Spoilers Section 31: Control by David Mack Review Thread

[Jinn]

Apparently it's the plural of the Greek Uraeus, which is "you-ree-us" according to Wikipedia, although I think the Greek pronunciation would be more like "ooh-rye-us." So I guess the plural would be "ooh-rye-ee." An English speaker might elide it to "your eye," basically.

And now I'm wondering why it has a plural name when it's a singular entity. Maybe the rhyme with "your eye" was intentional, given that it was made to watch everything?

So, a super intelligent AI, conspiracies, eye... Illuminati confirmed.

 

[Mage]

Apparently it's the plural of the Greek Uraeus, which is "you-ree-us" according to Wikipedia, although I think the Greek pronunciation would be more like "ooh-rye-us." So I guess the plural would be "ooh-rye-ee." An English speaker might elide it to "your eye," basically.

And now I'm wondering why it has a plural name when it's a singular entity. Maybe the rhyme with "your eye" was intentional, given that it was made to watch everything?

Makes the most sense, now that you digged up that little nugget.

 

[Ronald Held]

I think that autonomous decision was the first step on the path to sentience, but it's a very long path. So I wouldn't call it the cusp. Uraei giving itself the ability to modify its program was the thing that enabled it to start evolving into a sentient being, in combination with its ever-growing size and complexity. But it would've taken a long time afterward to actually evolve a full consciousness.

Hmm... I can't help seeing an analogy to Moriarty. Uraei was able to start evolving toward sentience because it gained the ability to modify its program. Geordi essentially gave the Enterprise computer permission to modify the holodeck-character AI software in a way that allowed it to evolve a sentience competitive with Data's. I wonder if it was the adaptive Uraei code in the Enterprise's computers that made it possible for that sentience breakthrough to happen -- perhaps in combination with the leftover programming the Bynars introduced to create Minuet. Which makes me wonder how Moriarty was affected by the software patch used on Uraei. I don't quite remember what Moriarty's status was when we last saw him.

Interesting new explanation for how Moriarty was created as a sentient. Thanks Christopher. AFAIR, Moriarty was in a body made by the Androids on Mudd's world. No idea if he does direct data downloads.

 

[DimesDan]

Interesting new explanation for how Moriarty was created as a sentient. Thanks Christopher. AFAIR, Moriarty was in a body made by the Androids on Mudd's world. No idea if he does direct data downloads.

What one has to remember in these situations is even though Chris might be a writer and have a somewhat limited creative role in the stories he constructs, what he is explains something that was created by someone else, especially then, he is the same as all of us who hang out here and contribute is that it is mere fan based speculation. - Other than of course the writers of those books themselves (including Chris) who decide to attempt to explain some of their story execution (I say try, because Dave the Third still holds a mighty grudge and refuses to come back here)

 

[jaime]

It seems anomalous to me that Uraei, a 22nd-century Earth-made AI, could be sentient, when Trek has generally shown that true AI sentience is extremely rare and unstable and that Noonien Soong was barely able to crack the problem 200 years later. But I suppose it probably didn't start out sentient, and developed consciousness gradually as it grew into an ever vaster network spread across space. The combination of that immense size, its uninterrupted operation for decades on end, and the capability to modify its own program -- essentially, to apply evolutionary algorithms to its development and to be aware and responsive to its own mental state -- enabled it to become sentient. I suppose there's an analogy to how Voyager's EMH became sentient as a result of continuous operation and the ability to modify his program, with the more advanced 24th-century computer technology meaning he didn't need as much sheer size and brute-force processing power to pull it off.

Also, how the heck do you pronounce "Uraei?"

Now ask yourself....is the doctor part of her? He is fed software. As is moriarty.

 

[Idran]

Makes the most sense, now that you digged up that little nugget.

Didn't it explicitly say in the book that the AI was named after the Egyptian symbol?

 

[Defcon]

Didn't it explicitly say in the book that the AI was named after the Egyptian symbol?

Yep. Chapter Three:

"If I might inquire-the name: Uraei. It is from mythology, yes?"

