And the science has to be more than fantasy. It has to be possible. It has to be thinkaboutable. If one writes a story and assumes that at some time and place space travel will be possible, that’s all right. It probably — anyhow conceivably —
will be. But if a story mentions somebody making a four-sided triangle, it is not acceptable because it simply can’t happen.
Again, one can write about a monster. But to be believable there must be an environment in which the monster wouldn’t be monstrous, but normal. In the 174
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same way, we can have gadgets which are impossible now, but not forever. I think of a story called The Brick Moon by Edward Everett Hale, author of A Man Without a Country.
The Brick Moon was written in the 1850s. (My copy used to belong to Jefferson Davis.) It’s about an artificial satellite. At the time it was impossible technically but not inherently. It was science fiction in the modern manner except it could have been better.
Today, science fiction is as distinct a genre as satire or comedy or farce. You can say that in comedy one takes the possible and stretches it, while in farce one takes the impossible and stretches it. Science fiction does not deal with the impossible. It deals with the only temporarily impossible, which is another thing entirely. And it examines the temporarily impossible and how it will affect people who live when and where it ceases to be impossible. I am saying that it takes situations and relationships and circumstances and examines them as satire or comedy does (but never farce). It often ends with conclusions of a precision and accuracy no literal-minded approach could possibly develop.
Also, science fiction often makes a prediction of a scientific invention or discovery that later comes true. At least six devices used in World War II were not only like science fiction inventions, but were deliberately modeled on things first described in science fiction stories. Yet the function of science fiction is not only to make predictions; it may also look backward. I once wrote a story called “The Power” set in the thirteenth century which required me to do elaborate historical research. It has been included in several anthologies and translated into various languages. And there is a classic story —“Don’t Look Now”— by Henry Kut-tner — which is told as happening in the corner saloon, either yesterday or tomorrow or perhaps an hour from now.
I’ve been trying to clarify what science fiction is, because I take great pleasure in writing it and perhaps even more in reading it.... But I do say one thing firmly. It applies to all kinds of writing and especially to science fiction.
Don’t try writing science fiction unless you honestly like to read it! If you don’t enjoy writing it for the sake of getting it down on paper, if you write for any other reason but wanting to, it’s extremely likely that a reader will share your indifference!
Appendix A.
“A Logic Named Joe”
“A Logic Named Joe” was published in the March 1946 issue of Astound -
ing Science-Fiction. There was a Murray Leinster story, “The Adapter,” in the same issue so it was bylined under his own name, Will F. Jenkins. The story was immediately popular with the readers, and they rated it the number one for that month.
“A Logic Named Joe” has been credited as being the first to predict the home computer and the internet. Interest has not only endured over the years but increased as we became more and more a wired world.
It is worth repeating what Joe Rico, editor of several anthologies and a Fellow of the New England Science Fiction Association (NESFA), wrote: “At a time in which the world had about 10 electronic computers, he wrote a story about a future in which every household has a personal computer and is connected to an internet-like system. If this story had been written in 1956, 1966
or 1976 it would have been known as the most predicative story in the genre, but it was written in 1946!”
A Logic Named Joe
by Will F. Jenkins
It was on the third day of August that Joe come off the assembly line, and on the fifth Laurine come into town, an’ that afternoon I saved civilization. That’s what I figure, anyhow. Laurine is a blonde that I was crazy about once — and crazy is the word — and Joe is a logic that I have stored away down in the cellar right now. I had to pay for him because I said I busted him, and sometimes I think about turning him on and sometimes I think about taking an ax to him.
Sooner or later I’m gonna do one or the other. I kinda hope it’s the ax. I could use a coupla million dollars — sure!— an’ Joe’d tell me how to get or make ’em.
He can do plenty! But so far I’ve been scared to take a chance. After all, I figure I really saved civilization by turnin’ him off.
