TOS' hostility toward advanced computers

[Noname Given]

One cannot help but notice that TOS seems to have a distinct hostility toward computers and advanced machines. They are NEVER shown to be useful and are usually depicted as a threat to human life. This stands in stark contrast to all of the later series who had a much more favorable approach to technology.

Most intelligent machines were depicted as malevolent or at the veryleast a malevolent influence

Nomad
M5
The Doomsday Machine
Landru
Vaal

Even Kirk's personal computer was, with its female personality, was depicted as an annoyance. This of course does not include the various androids (which are quietly forgotten in on TNG in order to make Data special).

Why do you think that the show seemd so hostile toward machines? was it simply a lack of familiarity with the technology? (i.e. by the time of TNG people were familiar with computers and thus less afraid of them).

In that it really is a product of its time in that the supposed 'replacement' of man by machines (ie that automated and intelligent machines would take over the majority of jobs done by man) was an issue on the minds of many as automation and computer technology advanced. So, it's not surprising that the theme showed up in a lot of stories (and not only in Star Trek - take a look at The Twilight Zone too.)

 

[Anticitizen]

You forgot the Terminator movies. Even Gibson's Neuromancer plays off of the threat of a dangerous AI.

Yeah, in Neuromancer the threat is really as-read, though. Given his overall rather intense visualization of that world the fact (IMAO) that there is never any sense of real danger in unleashing the A.I.s is kind of a flaw in the narrative.

And in fact once they're "liberated" he has to move Wintermute and Neuromancer off-stage pretty much altogether in the sequels - really, the Hollywood melodrama of "Terminator" or "Colossus" would be a poor fit for Gibson's sensibilities.

I never got the sense that there necessarily was an inherent danger in the conjunction of Wintermute and Neuromancer. The Turing Cops were there to stop it, of course, and the AI was certainly... ruthless in obtaining its goals... but Case didn't seem necessarily frightened by the prospect.

It was a more general fear, I think, of what the AI would be capable of.

Gibson's my favorite author, btw.

 

[CoveTom]

...which in reality was IBM, Arthur C Clarke the writer simply took the next letter of the alphabet and so forth, as not to be sued by the computer giant...

Actually, that's a myth that others came up with. Arthur C. Clarke has repeatedly said that it was a mere coincidence that HAL is one off from IBM and that had he realized that at the time, he would have changed it.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Gibson is one of my favorite sf authors as well - it's true, though, that the storylines of his novels are little more than launching points for his characters to travel around and experience the world that he's visualizing for the reader.

"Neuromancer" got me back into reading and actually having a certain suspension-of-disbelief about sf after a couple of fallow decades.

Gibson's introduction to the 20th anniversary edition of the book is a good read too - he mulls over some of the more obvious ways in which the book has dated, at least as far as the specifics are concerned. The opening sequence of Case looking desperately for a pay phone kiosk in Chiba city, for instance...

 

[Neopeius]

Gibson's introduction to the 20th anniversary edition of the book is a good read too - he mulls over some of the more obvious ways in which the book has dated, at least as far as the specifics are concerned. The opening sequence of Case looking desperately for a pay phone kiosk in Chiba city, for instance...

Well, if there's any place you'll still find a green pay phone, it's Japan

Of course, they also have the most advanced cel phones in the world, too.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

He also remarked upon the fact that the "color of TV tuned to a dead channel" doesn't conjure what it did in those days...

 

[Brutal Strudel]

I rate Gibson among my top 5 or so faves in SF too, for all the reasons you list, Dennis. I was lucky enough to catch him read at the Philadelphia Free Library last Summer and get an autograph on my copy of Spook Country. He's one of those few writers of whom I can say I've read virtually all his stuff.

 

[Anticitizen]

Same here. And I re-read most of it every year or two.

 

[NIUPonyBoy]

Star Trek was so forward thinking, they were anticipating all the problems with Microsoft products!!

Yup because Cpt. Archer told Cpt. Kirk about how the NX was still running on Vista. lol

 

[stoneagepunk]

In the ultimate computer spock says something like he likes to work with computers but he does not wish to serve under them.
Very prophetic I find.