Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"I think crypto will slowly percolate its way up and people will adopt it gradually as user friendly, cheap products, become available."
- Neal Stephenson
 |
| Cybrid | ||
| An organic body used by an artificial intelligence. |
This interesting word is a combination of "cyborg" and "hybrid." From the way the character is used in the novel, it appears to be purely android - no metal parts. It is an extension of an artificial intelligence.
| Cybrids are a whole different matter. Tailored from human genetic stock, they are far more human in appearance and outward behavior than androids are allowed to be. Agreements between the TechnoCore and the Hegemony allow only a handful of cybrids in existence... From an AIs perspective, the beautiful body and intriguing personality sitting across the desk from me must be merely another appendage, a remote, some what more complex but otherwise no more important than any one of ten thousand such sensors, manipulators autonomous units or other remotes.. |
| Technovelgy from Hyperion,
by Dan Simmons. Published by Doubleday in 1989 Additional resources -
|
From this passage, the cybrid appears to be little more than a remote sensor, an input/output device. However, the development of the cybrid into a more complete, independent personality is an interesting theme in the book.
I’d heard about cybrids. Who hasn’t? I once accused my first husband of being one. But I never expected to be sitting in the same room with one. Or to find it so damned attractive.
Johnny was an AI. His consciousness or ego or whatever you want to call it floated somewhere in the megadatasphere dataumplane of the TechnoCore. Like everyone else except maybe the current Senate CEO or the AIs’ garbage removers, I had no idea where the TechnoCore was. The AIs had peacefully seceded from human control more than three centuries ago—before my time—and while they continued to serve the Hegemony as allies by advising the All Thing, monitoring the dataspheres, occasionally using their predictive abilities to help us avoid major mistakes or natural disasters, the TechnoCore generally went about its own indecipherable and distinctly nonhuman business in privacy.
Fair enough, it seemed to me.
Usually AIs do business with humans and human machines via the datasphere. They can manufacture an interactive holo if they need to — I remember during the Maui-Covenant incorporation, the TechnoCore ambassadors at the treaty signing looked suspiciously like the old holo star Tyrone Bathwaite.
Johnny — his real name was a code of digits, letters, and cipher bands longer than my arm — was a cybrid.
Comment/Join this discussion ( 1 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Hyperion
More Ideas
and Technology by Dan Simmons
Tech news articles related to Hyperion
Tech news articles related to works by Dan Simmons
| AI Operates An Excavator |
| Grok And The City Fathers From 'Cities In Flight' By James Blish |
| Will An AI Found A New Religion? |
| Orwell's Nightmare Of AI-Written Novels Comes To Pass |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
'It sounds to me as though you had invented a kind of metal earthworm.'
'I don't have to tell you about the seven two-mile-diameter orbital mirrors that circulate around the satellite, making it habitable.'
'The steel tortoise gave MacKinnon a feeling of Crusoe- like independence.'
'...then back to their work, though little enough it was on these automatic cultivators.'
't came out into plain view. Darkington glimpsed a slim body and six short legs of articulated dull metal.'
'The suit stands up and starts walking, gripping me round the calves and waist, taking the bulk of my weight off my throbbing feet.'
'Internally it’s made up of millions of components, but the most important ones are the thinking and memory parts of the Mind proper.'
