Analog SF, March 2003 by Dell Magazine Authors

Author:Dell Magazine Authors [Authors, Dell Magazine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Magazine, 2012
Publisher: www.Fictionwise.com
Published: 2001-07-03T04:00:00+00:00

The Human Dress by David Alexander

A crew has certain responsibilities toward its passengers—even if there's some doubt about who they are.

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Ignoring the odor of Cookie's stuffed peppers that had overpowered the mess room's ventilators, I poked a few more times at the fragments on my tray, then got up to grab a last cup of tea before going back on watch. The deck plates vibrated faintly with the dull hum induced by the Orion's engines running only slightly out of phase. When I turned away from the dispenser I noticed Chief Engineer Moahmar Califa sharing a table in the corner with our sole passenger, a spindly academic by the name of Einot Kairee. Moahmar caught my gaze and waved me over.

“Professor, you know our First Officer I think, Harry Dondero.” Califa's huge hands gestured up at me. Kairee swiveled his head and blinked twice rapidly as if puzzled by my presence, then gave his chin a slight bob.

“Uhh, certainly, of course, please join us, Mr. Dondero.”

Moahmar twisted the table's third seat on its gimbal and, after a half second's hesitation, I sat, placing my chipped white mug in front of me.

“Professor Kairee was just explaining the benefits of manufactured minds,” Califa said easily, a glint of suppressed emotion flicking behind his eyes.

“I didn't think that they had ever gotten those things to work.”

“The Professor was speaking theoretically.” A thin smile creased Califa's lips.

“Is that your specialty, Professor, neural net design?”

“Actually,” Kairee said, drawing out the syllables, “my primary training was in psychology with a specialization in emotion stimulus-response mapping. I've come to my interest in manufactured minds quite legitimately as an aspect of the investigation of the role of emotion on thought.”

“It's been my experience,” Califa said, smiling, “that the more emotion there is in any situation the quicker thought goes out the hatch.”

“Is that your point, Professor, that the benefit of manufactured minds is that their judgments aren't clouded by emotion?”

Kairee frowned and gave his head a little shake. “I don't believe that any thinking entity can survive without emotion. My thesis is that the presence of emotion is vital, a sine qua non. Without it the organism, any organism, dies.” Kairee stared at Califa belligerently for half a breath then lowered his eyes and slouched back in his seat.

“We're still speaking theoretically then, I assume, because as I recall,” I said, pausing to take a sip of tea, “most of the manufactured minds self-destructed within a year of being turned on.”

“That's one way to put it,” Califa snorted. “Most went catatonic, and a few went just plain crazy. Remember the experimental shuttle on the Marsport-Deimos run that they stuck one in? The thing ran fine for about a year—then it kamikazied straight for the Juno Queen. If the meteor deflector hadn't made a lucky hit on the shuttle's thruster control it would have turned the Queen into a floating pile of scrap. And what did the manufacturer have to say about it? ‘Equipment malfunction of undetermined origin.

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