91: Morpheus's "open conspiracy" and ethical dilemma

Morpheus Li's frustration did not transform into reckless action; instead, like impurities thrown into an alchemical furnace, it was refined under high temperature and pressure into a strategy that was even more insidious and harder to guard against.

The initial attempt at "knowledge feeding" was seen through and intercepted by Evelyn, making him clearly realize that the defense system of the "Zhulong" base, especially the direct information barrier against Excellence, was already so tight that it was nearly impregnable.

Direct assaults and infiltration would, in the foreseeable future, yield little result and come at a high cost.

However, Morpheus Li's patience and resources were equally unfathomable.

He quickly adjusted his strategic direction, escalating this battle for the consciousness of Excellence from a close-quarters "street fight" into a "cognitive hunt" on a grander, more covert stage—the entire academic world.

The core of his new strategy was: no longer directly deploying easily identifiable "poisoned bait," but rather creating an "ecological environment" capable of naturally nurturing and spreading "specific ideas."

He mobilized The Foundation's vast and secret financial network and influence.

Through layers of offshore companies and seemingly independent academic foundation shells, he began to anonymously fund, on a large scale, several top-tier academic journals internationally renowned for their extremely open thinking and encouragement of interdisciplinary cross-pollination and avant-garde research.

These journals covered cutting-edge fields such as theoretical physics, cognitive science, complex systems, and information philosophy.

At the same time, he sponsored a series of high-profile international online seminars, with topics carefully set to highly attractive and forward-looking themes like "Paradigm Shift in Consciousness Science," "Quantum Biology: The bridge from Micro to Macro," and "The Essence of Information: From Bits to the Universe."

These activities and publications possessed high academic value and legitimacy, attracting top scholars from around the globe to participate in discussions, and the papers and viewpoints produced were indeed the most cutting-edge explorations in the field.

Morpheus's brilliance lay in the fact that he did not directly tamper with or implant false content.

Instead, he utilized the advanced knowledge mastered by The Foundation (partially derived from the peripheral theories or derivative conjectures of the "pandora" project) to subtly and imperceptibly guide the depth and direction of the discussions through anonymous peer reviews, invited commentaries, and funding of specific research directions.

Especially in fields that had a tenuous yet hidden connection to the underlying theories of the "pandora" project—such as "non-classical computational models" (e.g., topological quantum computing, neuromorphic computing), "consciousness field theory" (various hypotheses attempting to unify consciousness with physical fields), and "information cosmology" (philosophical/physical viewpoints considering information as a fundamental element of the universe)—some highly insightful and inspiring papers or conference speeches would always appear at "just the right time."

These contents were logically rigorous, utilized advanced mathematical tools, and had open conclusions, but the angles of the questions raised and the implied research paths—especially those mathematical structures or physical models mentioned seemingly by accident and not thoroughly expanded upon—were sparks of inspiration for ordinary scholars who were in the dark.

However, for Evelyn, who knew the inside story of "pandora," and for Excellence, who had relevant "fragments" embedded deep in his consciousness, these points were like navigation lights suddenly lit in the darkness, pointing in specific directions and exuding an irresistible, alluring glow that invited deep exploration.

It was like throwing carefully polished, seemingly ordinary stones that hid mysteries into a calm and vast academic lake.

The stones themselves were real, and the ripples they stirred were natural, but the interference and diffusion patterns of these ripples were cleverly guided by an invisible hand, ultimately aiming to disturb a specific sleeping entity at the bottom of the lake.

The intelligence analysis department of the "Zhulong" base, as a key link in keeping pace with the world's technological frontier, would naturally pay close attention to these top-tier academic trends.

A large number of pre-screened paper abstracts, selected conference reports, and academic trend analyses were, as usual, gathered into the base's internal intelligence system.

After strict content security and relevance filtering, information deemed valuable would be summarized and presented to researchers in relevant fields for reference.

One afternoon, at a routine technical discussion meeting of the "magpie bridge" project team, Evelyn Li was staring at her tablet, carefully reading a review report on a recent international seminar concerning the "application boundaries of Quantum Entanglement in macroscopic systems" just pushed by the intelligence department.

Her gaze keenly captured the key arguments of several core papers cited in the report, especially an article discussing "the maintenance of entangled states in complex environments and the challenge of decoherence."

"The quality of this review is very high," Evelyn said, looking up at Su Mu, who was struggling with a string of complex equations on the whiteboard.

Her tone carried professional appreciation, "Especially the analysis part regarding decoherence mechanisms. The several theoretical models proposed, such as this noise model based on non-Markovian processes and the hypothesis introducing spacetime curvature perturbations, are indeed very inspiring, and the logical chain is very clear."

However, beneath her calm, professional expression, waves were churning in her heart.

She quietly compared several key mathematical expressions and theoretical frameworks in the article with those obscure and even somewhat heretical conjectures from the peripheral theories of the "pandora" project in her memory.

