In the Blink of An Eye Plot Summary
In the Blink of An Eye tells the story of Warwickshire DCS Kat Frank as she is tasked with testing out a new AI-based program for the police force. Reluctantly, she accepts, and with a small team and under the eye of Professor Okonedo, creator of the AIDE program, is given cold cases to test and train the AI named AIDE Lock.
However, when two cases lead to something bigger, Kat and her team must work with the AI to solve these cases. It is AI logic versus human experience, but a few questions need to be answered. So, which side wins?
Why did Warwickshire Police Implement the AIDE program?
Throughout In the Blink of An Eye, the implementation of the AIDE program kickstarts a series of events that lead to the cases of Will Robinson and Tyrone Walters and a source of tension for Kat Frank. But why was it implemented? The program was created by Professor Okonedo, a professor from the NiAIR – National Institute for AI Research, a Warwick-based University to solve crimes using an algorithm that was free from bias or prejudice of any kind.
It was implemented in Warwickshire Police as a pilot approved by the Home Secretary to show that AI can be more capable than human police officers. It was brought in to test, observe and learn.
Why did Kat have such a problem with the AIDE program?
Kat was not receptive to working with AIDE Lock. In fact, her goal was to show that AI couldn’t replace experience and a human touch to cases. But she also wanted to kill the AIDE program before it could get a foothold.
At first, readers are led to believe this is because of her values as a police officer, however, there is a deeper reason as to why she didn’t trust Lock and the AIDE program. At the beginning of the novel, readers discover that Kat’s husband, John, just recently died of Lung Cancer, and she is trying to find her way back from bereavement.
Later on, you find out that John’s cancer was missed by the hospital’s AI system, which was being used instead of doctors. By the time a doctor looked through John’s case, the cancer had progressed to a terminal stage.
Why were Will Robinson’s and Tyrone Walter’s cases picked over the other cold cases?
The AI team consisting of DCS Frank, DI Hassan, DS Browne and Professor Okonedo could only use cold cases for the AIDE program. DI Hassan and DS Browne choose cases based on their personal experiences. Browne chooses Max Jones, a missing 35-year-old father of three because of her father issues, growing up without one. Hassan chooses Jane Hughes, an 18-year-old woman who went missing on a night out a week before Christmas. This is due to his sister being the victim of an attack while she was at university.
Lock chooses Will Robinson, a more recent disappearance case, because of statistics. Young men are more likely to go missing after a night of misadventure, and White people are more likely to be found or return home on their own after a period of time, as well as other statistical data. Kat chooses Tyrone Walters in opposition to Lock’s choice, and also due to Tyrone being the same age as her son, with a father who passed away when he was young, and just starting his first year at University, something else that echoes her son Cam.
With tensions high between Kat and Okonedo, and Kat wanting to prove Lock wrong by proving human instincts are better than AI states and data, Kat chooses for her team to work on both Tyrone’s and Will’s cases together.
What happens with the AIDE program?
Throughout the investigation of the Will Robinson and Tyrone Walters cases, both AIDE Lock and the human police are shown to have pitfalls that are counterproductive to the case. Lock’s cold demeanor is seen to alienate and cause issues with witnesses during interviews, for instance showing a projection of Tyrone Walters to his mother, which causes her emotional distress.
While the police officers allow emotion and personal issues to cloud their judgement, such as Kat’s inability to work well with Lock and often ignore his suggestions, Hassan questions Kat on a lead that he believes to a red herring and even Kat’s superior McLeish believes that Kat’s interest in the case is becoming too personal, especially since she picked a case that was similar to her own circumstances.
However, AIDE Lock and the rest of the team balance out each other. The officers are able to handle the emotional and delicate side of police work, while Lock is able to make collecting clues and data an easier task since the AI can collect information within minutes and seconds instead of within days or weeks.
In the end, putting together two strong sides of the opposing teams leads to the AIDE program being seen as a semi-success and failure. The Home Secretary decides that the AIDE program is helpful to the police force, but still needs more testing and creates a task force called the FPU, Future Policing Unit to focus on this. The FPU is a human-machine team working on complex live cases. However, to avoid issues, this team will only be used and tested in Warwickshire.