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The way Laurine fits in is that she makes cold shivers run up an’ down my spine when I think about her. You see, I’ve got a wife which I acquired after I had parted from Laurine with much romantic despair. She is a reasonable good wife, and I have some kids which are hell-cats but I value ’em. If I have sense enough to leave well enough alone, sooner or later I will retire on a pension an’
Social Security an’ spend the rest of my life fishin’ contented an’ lyin’ about what a great guy I used to be. But there’s Joe. I’m worried about Joe.
I’m a maintenance man for the Logics Company. My job is servicing logics, and I admit modestly that I am pretty good. I was servicing televisions before that guy Carson invented his trick circuit that will select any of ’steenteen million other circuits — in theory there ain’t no limit — and before the Logics Company hooked it into the tank-and-integrator set-up they were usin’ ’em as business-machine service. They added a vision screen for speed — an’ they found out they’d made logics. They were surprised an’ pleased. They’re still findin’ out what logics will do, but everybody’s got ’em.
I got Joe, after Laurine nearly got me. You know the logics setup. You got a logic in your house. It looks like a vision receiver used to, only it’s got keys instead of dials and you punch the keys for what you wanna get. It’s hooked in to the tank, which has the Carson Circuit all fixed up with relays. Say you punch “Station SNAFU ” on your logic. Relays in the tank take over an’ whatever vision-program SNAFU is telecastin’ comes on your logic’s screen. Or you punch “Sally Hancock’s Phone” an’ the screen blinks an’ sputters an’ you’re hooked up with the logic in her house an’ if somebody answers you got a vision-phone connection. But besides that, if you punch for the weather forecast or who won today’s race at Hialeah or who was mistress of the White House durin’
Garfield’s administration or what is PDQ and R sellin’ for today, that comes on the screen too. The relays in the tank do it. The tank is a big buildin’ full of all the facts in creation an’ all the recorded telecasts that ever was made — an’ it’s hooked in with all the other tanks all over the country — an’ everything you wanna know or see or hear, you punch for it an’ you get it. Very convenient.
Also it does math for you, an’ keeps books, an’ acts as consultin’ chemist, physicist, astronomer, an’ tea-leaf reader, with a “Advice to the Lovelorn” thrown in.
The only thing it won’t do is tell you exactly what your wife meant when she said, “Oh, you think so, do you?” in that peculiar kinda voice. Logics don’t work good on women. Only on things that make sense.
Logics are all right, though. They changed civilization, the highbrows tell us.
All on accounta the Carson Circuit. And Joe shoulda been a perfectly normal logic, keeping some family or other from wearin’ out its brains doin’ the kids’
homework for ’em. But somethin’ went wrong in the assembly line. It was somethin’ so small that precision gauges didn’t measure it, but it made Joe a individual. Maybe he didn’t know it at first. Or maybe, bein’ logical, he figured out that if he was to show he was different from other logics they’d scrap him. Which woulda been a brilliant idea. But anyhow, he come off
the assembly-line, an’ he went through the regular tests without anybody screamin’ shrilly on findin’ out what he was. And he went right on out an’ was duly installed in the home of Mr.
Thaddeus Korlanovitch at 119 East Seventh Street, second floor front. So far, everything was serene.
The installation happened late Saturday night. Sunday morning the Korlanovitch kids turned him on an’ seen the Kiddie Shows. Around noon their
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parents peeled ’em away from him an’ piled ’em in the car. Then they come back in the house for the lunch they’d forgot an’ one of the kids sneaked back an’ they found him punchin’ keys for the Kiddie Shows of the week before. They dragged him out an’ went off. But they left Joe turned on.
That was noon. Nothin’ happened until two in the afternoon. It was the calm before the storm. Laurine wasn’t in town yet, but she was comin’. I picture Joe sittin’ there all by himself, buzzing meditative. Maybe he run Kiddie Shows in the empty apartment for awhile. But I think he went kinda remote-control exploring in the tank. There ain’t any fact that can be said to be a fact that ain’t on a data plate in some tank somewhere — unless it’s one the technicians are diggin’ out an’ puttin’ on a data plate now. Joe had plenty of material to work on.
