Minsky ( The Society of the Mind ), one of the foremost authorities on artificial intelligence research, has many interesting ideas about the potential and pitfalls of the quest for a truly free-thinking machine, and some of them come through in this murky, creaky thriller, written with veteran science fiction author Harrison ( Return to Eden ). Brian Delany, a brilliant computer scientist at top-secret Megalobe labs, is on the brink of developing a true machine intelligence when industrial pirates penetrate security and steal his research, gravely wounding him in the process. Though a bullet has destroyed parts of his brain, the technology he created offers hope: neurosurgeon Erin Snaresbrook uses microsurgical robots and a superpowerful computer to restore Brian to consciousness. Now he races against time to re-create his research before the thieves can develop it for the marketplace, and to find out who was behind the theft before they can finish him off. The stale, contrived plot and unlikely characters serve only as a framework for the authors' exposition of various issues surrounding AI. Readers interested in a lecture enlivened by a plot line should find this entertaining; those seeking the pleasures of fiction (science or otherwise) should look elsewhere.

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