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发信人: by (春天的小懒虫), 信区: SFworld
标  题: 2010 (35)
发信站: 哈工大紫丁香 (Wed Oct  6 15:09:46 1999), 转信

                     35
                  Rehabilitation

The uproar of Earth was comfortably muted, across the
millions of kilometres of space. Leonov's crew watched,
with fascination yet with a certain detachment, the debates
in the United Nations, the interviews with distinguished
scientists, the theorizing of the news commentators, the
matter-of-fact yet wildly conflicting accounts of the UFO
contactees. They could contribute nothing to the brouhaha,
for they had witnessed no further manifestations of any
kind. Zagadka, alias Big Brother, remained as blankly in-
different to their presence as ever. And that was indeed an
ironic situation; they had come all the way from Earth to
solve a mystery - and it looked as if the answer might be
right back at their starting point.
  For the first time, they felt grateful for the slow velocity
of light, and the two-hour delay that made live interviews
impossible on the Earth-Jupiter circuit. Even so, Floyd was
badgered by so many media requests that he finally went on
strike. Nothing more remained to be said, and he had said it
at least a dozen times.
  Besides, there was still much work to be done. Leonov
had to be prepared for the long journey home, so that it
would be ready to depart immediately when the launch
window opened. The timing was not at all critical; even if
they missed by a month, that would merely prolong the
trip. Chandra, Curnow, and Floyd would not even notice as
they slept their way toward the Sun; but the rest of the crew
was grimly determined to leave just as soon as the laws of
celestial mechanics permitted.
  Discovery still posed many problems. The ship had barely
sufficient propellant for the return to Earth, even if it left
much later than Leonov and flew a minimum-energy orbit -
which would take almost three years. And this would be
possible only if Hal could be reliably programmed to carry
out the mission with no human intervention except long-
range monitoring. Without his cooperation, Discovery
would have to be abandoned once again.
  It had been fascinating - indeed, deeply moving - to
watch the steady regrowth of Hal's personality, from brain-
damaged child to puzzled adolescent and at length to slight-
ly condescending adult. Although he knew that such
anthropomorphic  labels were highly misleading, Floyd
found it quite impossible to avoid them.
  And there were times when he felt that the whole situa-
tion had a haunting familiarity. How often he had seen
videodramas in which disturbed youngsters were straight-
ened out by all-wise descendants of the legendary Sigmund
Freud! Essentially the same story was being played out in
the shadow of Jupiter.
  The electronic psychoanalysis had proceeded at a speed
totally beyond human comprehension as repair and di-
agnostic programs flashed through Hal's circuits at billions
of bits a second, pinpointing possible malfunctions and
correcting them. Though most of these programs had been
tested in advance on Hal's twin, SAL 9000, the impossibility
of a real-time dialogue between the two computers was a
serious handicap. Sometimes hours were wasted when it
proved necessary to check back with Earth at a critical point
in the therapy.
  For despite all Chandra's work, the computer's rehabi-
litation was still far from complete. Hal exhibited numerous
idiosyncrasies and nervous tics, sometimes even ignoring
spoken words - though he would always acknowledge
keyboard inputs from anyone. In the reverse direction, his
outputs were even more eccentric.
  There were times when he would give verbal replies, but
would not display them visually. At other times he would
do both - but refused to print hard copy. He would give no
excuses or explanations - not even the stubbornly impene-
trable `I prefer not to' of Melville's autistic scrivener,
Bartelby.
  However, he was not actively disobedient so much as
reluctant, and only where certain tasks were concerned. It
was always possible to win his cooperation eventually - `to
talk him out of his sulk', as Curnow put it neatly
  It was not surprising that Dr Chandra was beginning to
show the strain. On one celebrated occasion when Max
Brailovsky innocently revived an old canard, he almost lost
his temper.
  `Is it true, Dr Chandra, that you chose the name Hal to be
one step ahead of IBM?'
  `Utter nonsense! Half of us come from IBM and we've
been trying to stamp out that story for years. I thought that
by now every intelligent person knew that H-A-L is derived
from Heuristic Algorithmic.'
  Afterward, Max swore that he could distinctly hear the
capital letters.
  In Floyd's private opinion, the odds were at least fifty to
one against flying Discovery safely back to Earth. And then
Chandra came to him with an extraordinary proposal.
  `Dr Floyd, can I have a word with you?'
  After all the weeks and shared experiences, Chandra was
still as formal as ever-not only to Floyd, but to all the crew.
He would not even address the ship's baby, Zenia, without
the prefix 'ma'am'.
  `Of course, Chandra. What is it?'
  `I've virtually completed the programming for the six
most probable variations on the Hohmann return orbit.
Five have now been run on a simulation, without any
problems.'
  `Excellent. I'm sure that no one else on Earth - in the
Solar System - could have done it.'
  `Thank you. However, you know so well as I do that it's
impossible to program for every eventuality. Hal may - will
- function perfectly, and will be able to handle any reason-
able emergency. But all sorts of trivial accidents - minor
equipment failures that could be fixed with a screwdriver,
broken wires, stuck switches - could leave him helpless and
abort the whole mission.'
  `You're absolutely right, of course, and it's been worry-
ing me. But what can we do about it?'
  `It's really quite simple. I'd like to stay with Discovery.'
  Floyd's   immediate  reaction  was  that  Chandra  had  gone
crazy.  On  second  thoughts,  perhaps  he was only half crazy.
It  might  indeed  make all the difference between success and
failure  to  have  a  human  being  -  that superb all-purpose
trouble-shooting  and  repair  device  -  aboard Discovery for
the  long  voyage  back  to  Earth. But  the  objections were
completely overwhelming.
  `It's  an  interesting  idea,'  Floyd  answered with extreme
caution,  `and  I  certainly  appreciate  your  enthusiasm. But
have  you  thought of all the problems? That was a silly thing
to  say;  Chandra  would  have  all  the answers already filed
away for immediate retrieval.
  `You'll  be  on  your  own for over three years! Suppose you
had an accident or a medical emergency?'
  `That's a risk I'm prepared to take.'
  `And   what   about   food,   water?   Leonov  doesn't  have
enough to spare.'
  `I've  checked  Discovery's recycling system; it can be made
operational  again  without  too  much difficulty. Besides, we
Indians can manage on very little.'
  It  was  unusual  for  Chandra  to  refer to his origins, or
indeed  to  make  any  personal  statements; his `true confes-
sion'  was  the  only  example  Floyd  could  remember. But he
did  not  doubt  the  claim;  Curnow  had  once  remarked that
Dr  Chandra  had  the  sort  of  physique  that  could  only be
achieved  by  centuries  of  starvation.  Although  it sounded
like  one  of  the engineer's unkinder wisecracks, it had been
made   entirely   without  malice  -  indeed,  with  sympathy;
though not, of course, in Chandra's hearing.
  `Well,  we still have several weeks to decide. I'll think it
over and talk to Washington.'
  `Thank  you;  do  you  mind  if I  start  making the arrange-
ments?'
  `Er  -  not at all, as long as they don't interfere with the
existing plans. Remember - Mission Control will have to
make the final decision.'
  And I know exactly what Mission Control will say. It
was madness to expect a man to survive in space for three
years, alone.
  But, of course, Chandra had always been alone.

--
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:-) Helix@163.NET                                                    85958F57
:-( Helix@KALI.COM.CN                                                208CE12C
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