(no subject)

Recently I read What Everyone Remembers, which is a fantastic story that you should read. I'll wait.

So it's the story of an AI made from what I assume is a roach--I guess another bug works but roaches will last to the end of the world--and even reading it I was struck by the callousness of the AI's creators. They're not good people, no, and the story does a good job getting this across along with a sort of natural revulsion for what the protagonist is, but what stuck with me, oddly, was that moment Frederick "instinctively" slapped her away.

I was thinking about it when I finally found out where the roaches in my house were coming from. They've been around for a couple months but I could never figure out their lair (inside an electrical outlet, behind a big adapter). Once a piece of plastic stuck to my hand and I started screaming, flipping out about how oh god one of them was touching me, and planning their demise.

And I thought about the little roach AI.

It's nothing against the roaches. They don't gross me out. I'm more annoyed by them than anything, because seeing one I know that there are thousands if not millions more somewhere. I caught one, once, before I knew what they were (say "cockroach" to me and I think of the American cockroach, which is bigger and doesn't infest like german roaches) and spent a long time looking at this bug with leg spurs and weird little butt antennae like cattle horns. It sat dumbly on the floor, allowing me to catch it. They scuttle pretty quick but then hit a corner (like where the floor meets the wall) and stop like they think they're safe. It's kind of endearingly stupid.

I thought about how gross the two people found the protagonist. They made this incredible thing and they were still disgusted, and the AI internalized this disgust--and I don't know how much of this is "ugh, roaches" and how much is the two human characters being bad people, though given how most people have said they don't want to hear about my roach problem I suspect that this response to the AI might be exactly what happens.

Though honestly, if one of the roaches started talking to me with half the charm and earnestness of the protagonist, I'd be all "fine make your little bug city in my wall."

But they didn't talk, so I put poison in the outlet.