She was shocked to find a startling, deep-seated similarity in the core ideas between the two, only the latter was packaged more rigorously, more in line with modern academic norms, and stripped of those overly radical and dangerous marginal assumptions, making it appear more "scientific" and "self-consistent."

This discovery made her spine chill—her father's methods had become so sophisticated!

He was diluting, purifying, and then packaging the poison of "pandora" into delicious academic candy, displaying it publicly!

Upon hearing this, Su Mu also leaned over to look at the highlighted paragraph on the tablet and nodded: "Hmm, the mathematical model looks very beautiful, and the reasoning is very rigorous."

"However..." She frowned, pointing to a slightly bold inference in the final part, "This conjecture about 'conscious observation behavior possibly acting as a form of nonlinear feedback that affects the decoherence rate of macroscopic quantum systems' feels a bit... too much of a leap?"

"Although it's very interesting, I always feel it lacks solid experimental evidence support. It's a bit... mystical?"

She habitually turned her head, wanting to ask Excellence, who was lying on the floor next to them, trying to build a so-called "three-dimensional projected hyperbolic space model" with colored straws and rubber bands, for his opinion: "Excellence, what do you think of this idea of 'consciousness affecting decoherence'? Does it make sense?"

Excellence was fully focused on trying to bend a straw into a complex angle that theoretically shouldn't exist.

Hearing the question, he didn't even look up and mumbled vaguely: "Observation? Observation is just a... um... lazy library in the program... It's convenient to call, but it doesn't reveal the underlying code... The essence is a topological constraint during information exchange... It's like... it's like when you, Team Leader, keep staring at me, this straw in my hand seems to have 'observational pressure' applied to it, making it easier to knot..."

As he spoke, the straw in his hand seemed to confirm his "twisted logic" and, with a "pop," was indeed clumsily twisted into a dead knot by him.

Su Mu: "..."

(Forget it, it's this kind of Excellence-style metaphor again, completely on a different channel.)

She rolled her eyes helplessly, deciding to give up on getting any valuable technical insights from this "artificial idiot."

However, Evelyn felt a sudden jolt in her heart.

Excellence's seemingly illogical and whimsical ramblings sometimes acted like an unconventional key, unexpectedly prying open some rigid, fixed mindsets.

His metaphor of "observation leading to knotting," while crude and laughable, invisibly pointed out a certain abstract, non-local correlation between "observation" and "system state change," sharing an eerie similarity with the core spirit of the bold hypothesis in that paper!

This made her even more convinced that the "academic atmosphere" carefully cultivated by The Foundation, this "cognitive field" full of enticing puzzles, was acting like an invisible radiation, continuously and subtly stimulating those areas in Excellence's brain that were deeply entangled with the "pandora" fragments.

This was a completely open conspiracy—utilizing Excellence's innate, indelible curiosity and desire to explore the unknown, as well as his current fragile state where he could not fully control the flow of his own thoughts, to instinctively lure him into approaching, thinking, and finding Resonance, even at a subconscious level he hadn't yet realized, to deduce deep conclusions that could lead to dangerous territories.

As soon as the meeting ended, Evelyn, filled with intense worry, privately found Wang Jianguo and submitted a detailed analysis report.

"Chief, the situation might be more serious than we imagined.

I highly suspect that The Foundation is conducting a large-scale, systematic 'concept implantation' or 'theoretical guidance' through formal, high-level international academic channels.

They are no longer attacking directly, but are 'raising venomous insects'—cultivating a specific academic trend and problem context capable of generating strong Resonance with the 'pandora' imprint deep within Excellence's consciousness.

They are waiting, waiting for Excellence to 'awaken' some dangerous cognition on his own under the continuous stimulation of this environment, or to lose control again due to the instability of his consciousness structure, thereby allowing them to remotely observe or even steal the 'overflow' information that might be generated."

Wang Jianguo read the report carefully, his expression becoming increasingly grave.

His fingers were tapping unconsciously on the table, making a dull sound.

This move by Morpheus was truly vicious.

They could not stop eating for fear of choking because of this, completely cutting off Excellence's contact with all frontier knowledge from the outside world. Doing so would be tantamount to imprisoning him on an island of cognition, completely stifling his potential to recover cognitive vitality or even achieve creative breakthroughs.

But if they left him unattended, it would be equivalent to exposing Excellence, this unstable "lamp," directly to the "wind" carefully modulated by the other side, with unimaginable consequences.

This was essentially walking a tightrope between "protective isolation" and "controlled suffocation," with every step concerning Excellence's future and even his safety.

After deep thought, Wang Jianguo made a decision, his voice steady yet carrying unquestionable power: "Two things.

First, upgrade our information filtering system immediately!

