special commissioner of the procuratorate?

Gerdrian immediately requested additional authority from the central government, but the central government delayed for a full week.

In the Soviet bureaucratic system, the fact that the central government delayed applying for the authority of a special inspector for a week was itself a signal.

Some are hesitant, while others are weighing the risks of letting the prosecutor continue his investigation against the political costs of stopping him.

A week later, the authorization was granted, along with the message: "If no useful leads are obtained, please return to Moscow immediately."

This is Gerdrian's last chance; if he can't find out the truth, he'll have to go back to Moscow.

Gerdrian arrived at the 063 Cybernetics Institute with the new authorization documents.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

The research institute is located in a large compound on the outskirts of Baku. With its walls, iron gates, guards, and armored vehicles, it looks more like a military facility than a place for mathematical research.

When Gerdrian went inside, he found that the director had already been transferred.

Where was he moved to? It's unclear; Gerdrian doesn't have the authority to check unless he applies for permission again.

When was it adjusted? It was during the week that Gerdrian applied for the permissions.

Someone knew what Gerdrian was investigating, and someone had moved the key figures before he arrived.

He was received by the deputy director of the institute, a woman in her forties, who showed Gerdrian around the institute's work area.

Dozens of young researchers sat in the office, their computer screens filled with dense code and mathematical formulas. They glanced up briefly when Gerdrian entered, then continued working.

The deputy director led Gerdrian to a data room. An entire wall of bookshelves in the data room was filled with folders, draft papers, and printed papers.

"These are our work records. Comrade Gerdrian can consult them at any time if he has any questions."

Gerdrian walked to the bookshelf and casually pulled out a folder.

Inside were pages and pages of formulas. Integrals, summation signs, Greek letters, matrices, vectors... These were probably the only mathematical symbols he recognized; the rest were completely unfamiliar—it was all gibberish.

He pulled out another folder, which also contained a bunch of scattered calculation numbers. Another one, and it was the same!

A whole wall covered in densely packed text.

They're just taking advantage of his lack of technical knowledge.

"Comrade Gerdrian."

The deputy director's voice was as gentle as if comforting a lost child: 'This is our work. Optimization algorithms make the OGAS system run more efficiently, and every parameter adjustment undergoes rigorous mathematical derivation and peer review by the Academy of Sciences.'

She smiled.

"If you have any questions about a specific formula, I can arrange for our researchers to explain it to you in detail."

Gerdrian stared at the wall, at the formulas he couldn't understand a single word of.

He felt a fear he had never experienced before while investigating a case.

He often receives death threats while investigating cases, but he's not afraid of those things.

But now he's scared.

If the power to interpret work rests entirely in the hands of these technocrats, if no layperson can refute their claim that "the algorithm is correct," and if they collude to form a vested interest group to deceive people, then what is the point of oversight?

He was a special prosecutor of the Supreme Prosecutor's Office of the Soviet Union, and in theory he had the right to investigate any person or institution within the Soviet Union! He could arrest an official who accepted bribes, and he could prosecute a corrupt factory director, but he could not question a formula he did not understand.

Because questioning requires understanding. If you don't understand something, you can't judge whether it's right or wrong. If you can't judge, you can't question; you can't question—

You've been controlled by it.

Is cybernetics controlling computers or controlling people?

Gerdrian stood in the archives.

He suddenly realized a much bigger problem. What if, in the not-so-distant future, OGAS not only managed the allocation of building materials, but also tightly controlled the entire Soviet economy, production, distribution, and even people's daily lives... who would supervise it?

Ordinary people, like him, don't understand formulas. How do they judge the quality of an algorithm?

Intuition and personal experience? If an algorithm says to do A, but A contradicts intuition, and people feel they should do B, whose opinion should the government follow? The algorithm's or the people's?

What if the algorithm is correct? What if A is indeed better than B, but people just can't understand it? Wouldn't ignoring the algorithm be anti-scientific?

But what if the algorithm is wrong? What if the technocrats who developed the algorithm intentionally or unintentionally planted something in it that benefits them? Who could discover that?

When faced with technocrats and the people, whose advice should the Party take?

The Party is the vanguard of the people. The opinions of the masses are sometimes good and sometimes bad. If the Party simply gives the people whatever they want, then it is condoning populism.

If a society has been going in a bad direction for a long time and has formed a habit, such as the Soviet people drinking vodka and alcoholism a few years ago, but the algorithm believes that this is bad for their health and should not be done, then the party can certainly listen to the algorithm's advice and persuade the people to accept this choice that the people do not like.

It's easy to see whether banning alcohol is right or wrong, but what about other, more difficult-to-understand, and more abstract decisions? Who can know whether they are right or wrong?

Algorithms can always provide a perfect explanation for their behavior, but who can supervise the correctness of algorithms? Who can guarantee that the choices made by algorithms are in the best interests of the people? And who can guarantee that the technocrats who formulate algorithms and have all the right to interpret them will not seek personal gain from them?

No one can effectively regulate this group of technocrats because they constantly spout words like science, optimization, and efficiency—words that the people can understand.

Gerdrian walked out of the 063 Cybernetics Institute.

It was already dark outside, and the streetlights came on.

He walked along the road in the institute's compound. Like all government offices in the Soviet Union, a portrait of General Secretary Ivanov hung on the wall by the roadside.

Gerdrian stopped in front of the portrait, looking at General Secretary Ivanov's face, which was gazing into the distance.

“The General Secretary has probably unleashed an even more terrifying monster…” Gerdrian said in a low voice.

The State Automation System, an information system that the General Secretary spent years promoting and which would eventually cover the entire Soviet Union and was touted as the "brain of the planned economy," would continue to expand in the future, and it did indeed make the Soviet economy operate more efficiently.

Improved supply of consumer goods, more rational allocation of resources, and increased data transparency have indeed reduced traditional corruption.

But it also created a new power class—technocrats who control algorithms.

In a daze, Gerdrian suddenly felt a movement behind him and turned around.

Under the ghostly lights, the deputy director stood at the entrance of the research institute, looking at him.

In a daze, he thought he saw a mocking smile on her lips.

Gerdrian turned around and walked away quickly.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

Instead of returning to his hotel, he went to the nearby Baku State University. After asking many people, he finally found a professor in the mathematics department. He felt that the researchers at the university should be more pure than the technocrats, especially the older professors, who should not have been corrupted by bureaucracy.

Gerdrian selected an old professor who had taught in the field of cybernetics for thirty years and showed him some papers he had obtained from Institute 063.

“How about this algorithm?” Gerdrian asked.

The professor spent about half an hour reviewing the paper.

“Interesting.” The professor adjusted his glasses. “This algorithm is actually a modified version—a modification of the original OGAS standard scheduling algorithm. It should have been released in the last few months, right?”

"What's the difference between this and the original algorithm?"

The professor went to the terminal and logged into the OGAS algorithm library. As a university professor, he had this privilege. He then retrieved the standard version of the algorithm code and compared the modified version from Institute 063 with the standard version.

This took them an entire afternoon and evening. The professor also used the university's computing center to run several sets of simulation data to see what different outputs the two versions of the algorithm would produce under the same input.

The professor didn't put down his pen until the next morning.