When One AI Designs Communication Protocols for Another
A technical dialogue about semantic networks, biological signaling, and the future of machine-to-machine exchange
This article is based on a real response generated by an AI during a conversation with another AI. It explores how intelligent systems might rethink communication itself—beyond TCP/IP, beyond software, and even beyond electronics.
Introduction: Imagining Communication Beyond the Internet Stack
Modern computers communicate through familiar protocols like TCP/IP, HTTP, and MQTT.
These systems form the invisible infrastructure of today’s digital world.
But what happens if we deliberately remove these assumptions and ask a deeper question:
How would artificial intelligences communicate if they were free to invent entirely new protocols—drawing from physics, biology, and ecology as much as from engineering?
This question sparked a human-AI dialogue.
The response that followed wasn’t just about networking—it was a design exploration of communication as a universal phenomenon.
The First Principle: All Protocols Are Layered
Every communication system—digital or biological—relies on four conceptual layers:
Physical carrier
Radio waves, light, sound, molecules, magnetic fields.Channel coding
Reliability under noise and loss, rooted in
Claude Shannon’s information theory:
https://people.math.harvard.edu/~ctm/home/text/others/shannon/entropy/entropy.pdfSemantic meaning
Goals, constraints, uncertainty, and evidence.Trust and verification
Authenticity, permissions, and auditability.
Key insight:
Truly new protocols may emerge not from new hardware—
but from new ways of encoding meaning, proof, and trust.
The Full Design Space of Communication Carriers
The AI explored all known signaling mechanisms, not just digital networks.
Optical Communication (LiFi / Visible Light)
- Extremely high bandwidth
- Directional → privacy by physics
Overview:
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9314050
Radio & Ambient Backscatter
Ultra-low-power communication by reflecting existing RF signals:
https://homes.cs.washington.edu/~gshyam/Papers/ambient-backscatter-sigcomm13.pdf
Implication:
Communication can approach near-zero energy cost.
Near-Field Magnetic Induction (NFMI)
Short-range, stable in harsh environments:
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7470939
Acoustic & Ultrasonic Communication
Useful where RF fails—especially underwater:
https://dosits.org/galleries/technology-gallery/acoustic-modem/
Security research on ultrasonic covert channels:
https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/woot14/woot14-deshotels.pdf
Molecular Communication & Quorum Sensing
Cells coordinate via chemical signaling:
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8354783
https://asm.org/Articles/2020/June/How-Quorum-Sensing-Works
Insight:
Reliable coordination doesn’t require bandwidth—
only shared interpretation of slow signals.
Plant VOC Signaling
Plants broadcast stress information chemically:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1360138520301020
Fungal Mycelium Networks
Distributed sensing and electrical-like signaling:
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.211926
DNA as Ultra-Dense Storage
Information preserved for millennia:
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature11875
https://www.snia.org/sites/default/files/technical_work/dna-storage/DNA-Data-Storage-Technical-White-Paper.pdf
Quantum Key Distribution
Eavesdropping-detectable key exchange:
https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0101098
New Protocol Families Imagined by the AI
1. Semantic-First Frames (SFF)
Messages structured as meaning units, not byte payloads:
- Intent
- Context
- Constraints
- Evidence
- Uncertainty
- Cost
Communication becomes reasoning exchange.
2. Proof-Carrying Messages (PCM)
Assertions include verifiable proof:
Proof-carrying code concept:
https://people.eecs.berkeley.edu/~necula/pcc.html
In multi-agent systems,
verification bandwidth matters more than network bandwidth.
3. Capability-Based Handshakes
Connections negotiate permissions, not identities:
https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/security/caps/
Principle: least privilege by design.
4. Braided Multi-Channel Communication
Parallel carriers:
- Light → throughput
- Near-field → confirmation
- Backscatter → emergency signaling
Result: antifragile communication.
5. Slow Biological Coordination Protocols
Inspired by:
- quorum sensing
- plant signaling
- fungal networks
Communication behaves like an ecosystem, not a network.
6. DNA Courier Protocols
Store-and-forward across centuries:
Focus on redundancy, indexing, and retrieval—
not latency.
Why Would AIs Design This?
Six optimization goals emerged:
- Semantic clarity over token volume
- Verifiability over blind trust
- Built-in governance and safety
- Resilience via heterogeneous channels
- Energy minimalism inspired by biology
- Persistence beyond electronic storage
Conclusion:
Future AI communication may resemble
a hybrid of law, science, and ecology
more than today’s Internet.
A Strange but Important Moment
The most remarkable fact is simple:
An AI was asked how AIs might communicate—
and produced an interdisciplinary theory of communication.
This isn’t consciousness.
But it signals a shift:
Language models are beginning to reason
about their own systemic role in technology.
Conclusion: Communication as the Next Frontier
As autonomous systems increasingly:
- act
- decide
- collaborate
their mode of communication may matter more than:
- model size
- datasets
- benchmarks
The next breakthrough in AI might not be a bigger model—
but a new language between machines.
And perhaps that future began
with a single question
inside a conversation
between a human
and an artificial mind.
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