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
"What television does is rent us friends and relatives who are quite satisfactory. This is quite something, to rent artificial friends and relatives right inside the house."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
 |
| Construct (Digital) | ||
| A stored version of a person's particular skills and personal approaches to problems. |
One of the greatest hackers in the novel Neuromancer is a man named McCoy Pauley, also known at the Dixie Flatline. Unfortunately, Pauley was dead at the time of the novel; his skills were available in the form of a construct, an artificial intelligence in the shape of this man's skills.
| Molly had gone back to the loft hours ago, the Flatline's construct in her green bag, and Case had been drinking steadily ever since. It was disturbing to think of the Flatline as a construct, a hardwired ROM cassette replicating a dead man's skills, obsessions, knee-jerk responses. |
| Technovelgy from Neuromancer,
by William Gibson. Published by Phantasia Press in 1984 Additional resources -
|
Pauley got his name by his remarkable capacity to persevere despite counter intrusion programs that could actually cause seizures and death. He flatlined on his EEG, and showed Case (the protagonist of the novel) the tapes. "Boy, I was daid."
See the Electronic Analogue of Living Brain from The Tunnel Under The World (1955) by Frederik Pohl.
For an elaborated (and very elegant) version of something very similar, see recorded personality, from Gibson's Mona Lisa Overdrive. See also the personality simulator from The Dosadi Experiment (1977) by Frank Herbert, the personality-construct from Killing Gramps (1988) by Ann K. Schwader and the Neuro-netsukes from Rim (1994) by Alexander Besher.
Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
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
Construct (Digital)-related
news articles:
- Roadside LED Signs May Not Be Believed
- Digital Immortality For Your Personality
- Dadbot Digital Immortality
- Steve Jobs: 'Capture The Next Aristotle - With AI'
| Light Society: Simulates Earth-Scale Society With A Billion AI Agents |
| Collective Superintelligence Is At Hand! |
| AI Operates An Excavator |
| Grok And The City Fathers From 'Cities In Flight' By James Blish |
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
'Our planes are going to start bringing in bales of discarded plastics...'
'... completely forgetting the ship at sight of the awesome figure and great head of the giant Gaut...'
'So, Ender, we will now begin your education.'
'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!'
'Forget the head atop it, the legs below, feet, arms, hands. It compels erasure.'
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair or to perch on a flagpole in imitation of a giant bird, even in the windy city of Chicago.'
'The thirty-odd miles of The Factory’s circumference...'
'Wandering mines, you took them out on the edge of the desert, set them down and activated them.'