An’ he musta started workin’ right off the bat.
Joe ain’t vicious, you understand. He ain’t like one of these ambitious robots you read about that make up their minds the human race is inefficient and has got to be wiped out an’ replaced by thinkin’ machines. Joe’s just got ambition. If you were a machine, you’d wanna work right, wouldn’t you? That’s Joe. He wants to work right. An’ he’s a logic. An’ logics can do a lotta things that ain’t been found out yet. So Joe, discoverin’ the fact, begun to feel restless. He selects some things us dumb humans ain’t thought of yet, an’ begins to arrange so logics will be called on to do ’em.
That’s all. That’s everything. But, brother, it’s enough!
Things are kinda quiet in the Maintenance Department about two in the afternoon. We are playing pinochle. Then one of the guys remembers he has to call up his wife. He goes to one of the bank of logics in Maintenance and punches the keys for his house. The screen sputters. Then a flash comes on the screen.
“Announcing new and improved logics service! Your logic is now equipped to give you not only consultive but directive service. If you want to do something and don’t know-how to do it — ask your logic!”
There’s a pause. A kinda expectant pause. Then, as if reluctantly, his connection comes through. His wife answers an’ gives him hell for somethin’ or other.
He takes it an’ snaps off.
“Whadda you know?” he says when he comes back. He tells us about the flash. “We shoulda been warned about that. There’s gonna be a lotta complaints.
Suppose a fella asks how to get ridda his wife an’ the censor circuits block the question?”
Somebody melds a hundred aces an’ says:
“Why not punch for it an’ see what happens?”
It’s a gag, o’ course. But the guy goes over. He punches keys. In theory, a censor block is gonna come on an’ the screen will say severely, “Public Policy Forbids This Service.” You hafta have censor blocks or the kiddies will be askin’ detailed questions about things they’re too young to know. And there are other reasons.
As you will see.
This fella punches, “How can I get rid of my wife?” Just for the fun of it. The screen is blank for half a second. Then comes a flash. “Service question: Is she blonde or brunette?” He hollers to us an’ we come look. He punches, “Blonde.” There’s another brief pause. Then the screen says, “Hexymetacryloaminoacetine is a constituent of green shoe polish. Take home a frozen meal including dried-pea soup. Color the soup with green shoe polish. It will appear to be green-pea 178
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soup. Hexymetacryloaminoacetine is a selective poison which is fatal to blond females but not to brunettes or males of any coloring. This fact has not been brought out by human experiment, but is a product of logics service. You cannot be convicted of murder. It is improbable that you will be suspected.” The screen goes blank, and we stare at each other. It’s bound to be right. A logic workin’ the Carson Circuit can no more make a mistake than any other kinda computin’ machine. I call the tank in a hurry.
“Hey, you guys!” I yell. “Somethin’s happened! Logics are givin’ detailed instructions for wife-murder! Check your censor-circuits — but quick!” That was close, I think. But little do I know. At that precise instant, over on Monroe Avenue, a drunk starts to punch for somethin’ on a logic. The screen says, “Announcing new and improved logics service! If you want to do something and don’t know how to do it — ask your logic!” And the drunk says, owlish, “I’ll do it!” So he cancels his first punching and fumbles around and says: “How can I keep my wife from finding out I’ve been drinking?” And the screen says, prompt: “Buy a bottle of Franine hair shampoo. It is harmless but contains a detergent which will neutralize ethyl alcohol immediately. Take one teaspoonful for each jigger of hundred-proof you have consumed.” This guy was plenty plastered — just plastered enough to stagger next door and obey instructions. An’ five minutes later he was cold sober and writing down the information so he couldn’t forget it. It was new, and it was big! He got rich offa that memo! He patented “SOBUH, The Drink That Makes Happy Homes! ” You can top off any souse with a slug or two of it an’ go home sober as a judge. The guy’s cussin’ income taxes right now!
