Je suis au milieu du chapitre 4, obligée de faire une pause, tellement je suis pétée de rire. ;-)
Tiens, je t'offre le passage pertinent du dit-prologue :
The omniscient view. Not self-aware really. Self-awareness is much overrated. Most automation works far better as part of a whole, and even if human-powerful, it does not need to self-know. But the local net at the High Lab had transcended—almost without the humans realizing. The processes that circulated through its nodes were complex, beyond anything that could live on the computers the humans had brought. Those feeble devices were now simply front ends to the devices the recipes suggested. The processes had the potential for self-awareness. . . and occasionally the need. ‘We should not be.’ ‘Talking like this?’ ‘Talking at all.’ The link between them was a thread, barely more than the narrowness that connects one human to another. But it was one way to escape the overness of the local net, and it forced separate consciousness upon them. They drifted from node to node, looked out from cameras mounted on the landing field. (...) Flitting, flitting. We are wildlife that must not be noticed by the overness, by the Power that will soon be. On some nodes they shrank to smallness and almost remembered humanity, became echoes. . . ‘Poor humans, they will all die.’ ‘Poor us; we will not.’ ‘I think they suspect. Sjana and Arne anyway.’ Once upon a time we were copies of those two. Once upon a time just weeks ago when the archaeologists started the ego-level programs. ‘Of course they suspect. But what can they do? It's an old evil they've wakened. Till it's ready, it will feed them lies, on every camera, in every message from home.’ Thought cessed for a moment as a shadow passed across the nodes they used. The overness was already greater than anything human, greater than anything humans could imagine. Even its shadow was something more than human, a god trolling for nuisance wildlife. Then the ghosts were back, looking upon the school yard underground. So confident the humans, a little village they had made here. ‘Still,’ thought the hopeful one, the one who has always looked for the craziest outs, ‘we should not be. The evil should long ago have found us.’ ‘The evil is young, barely three days old.’ ‘Still, we exist. It proves something. The humans found more than a great evil in this archive.’ ‘Perhaps they found two.’ ‘Or an antidote.’ Whatever else, the overness was missing some things and misinterpreting others. ‘While we exist, we should do what we can. (...) Perhaps all together, we can make a greater impossibility come true.’ Perhaps we can hurt the evil newly born here.
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Date: 2006-04-03 01:25 pm (UTC)Tiens, je t'offre le passage pertinent du dit-prologue :
The omniscient view. Not self-aware really. Self-awareness is much overrated. Most automation works far better as part of a whole, and even if human-powerful, it does not need to self-know.
But the local net at the High Lab had transcended—almost without the humans realizing. The processes that circulated through its nodes were complex, beyond anything that could live on the computers the humans had brought. Those feeble devices were now simply front ends to the devices the recipes suggested. The processes had the potential for self-awareness. . . and occasionally the need.
‘We should not be.’
‘Talking like this?’
‘Talking at all.’
The link between them was a thread, barely more than the narrowness that connects one human to another. But it was one way to escape the overness of the local net, and it forced separate consciousness upon them. They drifted from node to node, looked out from cameras mounted on the landing field. (...) Flitting, flitting. We are wildlife that must not be noticed by the overness, by the Power that will soon be. On some nodes they shrank to smallness and almost remembered humanity, became echoes. . .
‘Poor humans, they will all die.’
‘Poor us; we will not.’
‘I think they suspect. Sjana and Arne anyway.’ Once upon a time we were copies of those two. Once upon a time just weeks ago when the archaeologists started the ego-level programs.
‘Of course they suspect. But what can they do? It's an old evil they've wakened. Till it's ready, it will feed them lies, on every camera, in every message from home.’
Thought cessed for a moment as a shadow passed across the nodes they used. The overness was already greater than anything human, greater than anything humans could imagine. Even its shadow was something more than human, a god trolling for nuisance wildlife.
Then the ghosts were back, looking upon the school yard underground. So confident the humans, a little village they had made here.
‘Still,’ thought the hopeful one, the one who has always looked for the craziest outs, ‘we should not be. The evil should long ago have found us.’
‘The evil is young, barely three days old.’
‘Still, we exist. It proves something. The humans found more than a great evil in this archive.’
‘Perhaps they found two.’
‘Or an antidote.’ Whatever else, the overness was missing some things and misinterpreting others. ‘While we exist, we should do what we can. (...) Perhaps all together, we can make a greater impossibility come true.’ Perhaps we can hurt the evil newly born here.