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"...the space defense initiative drove the USSR bankrupt, and it originated at my house in Tarzana."
- Larry Niven
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| Mechanical Jokester | ||
| A vast computer system learns about humor. |
This is one of a series of stories by Asimov about Multivac.
| "Because I've heard him telling jokes to Multivac." "Oh, no." "Accidentally. I walked in on him and he threw me out. He was savage. He's usually good-natured enough, and I consider it a bad sign that he was so upset at the intrusion. But the fact remains that he was telling a joke to Multivac, and I'm convinced it was one of a series." "But why?" Whistler shrugged and rubbed a hand fiercely across his chin. "I have thought about that. I think he's trying to build up a store of jokes in Multivac's memory banks in order to get back new variations. You see what I mean? He's planning a mechanical jokester, so that he can have an infinite number of jokes at hand and never fear running out." |
| Technovelgy from Jokester,
by Isaac Asimov. Published by Infinity Science Fiction in 1956 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the robot comedian from William Tenn's 1951 story The Jester.
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'The king, an old hand in the running of tyrannies, instantly grasped the directions...'
'...a hemispherical force field enclosing his head.'
'Then he became aware of a gentle pressure pushing him away from the ship.'
'And now they wre busily transforming all their companions, and so on, and so on...'
'Why, a clockwork dancer, or, better still, one that would go by electricity and never run down...'
'Maybe the individual intelligence of each Cubic pools into a group intelligence...'
