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The Ego Machine
The Ego Machine
When a slightly mad robot drunk on AC, wants you to join an experiment in optimum ecology—don't do it! After all, who wants to argue like Disraeli or live like Ivan the Terrible?
Book Excerpt
e at the desk-lamp. "F(t)--I mean, if you counted the kappa waves of my radio-atomic brain now, you'd be amazed how the frequency's increased." He paused thoughtfully. "F(t)," he added.
Moving quite slowly, like a man under water, Martin lifted his glass and drank whiskey. Then, cautiously, he looked up at the robot again.
"F(t)--" he said, paused, shuddered, and drank again. That did it. "I'm drunk," he said with an air of shaken relief. "That must be it. I was almost beginning to believe--"
"Oh, nobody believes I'm a robot at first," the robot said. "You'll notice I showed up in a movie lot, where I wouldn't arouse suspicion. I'll appear to Ivan Vasilovich in an alchemist's lab, and he'll jump to the conclusive I'm an automaton. Which, of course, I am. Then there's a Uighur on my list--I'll appear to him in a shaman's hut and he'll assume I'm a devil. A matter of ecologicologic."
"Then you're a devil?" Martin inquired, seizing on the only plaus
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2.7
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I don't get it.
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Science takes a small vacation in this SF story; it seems not to matter at all. Accept the premise of mind augmentation and enjoy the story.
08/30/2012
Kuttner writes a charming novella that reminds me a bit of Rudy Rucker's science fiction. Entirely character based and very psychological, with only mild science fictional elements. A good taste of what Kuttner's about. As one of the transcribers noted in the header for the book, "When a slightly mad robot drunk on AC wants you to join an experiment in optimum ecology--don't do it!"
09/30/2010
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