Alfred Bester - The Computer Connection

“You should know,” the Syndicate said contemptuously. “ We know where we are. You people prove the truth of an ancient maxim: Never show a fool or a child a thing half-finished. We at I.G. Farben are neither foolish nor childish. Come to us, Dr. Guess. If these fools attempt legal action, we’ll know how to handle it.”

Fee-5, who had been standing quietly behind the workbench with a careful ear cocked, said, “The stockholders are confused because you haven’t told them what results you expect from the research, Dr. Guess. That’s what they want to know.”

“But I can’t tell them. This is an Emergent program.”

“Ah!” Edison was genuinely with it. “Very true. You had better explain, Dr. Guess. Permit me.” He stood up. “Ladies and gentlemen, please listen to your project scientist. He will answer your crucial question.” They shut up. Authority.

“A basic concept in research,” the Chief said carefully, “is the question of whether the constituents of the experiments will yield Resultant or Emergent finds. In essence this is like bringing two people together. Will they become friends, lovers, enemies? How do you predict it? You all know that it can’t be predicted.”

The Ms. stockholder sobbed.

“In a Rusultant experiment the outcome can be foretold from the very nature of the constituents. There is no new and unforeseen set of properties arising from the combination of the constituents.”

Edison (Professor Crookes) was nodding and beaming. I had to work hard to follow the exposition and I doubted whether the U-Con heads were twigging at all, but they seemed to be impressed.

“The nature of an Emergent cannot be foretold from the nature of its several constituents as they were prior to combination. The nature of an Emergent can only be discovered through experiment and observation, and no one can possibly foretell it. It springs up, new and unexpected, to the surprise of everybody.”

“Example,” Edison called.

“Here is an example. We know the constituents of the human animal. From these constituents is it possible to predict the phenomenon of abstract thought? Is abstraction Resultant or Emergent?”

“Too abstruse,” I called in XX. “A simple, graphic example which even heads can see and believe.”

Sitting Bull thought hard for a moment. Then he turned to Fee. “Nitric acid. Hydrochloric. Three beakers. Three slugs of gold.”

While she scurried to the stock shelves he smiled at the house and said, “I’m going to give you a simple demonstration. I will show you that neither nitric acid nor hydrochloric acid attack the noble metals. Their properties are known. And yet when they are combined they form an Emergent called aqua regia, which does consume the noble metals. Early chemists had no way of predicting this. Today, with our knowledge of ion transfer, we do understand and can predict, particularly when we’re assisted by computer analysis. This is what I mean when I say the new cryogenic research is Emergent. Nothing can be foretold. Computers can’t help us because a computer is no better than its stored data and we have none available yet. Thank you, Fee.”

He set up the three beakers, dropped a chunk of gold into each, and unstoppered the acid bottles. “Watch closely, please. Gold in each beaker. Hydrochloric acid in the first. Nitric acid in the second. Aqua regia, the royal water, in the—”

He was interrupted by a blast of coughings, gaspings, stranglings. It sounded like fifty people were drowning. In half a minute the entire audience had stampeded out of the laboratory; only Edison, the Syndicate, and myself were left with the Chief. Sequoya looked at us in bewilderment. “What happened?” he asked in XX.

Glassware began to crash down as their metal supports gave way. Window blinds and valence and spectra charts fell with a clatter. The light fixtures dropped with sizzling short-circuit flares, and we were in pitch darkness. “What happened?” Guess repeated.

“What happened? I can tell you what happened.” Edison barked with laughter. “That damn fool girl brought you fuming nitric acid. Fuming. And the fumes have turned this room into one big nitric acid bath. Everything’s being eaten away.”

“Did you see her do it? Did you see the label? Why didn’t you stop her?” The Chief sounded furious.

“No. No, and no. I’ve deduced it. Not an Emergent, just a Resultant.”

“Dear God! Dear God! I’ve ruined the whole pitch to the U-Con crowd.” Despairing.

Suddenly I did the take and let out a yell.

“What’s the matter, Guig?” the Group called. “Are you hurt?”

“No, you damn fools, and that’s why I’m hollering. I’m Grand Guignol triumphant. Don’t you understand? Why didn’t he know it was fuming nitric acid? Why didn’t he choke on the fumes? Why isn’t he eaten away now? Why wasn’t he forced to ran out with Fee and the rest? Think about it while I revel.”

After a long moment, the Syndicate said, “I never believed in your campaign, Guig. I apologize. It was a million to one against, so I hope you’ll pardon me.”

“You’re pardoned. You’re all pardoned. We’ve got another Molecular Man. We’ve got a brand new beautiful Moleman. Still there, Uncas?”

“I can’t understand a word you’re saying.”

“Take a deep breath of nitric. Belt down a stiff shot. Do anything you like to celebrate, because nothing, but nothing you eat, drink, or breathe can kill you. Welcome to the Group.”

And he disappeared. How it happened: We had to get out of the acid bath before everything was eaten off us — rings, watches, bridgework, fillings, the portable lab Hiawatha carried inside his tutta. There was a crowd of dumbfounded stockholders milling outside the laboratory sounding like victims of a coryza plague, and we got separated. When we finally got together again, clustered around Fee-5, the Chief was gone and there was no locating him in the crowd. We hollered for him in XX. N. Fee began to panic.

I gave her a look. Again no time for cosseting. “Where can we talk in private? Sacred private?”

She feathered her vanes and landed again. “The high vacuum chamber.”

“R. Go.”

She led us on a twisted course to a giant sphere, opened a sequence of submarine hatches, and we were inside the sphere keeping company with half a space capsule.

“High vacuum circuitry check,” she said.

“Lovely scene for criminal assault.”

She gave me a look, the equal of mine, and it began to dawn on me that I’d better mind my manners with this new-risen phoenix.

I said to the Syndicate, “That was a lovely performance. Thanks.”

“Ah, yes. To make someone want something you must show them that someone else wants it more. Elementary.”

“By any chance was anything you said true?”

“But it was all truth.”

“You represent the independent sovereign state of I.G. Farben?”

“I own fifty-one percent of it.”

“How much of the whole world do you own, Greek?”

“Fourteen point nine one seven percent, but who counts?”

“My God, you’re rich. Am I rich?”

“You have eleven million six hundred thousand one hundred and three. By my standards you are poor.”

Fee-5 let out a little moan and I relented. “R,” I said. “It’s a simple problem. The poor bastard has had too many shocks in one day and he’s run off in all directions. All we have to do is find him and cool him. Now he may be somewhere in the JPL complex or at the university. Your job, Fee. Find him.”

“I can if he’s anywhere.”

“R. Let’s hope he’s somewhere. Now, he may have scuttled for the tepee, but there’s the problem of the wolves. We’d better let M’bantu handle that. On the other hand he may have levanted to a Particle Bio research center for technical advice. Ed?”