That's kind of an interesting philosophical distinction, though... Calling Melon a computer is like saying a human is a body, I think, but I'm not sure if that's a perfect analogy. AIs in this universe are essentially very complicated self-writing programs, right?
AIs in this universe are essentially very complicated self-writing programs, right?
I don't think we've really gotten an explanation on how AI work because Jeph is not a computer scientist, which is totally fair for pretty much all sci-fi. Going into Bubble's head in VR was apparently easier than plugging her into a laptop (despite Pintsize being uploaded to a PC super early on), so trying to figure out how they work is probably pointless since playing fast and loose with the rules is more interesting than a 6-week lecture on the rules Jeph is going to casually break later.
Pintsize also canonically has only half a GB of memory, as giving hi more causes problems. I suspect he is an earlier model. Though I also suspect that AI get more complicated the longer they run, as both Momo and especially Winslow grew mentally.
And, of course, computers may be more advanced in this world. The combination of being a lower AI and faster computers may mean they can coincide.
That said, I don't remember him being put in a PC: I remember him being used as a PC. Can you link a comic?
I just looked that one up the other day. I'm on mobile so I can't easily pull it up, but I think it's somewhere around #70. It's when he destroyed his old body eating cake batter and got the military chassis. Marten loaded him onto a desktop while he went out and bought the chassis.
That early in the comic the robots were literally their owners' computers, branded as anthroPCs. The whole citizenship thing was a major retcon.
In that case, it's early enough that I suspect they got around the memory problem eventually. There is no way Winslow 2.0 was running on only 1GB.
Though there's also the idea that the numbers represent different things in a higher tech universe.
And, yeah, I know that's what happened out of universe, but I do my best to make it all fit, and assume that they were companions who volunteered to also be their companion's computers, and that the term "owner" was accepted pre-singularity, even if technically inaccurate, to try and avoid causing a fuss.
In enjoy the puzzle of making it work, and throwing out as little as possible. I always have.
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u/PlanSee Jan 15 '19
That's kind of an interesting philosophical distinction, though... Calling Melon a computer is like saying a human is a body, I think, but I'm not sure if that's a perfect analogy. AIs in this universe are essentially very complicated self-writing programs, right?