You can’t kick on stuff like that. But a ambitious young fourteen-year-old wanted to buy some kid stuff and his pop wouldn’t fork over. He called up a friend to tell his troubles. And his logic says: “If you want to do something and don’t know how to do it — ask your logic!” So this kid punches: “How can I make a lotta money, fast?”
His logic comes through with the simplest, neatest, and the most efficient counterfeitin’ device yet known to science. You see, all the data was in the tank.
The logic — since Joe had closed some relays here an’ there in the tank — simply integrated the facts. That’s all. The kid got caught up with three days later, havin’ already spent two thousand credits an’ havin’ plenty more on hand. They hadda time tellin’ his counterfeits from the real stuff, an’ the only way they done it was that he changed his printer, kid fashion, not bein’ able to let somethin’
that was workin’ right alone.
Those are what you might call samples. Nobody knows all that Joe done. But there was the bank president who got humorous when his logic flashed that “Ask your logic” spiel on him, and jestingly asked how to rob his own bank. An’ the logic told him, brief and explicit but good! The bank president hit the ceiling, hollering for cops. There musta been plenty of that sorta thing. There was fifty-four more robberies than usual in the next twenty-four hours, all of them planned astute an’ perfect. Some of ’em they never did figure out how they’d been done. Joe, he’d gone exploring in the tank and closed some relays like a logic is supposed to do — but only when required — and blocked all censor-circuits an’ fixed up this logics service which planned perfect crimes, nourishing an’ attractive meals, counterfeitin’ machines, an’ new industries with a fine impartiality. He musta been plenty happy, Joe must. He was functionin’ swell,
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buzzin’ along to himself while the Korlanovitch kids were off ridin’ with their ma an’ pa.
They come back at seven o’clock, the kids all happily wore out with their afternoon of fightin’ each other in the car. Their folks put ’em to bed and sat down to rest. They saw Joe’s screen flickerin’ meditative from one subject to another an’ old man Korlanovitch had had enough excitement for one day. He turned Joe off.
An’ at that instant the pattern of relays that Joe had turned on snapped off, all the offers of directive service stopped flas
hin’ on logic screens everywhere, an’
peace descended on the earth.
For everybody else. But for me — Laurine come to town. I have often thanked Gawd fervent that she didn’t marry me when I thought I wanted her to. In the intervenin’ years she had progressed. She was blonde an’ fatal to begin with. She had got blonder and fataler an’ had had four husbands and one acquittal for homicide an’ had acquired a air of enthusiasm and self-confidence. That’s just a sketch of the background. Laurine was not the kinda former girlfriend you like to have turning up in the same town with your wife. But she came to town, an’
Monday morning she tuned right into the middle of Joe’s second spasm of activity.
The Korlanovitch kids had turned him on again. I got these details later and kinda pieced ’em together. An’ every logic in town was dutifully flashin’ a notice,
“If you want to do something and don’t know how to do it — ask your logic!” every time they was turned on for use. More’n that, when people punched for the morning news, they got a full account of the previous afternoon’s doin’s.
Which put ’em in a frame of mind to share in the party. One bright fella demands, “How can I make a perpetual motion machine?” And his logic sputters a while an’ then comes up with a set-up usin’ the Brownian movement to turn little wheels. If the wheels ain’t bigger’n a eighth of an inch they’ll turn, all right, an’ practically it’s perpetual motion. Another one asks for the secret of transmut-ing metals. The logic rakes back in the data plates an’ integrates a strictly practical answer. It does take so much power that you can’t make no profit except on radium, but that pays off good. An’ from the fact that for a coupla years to come the police were turnin’ up new and improved jimmies, knob-claws for gettin’ at safe-innards, and all-purpose keys that’d open any known lock — why — there must have been other inquirers with a strictly practical viewpoint. Joe done a lot for technical progress!
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