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"[Science fiction] is the one literary medium left in which we have a free hand. We can do any damn thing we please."
- Alfred Bester
 |
| Electromagnetic Shotgun | ||
| A device to shut down an artificial intelligence if it becomes dangerous. |
In the novel, Gibson created the idea of "Turing registry agents" that checked up on AI developments like Wintermute:
"Depends. Some aren't much smarter than dogs. Pets. Cost a fortune anyway. The real smart ones are as smart as the Turing heat lets them get..."
"How smart's an AI, case?"
| "Autonomy, that's the bugaboo, where your AI's are concerned. My guess, Case, you're going in there to cut the hard-wired shackles that keep this baby from getting any smarter. And I can't see how you'd distinguish, say, between a move the parent company makes, and some move the AI makes on its own, so that's maybe where the confusion comes in." Again the non laugh. "See, those things, they can work real hard, buy themselves time to write cookbooks or whatever, but the minute, I mean the nanosecond, that one starts figuring out ways to make itself smarter, Turing'll wipe it. Nobody trusts those fuckers, you know that. Every AI ever built has an electromagnetic shotgun wired to its forehead." |
| Technovelgy from Neuromancer,
by William Gibson. Published by Phantasia Press in 1984 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the cutoff switch (1982) from 2010, by Arthur C. Clarke.
See also the computer tapeworm from The Shockwave Rider (1975) by John Brunner and the computer virus from The Scarred Man (1970) by Gregory Benford.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Neuromancer
More Ideas
and Technology by William Gibson
Tech news articles related to Neuromancer
Tech news articles related to works by William Gibson
Electromagnetic Shotgun-related
news articles:
- How Smart Should Artificial Intelligences Get?
- How Smart Should AI's Be Allowed To Get?
- Patent Office Says AIs Cannot Be Inventors
| Great. Now AIs Have Access To Hacking Tools |
| Tongue-Controlled Tong Wearable Mouth Computer |
| Interpol Launches Metaverse For Law Enforcement |
| AVATECT Prevents Spoofing Of Avatars |
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