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"At its best, SF is the medium in which our miserable certainty that tomorrow will be different from today in ways we can't predict, can be transmuted to a sense of excitement and anticipation, occasionally evolving into awe."
- John Brunner
 |
| Chemical Brain | ||
| A purely chemical artificial intelligence. |
In the story, the author specifically calls out R.U.R. as an inspiration.
| The
problem engrossing the captain and
me is this: Can we build a mechanical, a chemical brain delicate
enough to respond to thought as it
now does to sound or other stimuli?
Can we give such a command as this
to our chemical and mechanical
brain: ‘Keep the motor running;
every four hours feed it gas and
oil’? Can we do more than that?
Can we set our machine certain tasks
to do, fixing those tasks in its ‘mind,’
and then going away and forgetting
it? Don’t you see what that would
mean? It would mean the creation
of a genuine Robot, an independent
metal creature that would work
without supervision, eat its daily ration of fuel, and never get sick or
go on strike.”
The machine grew under our hands until it was six feet tall. It stood, as I have said before, on rollers, the rollers being encased in caterpillar belts. At the base it was about four feet around, tapering to twelve inches at the top. It was built, not in one piece but in segments, jointed ball-and-socket fashion, with various springs and rubber cushions separating the different parts. To describe it further is beyond me; only it had two armlike pistons, one on each side, possessed a central electric dynamo, and was wired so profusely as to make the interior seem a tangled mass of cord. Came the day when the brain of this monstrous mechanism was put in place. The part that fitted into what I must call the neck was made of aluminum, all except the cover, which was transparent glass and screwed into place. A small cylinder, which emitted an intense bluish light when brought into contact with electricity, was inside the aluminum howl. The captain connected the necessary wires. His face was very red. I watched breathlessly as Parsons filled the hollow globe with a glutinous mixture of opaque liquid. My hands unconsciously gripped each other until they hurt while I waited for something to happen, but nothing did. He screwed the glass cap into place and stepped down and back from the machine. |
| Technovelgy from The Chemical Brain,
by Francis Flagg. Published by Weird Tales in 1929 Additional resources -
|
Alas, the tale does not end well for its creators:
The sight sickened me. My bowels
turned to water. The awful monstrosity was bent over like a bow,
screaming as if in rage, and the
pulsing matter under the glass cap
on the top of its head sent out its
reddish-blue tinge and glared at me
like an evil eye.
Insane with terror I showered
blow after blow on it with my Stilson wrench. The glass cap broke;
the glutinous mass rolled out and
pulsed on the floor like a living thing
in its death throes. Even as it
fell the whole body of the machine straightened up convulsively.
Through all its sinuous wires and
lengths ran a sighing sob. Then
with a terrible crash it fell over on
the already horribly mutilated body
of its victim and was still.
Parsons had evidently turned on
the lights as he entered, for the room
was well lighted. At the sight of
what I saw strength nearly left me.
I stood as if petrified. There before
me—believe it or not, as you like—
was lying the crushed and bleeding
body of Walter Parsons, his features
fixed in a set grimace of stark horror
and agony, while crouching over him
like some fearsome prehistoric monster was the metal man he had
helped to.make, the hideous Robot,
driving its short, armlike pistons
into his still quivering flesh.
('The Chemical Brain' by Francis Flagg)
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'... he had tightened the chest to gain maximum pumping action from the motion of breathing.'
'...a prayer wheel swung into view and began spinning at a furious pace.'
'And are all the people willing to be governed by a machine?'
'It's an old model,' Rawlins said. 'I'm not sure what to do.'
'the robot-boss was busy at the lip of the new lode instructing and egging the men on to greater speed...'
'He rode the bike with an intense lack of physical grace...'
