Walt Sheldon is bitter-bright in this imaginative short satire of Man'ssell-out by a group of staunch believers in the infallibility of numbers.
The Computer could do no wrong. Then it was askeda simple little question by a simple little man.
The little man had a headlike an old-fashioned light bulband a smile that seemed to sayhe had secrets from the rest ofthe world. He didn't talk much,just an occasional "Oh," "Mm"or "Ah." Krayton figured he mustbe all right, though. After allhe'd been sent to Computer Cityby the Information Departmentitself, and his credentials musthave been checked in a hundredways and places.
"Essentially each computer isthe same," said Krayton, "butadjusted to translate problems intothe special terms of the divisionit serves."
Krayton had a pleasant, well-behavedimpersonal voice. Hewas in his thirties and mildlyhandsome. He considered himselfa master of the technique of buildinga career in Computer City—heknew how to stay within thelimits of directives and regulationsand still make decisions, or ratherto relay computer decisions thatkept his responsibility to a minimum.
Now Krayton spoke easily andfreely to the little man. As publicliaison officer he had explainedthe computer system hundreds oftimes. He knew it like a techmanual.
"But is there any real centralcontrol, say in case of a breakdownor something of that sort?"The little man's voice was dry aslava ash, dry as the wastes betweenand beyond the cities. Tanter,was the name he'd given—Mr.Tanter. His contact lenseswere so thick they made his eyesseem to bulge grotesquely. Hehad a faint stoop and wore ablack tunic which made his looklike one of the reconstructedmodels of prehistoric birds calledcrows that Krayton had seen inmuseums.
"Of course, of course," saidKrayton, answering the question."It's never necessary to use theAll circuit. But we could veryeasily in case of a great emergency."
"The All circuit? What is that?"Mr. Tanter asked.
Krayton gestured and led thelittle man down the long controlbank. Their steps made preciseclicks on the layaplast floor. Thestainless steel walls threw backtinny echoes. The chromiummolding glistened, always pointingthe way—the straight andmathematical way. They were inthe topmost section of the topmostbuilding of Computer City.The several hundred clean, solid,wedding-cake structures of thetown could be seen from thepolaflex window.
"The All circuit puts everymachine in the city to work onany selection-problem that's fedinto our master control here. Eachmachine will give its answer in itsown special terms, but actuallythey will all work on the sameproblem. To use a grossly simpleexample, let us say we wish toknow the results of two-and-two,but we wish to know it in terms oftotal security. That is, we wish toknow that two-plus-two meanstwice as many nourishment unitsfor the Department of Foods,twice as many weapons for theDepartment of War, but is perhapsnot necessarily true accordingto the current situational adjustmentin the Department ofPublic Information.
"At any rate, we would set upour problem on the master, pushingthe button Two, then the buttonPlus, and the button Twoagain as on a primitive addingmachine. Then we would merelythrow the All switch. A shorttime later the total answer to ourproblem would be relayed backfrom every computer, and thecross-comparison factors canceledout, so tha