Deep Space Wandering Fleet
Chapter 487 - 485: A Small Gift (Two-in-One)

Chapter 487: Chapter 485: A Small Gift (Two-in-One)

Looking at the slightly puzzled crowd, Zhang Yuan recalled the feeling from that time and said, "Without experiencing it firsthand, it’s really hard to describe."

"To give a concrete example, everyone has two eyes and possesses normal vision. But what about blind people? Some might think that blind people can’t see the world, so they must see blackness, like when we close our eyes, but it’s actually not like that... That blackness is just the color produced when light is blocked by our eyelids."

"What is the true sensation for blind people then?"

Zhang Yuan blinked his own eyes and explained, "Everyone just open your left eye and close your right eye. What the closed eye feels is what blinds people sense; it isn’t blackness, but a state of emptiness."

Yes, emptiness.

With that explanation, nearly everyone understood.

"Emptiness" is a very abstract concept, but it undeniably exists. It’s as if there’s nothing at all, as if the brain has directly lost that closed eye.

Some people are now trying it, opening and closing their eyes, and the feeling of completely losing that perception is startling for those who didn’t understand at first.

Without personal experience, it indeed is difficult to describe with words.

Similarly, Zhang Yuan was currently experiencing the loss of several senses, and because it was more than one sense, that’s why he had been so uncomfortable for so long, temporarily paralyzed.

So, how important is perception?

It’s related to intelligence and can thoroughly influence a person’s way of thinking!

Do congenitally blind humans have "visions" in their "eyes"? The answer is affirmative, but that vision is essentially different from what normal people see through their eyes.

For a normal person, closing their eyes and touching an apple, the rough outline is that of a relatively round object, with a small depression and perhaps a little stem. Once an initial outline forms, an image forms in the mind, and the brain automatically fills in the color.

"This ability to form an image in the mind comes from the influence of vision and is a primary recognition of objects."

"But for a congenitally blind person touching an apple, what forms in their mind may be a memory that isn’t an image; it is still limited to the sense of touch."

"That’s the impact of perception on thinking."

Then, by the same token, all normal humans compared to high-level civilizations are essentially "blind".

The perception of high-level civilizations is more developed, and their way of recognizing things is completely different.

In the interstellar trading market, there are specialized fields of study, such as the "Spirit Level System" and "Racial Value Judgment," which evaluate the intellectual potential of native civilizations.

Perception is an important part of judging potential, and if a species has super perception, they can sell for many AmiBa points in the interstellar trading market! Of course, such species are rare in the universe.

And Zhang Yuan is the only person among humans who is different. Although he is now "blind," that memory is still there.

"Mr. Zhang Yuan, has your way of understanding the world changed significantly from normal people?" a neuroscientist suddenly raised his hand to ask. "Can you still remember that sensation? You won’t forget it?"

Zhang Yuan spread his hands, "I’m not sure how to describe it for now... Of course, I won’t forget, just like someone who becomes blind later in life, they will always remember those days filled with light, the various colors. He still knows what Kunlun Mountain looks like, what the Radiant Galaxy looks like."

The expert nodded and sat down.

Zhang Yuan continued, "Einstein, the greatest scientist of the 20th century, discovered the theory of relativity single-handedly with his amazing inspiration, the existence of mass causes the curvature of space, and the curvature of space produces gravity."

"This space distortion phenomenon is mysterious and elusive to us humans. Even Newton believed that gravity was an action at a distance. It’s even less likely for an ordinary person to sense the distortion of space."

"But what if I could directly perceive the distortion of space?"

"Yes, at that time, I truly felt the distortion of space and the gravitational phenomena it caused, these sensations perfectly fused together in my brain! Everyone can imagine how much progress it would be for human scientists if they could perceive the essence of the universe more accurately."

What’s the most important thing in science?

Inspiration!

Hard work may determine the lower limit, but inspiration sets the upper limit!

