It Started 25 Years Ago, When I

Pain Is An Interesting And Off-putting Thing. Few If Any Things In Life Concentrate Our Attention So Completely And Terribly, And Few Things Are More Boring To Listen To Or Read About.

Once Upon A Time ... The Only Autonomous Intelligences We Humans Knew Of Were Us Humans. We Thought Then That If Humankind Ever Devised Another Intelligence That It Would Be The Result Of A Huge Project ... A Great Mass Of Silicon And Ancient Transistors And Chips And Circuit Boards ... A Machine With Lots Of Networking Circuits, In Other Words, Aping-if You Will Pardon The Expression-the Human Brain In Form And Function. Of Course, Ais Did Not Evolve That Way. They Sort Of Slipped Into Existence When We Humans Were Looking The Other Way.

There Were Reprints Of American Editorials. Liberals Saw It As A Resurgence Of Social Protest And Decried The Discrimination, Poverty, And Hunger That Had Provoked It. Conservative Columnists Acidly Pointed Out That Hungry People Don't Steal Stereo Systems First And Called For A Crackdown In Law Enforcement. All Of The Reasoned Editorials Sounded Hollow In Light Of The Perverse Randomness Of The Event. It Was As If Only A Thin Wall Of Electric Lighting Protected The Great Cities Of The World From Total Barbarism.

War Must Never Be A Condition But, Rather, A Temporary Scourge Which We Suffer As A Child Does A Fever, Knowing That Health Follows The Long Night Of Pain And That Peace Is Health.

I Know What Cancer Was. How Is It Like Humankind?" Sek Hardeen's Perfectly Modulated, Softly Accented Tones Showed A Hint Of Agitation. "we Have Spread Out Through The Galaxy Like Cancer Cells Through A Living Body, Duré. We Multiply Without Thought To The Countless Life Forms That Must Die Or Be Pushed Aside So That We May Breed And Flourish. We Eradicate Competing Forms Of Intelligent Life.