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"...a few centuries of coherent humanist thought, set against a million odd years of evolved killer ape tendency. No-one's going to give you very good odds on humanism, are they?"
- Richard Morgan
 |
| Mechanical Jokester | ||
| A vast computer system learns about humor. |
This is one of a series of stories by Asimov about Multivac.
| "Because I've heard him telling jokes to Multivac." "Oh, no." "Accidentally. I walked in on him and he threw me out. He was savage. He's usually good-natured enough, and I consider it a bad sign that he was so upset at the intrusion. But the fact remains that he was telling a joke to Multivac, and I'm convinced it was one of a series." "But why?" Whistler shrugged and rubbed a hand fiercely across his chin. "I have thought about that. I think he's trying to build up a store of jokes in Multivac's memory banks in order to get back new variations. You see what I mean? He's planning a mechanical jokester, so that he can have an infinite number of jokes at hand and never fear running out." |
| Technovelgy from Jokester,
by Isaac Asimov. Published by Infinity Science Fiction in 1956 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the robot comedian from William Tenn's 1951 story The Jester.
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'This was their world, their planet — this swift-traveling, yet seemingly moveless vessel.'
'Gaines and Harvey mounted tumblebugs, and kept abreast of the Cadet Captain...'
Accompanied by a small selection of similar ideas from science fiction.
'...war-balloons, or, as it would be more correct to call them, navigable aerostats.'