Now, the greatest inspiration in Einstein’s life, a three-year-old of some civilization, could directly perceive it with their own brain. If a certain civilization could naturally see the curvature in space caused by mass, what a qualitative leap that would be! They would think of great discoveries of human civilization as mere child’s play.

Those present were intelligent enough to deeply understand what Zhang Yuan was hinting at.

In the cosmic civilization, there must be such inherently superior civilizations. They are the darlings of evolution; each evolutionary step naturally moves in the right direction, unlike other civilizations that need to ponder deeply over the nature of the universe. The universe as they perceive it is already close to its essence.

Humans, or many other civilizations, when compared to these inherently superior beings, are like blind fish in a cave.

Zhang Yuan, looking at the people silently pondering, said, "After explaining so much, I hope to join the Unreal Laboratory to research these matters. I also hope the government can allocate some resources to establish a special laboratory. Especially the control authority over the Virtual World, I think it’s a good choice to use the lives within the Virtual World to study these matters."

"After all, these feelings are truly too complex to describe in a few words. Only by taking the reins personally can one make a greater contribution to the entire civilization."

"Oh, and we’ll need some related scientists."

This matter was quickly approved, and a special laboratory was established—The "Superdimensional Perception Laboratory," which, because it would utilize Virtual World Technology, belonged to a department under the Unreal Laboratory.

It would be foolish not to utilize such talents.

Of course, this work might be long-term and extremely difficult, and without a clear theoretical foundation, it’s understood that significant results won’t be achieved quickly.

The New Human Civilization has enough patience to wait for Zhang Yuan’s gradual research.

After that, a number of scientists were temporarily reassigned. These scientists covered various aspects of the brain and intelligence and were very valuable. Consequently, the responsible leaders weren’t too happy. If these scientists were reassigned, what about the updating and replacing of the brain? Zhang Yuan’s work is important, but aren’t other tasks important as well?

In the end, they could only proceed on a voluntary basis, merging the original "Human Body Magnetic Field Perception Research Institute" with a total of 30 people. After all, humans knew nothing about this field. Thirty people, starting to figure out magnetic field perception and slowly pioneering, is a good start.

After discussing all this, a major issue was finally settled.

One minute of silence in the conference room later, a young professor from the Information Security Department spoke up, "Mr. Zhang, what is the function of that cube you brought back? We have decoded the data and have not found any issues related to safety."

"Oh? So it’s been confirmed to be safe?" Captain Ke couldn’t help but ask.

Safety issues are, after all, the most important.

The professor nodded and said, "Yes, according to our decryption, it seems to be a large-scale function that can calculate an infinite non-repeating decimal ... however, we didn’t find anything particularly remarkable about this infinite non-repeating decimal."

After the young professor finished speaking, he curiously looked towards Zhang Yuan.

Zhang Yuan smiled and replied, "Yes, it is indeed a unique function. However, it represents the cosmic perspective of the Gaia Faction."

"Simply put, the Gaia Faction believes that the entire universe is a series of complex functions, of course, probably not the one we have now."

In truth, he didn’t know what the Abel Ring ultimately gave him, simply mentioning "a small surprise."

"If we want to fully understand it, we must use a supercomputer with high computational power to calculate it. I hope everyone... can prepare themselves mentally."

Everyone in the venue began to stir, waiting for the "small surprise" from the higher-level civilization.

After discussing with a few computation experts and consulting professors from the information security department, the Captain agreed to the request.

Zhang Yuan directed the staff, "Place a mass point at the position of the three-dimensional coordinate system (0, 0, 0), then calculate its movement according to the function. It’s not an infinitely non-repeating decimal, the specific movement rule is like this..."

The mass point started to move slowly across the screen, one point after another, appearing in succession.

However, nobody could discern what this thing actually was.

Zhang Yuan said, "Please speed up the appearance rate of the points by one hundred million times!"

