Two Faces of Tomorrow

"HESPER machines were learning machines, designed to be capable of identifying connections between previously nonrelated factors in order to solve new problems or to solve old ones in newer and better ways."

This sounds great, until the machines in question decide that using conventional earth-moving equipment to shift an obstruction is an outdated fashion and dropping bombs on the area is a quicker way of getting the job done, as the opening of this book shows. The operator said "absolute best possible" to the priority request and "No, just get rid of it!" when asked if there were any constraints. HESPER (Heuristic Self Programming Routine) computers were supposed to learn, but not to cross-connect - so in theory, the machine responsible for managing obstructions shouldn't have access to the bombs...

"If they've been putting a potential lunatic in charge of the planet, they
want to know about it and quick."

So something needs to be done. The current computers are going a bit bonkers, but will the new ones they're working on be any better? The current iteration of the technology says no - the computer isn't smart enough to fry an egg (litterally). so, this story shows a model scenario where a smart computer is allowed to run a planet, on a microcosmic scale, then attacked to see just how dangerous it can be.

"When you buy a house, you know you may have to spend money to repair it one day. You don't go live in a tree instead in order to avoid the risk.
You accept the risk because the benefits outweigh it."

Of course people have to live with this computer, just to make the experience authentic, which is quite a scary thought given the way the first bombs fell. It is a neat idea to play with, and Hogan takes good advantage of it in many ways.

I feel a bit of a curmudgeon, always pointing out flaws in these books; who am I to critique? But then again I may decide to reread one day and want to know what annoyed me, so...

Ron, as a character, somewhat annoyed me. He's supposed to be working on this stuff and yet he has the attention span and temper of a two-year-old denied a chocolate bar. His surname is Stokes and he sure gets Stoked, which seemed quite discordant given the general theme of the book.

Secondly, the whole angle of planning to attack the computer seems a little silly when the Humans have given the computer the intelligence to adapt, the facilities to make vehicles, weapons and almost anything else it needs, then to place cameras all over the Human habitat. The point is to make things speed up - see if the computer will retaliate now with provocation rather than having it run the planet for a decade to find it slowly going mad - but it's almost so deliberate it's overdone.

And finally, the ending, though neat and tidy, sort of got around the edges of the problem without giving much of a concrete solution. Sort of a Deus ex computer program approach, really, which detracted. Still, there were some great bits (the whole sixteenth chapter was very good), and if it's in your field, I'd recommend it just for completeness.