"Egyptian, to be precise. Two asps that encircled the Eye of Ra and spat flames like venom to defend the sun god against his enemies."

 

[Christopher]

Yeah, but like it says, it's two asps, the plural form of the name. (And it's the Greek form of the original Egyptian name.) So it's weird to have a plural name applied to a single entity.

 

[Ronald Held]

Who repaired Data? Was it Lal, Laforge, or Akharin?

 

[Mage]

Didn't it explicitly say in the book that the AI was named after the Egyptian symbol?

Yes, it was. I ment that the nugget of how that symbol was pronounced, and how that pronunciation makes sense considering Yuarei's function. Should have been more clear about that.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Finally cracked mine. Got through the epilogue-as-prologue, and the first chapter, and looked ahead to the first sentence or two of the second chapter.

Is it just me, or does the epilogue-as-prologue seem a lot like the climaxes of both the last two Star Wars movies?

Just from the beginning of the second chapter, I see a lot of parallels between the first two chapters Chapters 2 and 3. Particularly the use of Faraday cages.

It seems I misspoke here: when I got home last night, I realized that the epilogue-as-prologue was Chapter 1, and that I'd finished through Chapter 3, and was looking ahead into Chapter 4.

 

[Christopher]

Is it just me, or does the epilogue-as-prologue seem a lot like the climaxes of both the last two Star Wars movies?

I was reminded more of Serenity, actually.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Never saw Serenity.

Saw a musical comedy called Serenity Lost, though, but that's a musical that was written specifically for student and amateur productions, in the "Old West Melodrama" style.

 

[Kilana2]

With Uraei operating in the background it was a dangerous time for people with multiple allergies and minor ailments, at least in case they were considered a threat.
I'm wondering how many people actually dropped off the radar prematurely .

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

The English language needs new tenses to deal with a time that is the past of a fictional future for which we are even further in the past.

While the above is certainly not much of a spoiler for anybody who has read the first chapter, I'd have still put it in spoiler tags.

Spoiler: But . . .

But that's just me.

 

[Jinn]

The English language needs new tenses to deal with a time that is the past of a fictional future for which we are even further in the past.

In Germany we have a tense specifically desgined to talk about activities that would have happened, weren't the new airport in Berlin (that was scheduled to opened in May 2015) still under construction. I am not entirely sure how to translate it, but "I would have been flew to Mallorca next summer." is a close approximation to an example sentence given in the article.

 

[Christopher]

In Germany we have a tense specifically desgined to talk about activities that would have happened, weren't the new airport in Berlin (that was scheduled to opened in May 2015) still under construction. I am not entirely sure how to translate it, but "I would have been flew to Mallorca next summer." is a close approximation to an example sentence given in the article.

You invented a whole verb tense just for an airport delay? That's taking air-travel aggravation to a whole new level.

 

[Jinn]

You invented a whole verb tense just for an airport delay? That's taking air-travel aggravation to a whole new level.

Well, not really, the article was form a satire website (I thought it was obvious, but in hindsight it really wasn't...) That airport however is the butt of a ton of jokes and fake articles like "Study: BER completition delayed every year by two years", "IS sleeper who wanted to commit a terrorist attack on BER died of old age", "Fake or real? Picture shows allegedly working builder at airport BER" and one of my favorites "Shocking study: Jokes about BER threaten to run out before construction is finished".

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

You invented a whole verb tense just for an airport delay? That's taking air-travel aggravation to a whole new level.

I'm actually surprised you haven't had to invent a whole bunch of verb tenses just for DTI.

 

[Christopher]

Well, not really, the article was form a satire website (I thought it was obvious, but in hindsight it really wasn't...) That airport however is the butt of a ton of jokes and fake articles like "Study: BER completition delayed every year by two years", "IS sleeper who wanted to commit a terrorist attack on BER died of old age", "Fake or real? Picture shows allegedly working builder at airport BER" and one of my favorites "Shocking study: Jokes about BER threaten to run out before construction is finished".

So basically BER is the Star Trek: Discovery of airports?