"Our screen’s refresh resolution is not enough. Who has a screen resolution of one hundred million frames per second?" a scientist said with a wry smile.

The computation speed could be increased, but the screen refresh rate couldn’t possibly be raised by that much.

"It’s okay, it’s unrelated to the screen resolution, as long as these points can maintain visual persistence."

When human eyes observe a scene, light signals are transmitted into the brain’s nerves and take a short time to process. After the light’s effect ends, the visual image doesn’t disappear immediately, this residual vision is known as "afterimage," and this phenomenon of vision is called "visual persistence."

As computation sped up, an abstract image quickly took shape on the screen. Still, everyone couldn’t make out what this thing actually was.

"Speed it up another one hundred million times!"

The movement of the mass point accelerated significantly, and the image started to become gradually more refined, faintly visible as various human images, although they seemed to be fixed, motionless.

"Speed it up by another ten thousand times!" This time it was the Captain who directly spoke.

"Your Excellency the Captain, if we speed up the computation further, this supercomputer won’t have enough computational power."

"Then mobilize other supercomputers; we should be able to complete the task, right?"

"No problem."

After approximately a moment, the program was set up.

Everyone held their breath, Zhang Yuan included, as his heartbeat began to accelerate... an inkling of something incredible about to happen arose in his mind!

This one mass point quickly jumped within the three-dimensional coordinate system, sketching out a complicated image.

As time passed, the sketched image became more and more concrete, more and more specific...

The real dynamic image appeared!

This time the image was jumping perhaps too fast, like a fast-forwarded movie, just 0.1 seconds passed, then it turned into a bunch of snowflake dots, with no one knowing what was played in between.

A somewhat impatient murmur rose in the meeting room.

The staff had to readjust the screen’s playback speed.

Another two minutes passed, and they got it right.

Everyone stared intently at the screen, once again holding their breath.

The image appeared.

A robot, pushing a half-paralyzed individual in a wheelchair, entered the meeting room...

Zhang Yuan’s complexion immediately changed, why did this paralyzed guy look exactly like him?

The image still continued, all the participants entered the venue in sequence; there were over a hundred people. Seeing everyone had arrived and looking at the "Zhang Yuan" who was half-paralyzed in the wheelchair, the leading individual in the middle smiled and said something.

Judging from the lip movements, it seemed to be—

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have been at the Huantai Civilization’s trading market for three months now. Over these three months, considerable progress has been made. Let’s start with our diplomats introducing the achievements made during this period..."

An individual who looked like Zhao Qingfeng stood up and presented the related information; everyone on the screen appeared bored to sleepiness.

Once this business was completed, people began to interact with the half-paralyzed individual, showing expressions of shock and awe, vividly lifelike.

There was silent muteness.

No sound at all.

Only a black and white image drawn by a rapidly moving mass point.

Aside from the "thud thud" of heartbeats, there was no sound in the meeting room.

It was too spine-chilling.

Zhang Yuan’s pupils dilated slightly and suddenly snapped back to reality, wasn’t this... the scene that just took place?!

Even the spoken words were identical?

The humans in the image also established a "Superdimensional Perception Laboratory," then quarreled endlessly over the reallocation of personnel. After the argument ended, they started to discuss the "small gifts" from the Hicks Civilization.

It was truly hair-raising!

Genuinely hair-raising!

The entire meeting room felt like it had fallen into an ice cellar, Captain Ke couldn’t help but swallow nervously. He even began to doubt if he was watching surveillance footage.

But, this was certainly not surveillance footage! It was the scene simulated by the high-speed movement of a mass point!

Whether humans liked it or not, the image continued to play, almost identically repeating everything that had just happened in the meeting...

Until humans planned to run the function in the cube storage, the image abruptly switched to a line of text...

"Human civilization, hello, this is a little gift for you. We hope you can find joy in it."

"If you reach the level of a Level 6 Civilization, welcome to join us in the study of predictive mathematics."

"Hicks Civilization, Abel Ring."