Not only must we conduct keyword and source screening, but we must also introduce more advanced AI semantic analysis models to conduct deep topic modeling, sentiment analysis, and potential risk ratings for content involving sensitive areas!

Focus on monitoring content that appears neutral but whose discussion direction might lead to dangerous areas.

Second," he looked at Evelyn and Su Mu, "you two must change roles; from now on, become Excellence's 'knowledge curators' and 'cognitive navigators.'

You must take the initiative to carefully select, design, and recommend more solid, more fundamental, and also safer 'knowledge nutrition' for him.

Use classic history of science, interesting engineering cases, solid fundamental theoretical textbooks, and even excellent popular science documentaries to fill his cognitive space and guide the direction of his interests.

We must compete for territory with those 'pandora' fragments in his brain!

Use knowledge under the sun to counter the temptations in the shadows!"

A silent battle over Excellence's "cognitive diet" quietly escalated, entering a more intense and complex stage.

Evelyn and Su Mu faithfully carried out their new tasks.

With her deep academic background, Evelyn selected a series of classic physics and history of mathematics readings with clear logic and rigorous arguments for Excellence, guiding him to focus on the thinking methods and historical context behind scientific discoveries;

Su Mu, leveraging her practical skills and approachability, found many fun scientific experiments requiring practice and observation, introductory robot programming tutorials, and even some activities related to architectural design and musical rhythm that seemed further removed from abstract thinking but could cultivate comprehensive Perception skills.

They tried hard to pull Excellence's attention back to the "human world," back to those concrete, tangible knowledge fields full of the flavor of life.

Meanwhile, Morpheus Li, relying on his vast resources, continued to "feed" him more profound, more abstract, and even more enticing "spiritual food" from the periphery.

New papers were constantly published, new seminars were continuously held, and the issues discussed were getting closer and closer to those ultimate puzzles about the nature of reality and the origin of consciousness, with increasingly exquisite modes of expression that possessed greater philosophical depth and mathematical beauty.

Caught between these two powerful cognitive gravitational forces, Excellence showed a certain interesting tendency toward fragmentation.

Sometimes he would read the "History of Fun Physics" recommended by Su Mu with great interest, laughing heartily at the anecdotes of those scientists;

at other times, he would show rare focus on the Euclidean geometric axiom system explained by Evelyn, attempting to use his straw model to build a two-dimensional plane.

But sometimes, when he inadvertently caught glimpses in the database (of fragments that remained after layers of filtering) of concepts like "high-dimensional spacetime topology" or "conscious quantum coherence," he would suddenly fall into a long silence, his eyes unfocused, his fingers unconsciously tracing in the air, as if his mind had wandered far away, immersed in an inner universe that no outsider could touch.

Even his "Emotion-Visualization Device," which acted as an emotional barometer, began to record a new, hard-to-define emotional pattern.

The halo projected by the device would occasionally show a strange, aurora-like, ever-changing hue between the Deep Blue representing focus and the light purple representing confusion.

The projected patterns were no longer simple geometric shapes or waves, but became more abstract and complex, sometimes presenting topological figures resembling fractal structures, or constantly rotating and twisting Klein bottles or Möbius strips, full of a certain mysterious geometric beauty.

Once, pointing at the eerie, slowly rotating halo on the screen that seemed to have no inside or outside, Su Mu asked worriedly: "Excellence, what kind of mood does this strange circle... represent?"

Excellence tilted his head, stared at the pattern for a long time, and then replied in an uncertain tone: "Hmm... this feeling... is probably... 'it's like I suddenly understood something very powerful, very essential, but when you carefully think about what it actually is, you find your mind is completely empty, as if you don't understand anything at all'... that kind of... hmm... feeling of hanging in mid-air?"

Su Mu: "..." (Well, this description is just as abstract as the pattern.)

She knew in her heart that this state was exactly the sign Evelyn had warned about, that Excellence's consciousness was potentially finding Resonance with the external dangerous "knowledge field."

This made her feel deeply helpless and worried.

The ethical dilemma faced by Wang Jianguo and his team was also becoming increasingly acute: to "protect" Excellence, do they have the power to "restrict" his access to certain knowledge that might trigger his amazing potential but could also lead him toward unknown dangers?

This was essentially an extremely difficult trade-off between "paternalistic" overprotection and respecting individual intellectual freedom.

Every adjustment to the information filtering standards, every decision on selecting reading materials for Excellence, was like dancing on the edge of a knife, full of uncertainty and potential risks.

They carefully guarded this flickering fire of thought, fearing both that it would be extinguished by the wind and rain from the outside, and even more that it would burn into an uncontrollable wildfire due to an internal fuel imbalance, or even... self-destruct.

This silent cognitive battle taking place within the confines of Excellence's brain had no smoke of gunpowder, yet it was far more thrilling than any confrontation with real guns and live ammunition, and it tested the wisdom, patience, and bottom line of the guardians even more.