Machines like me : and people like you

By:

McEwan, Ian

Publisher: London : Jonathan Cape, 2019Description: 305p. ; 24 cmISBN:

9781787331662
9781787331679

Subject(s):

Genre/Form:

Alternative histories (Fiction)

NLM classification:

ZZ 5.

Summary: Britain has lost the Falklands war, Margaret Thatcher battles Tony Benn for power and Alan Turing achieves a breakthrough in artificial intelligence. In a world not quite like this one, two lovers will be tested beyond their understanding. Machines Like Me occurs in an alternative 1980s London. Charlie, drifting through life and dodging full-time employment, is in love with Miranda, a bright student who lives with a terrible secret. When Charlie comes into money, he buys Adam, one of the first batch of synthetic humans. With Miranda’s assistance, he co-designs Adam’s personality. This near-perfect human is beautiful, strong and clever – a love triangle soon forms. These three beings will confront a profound moral dilemma. Ian McEwan’s subversive and entertaining new novel poses fundamental questions: what makes us human? Our outward deeds or our inner lives? Could a machine understand the human heart? This provocative and thrilling tale warns of the power to invent things beyond our control.

List(s) this item appears in: SLaM Artificial intelligence & human identity books | SLaM leisure reading

Holdings
Item type	Home library	Collection	Class number	Status	Date due	Barcode
Book	CEME Library (NELFT) Shelves		WS200 (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Available		NE10078
Book	South London and Maudsley Trust Library Shelves	People & planet	ZZ 5 MCE (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Available		023322

Britain has lost the Falklands war, Margaret Thatcher battles Tony Benn for power and Alan Turing achieves a breakthrough in artificial intelligence. In a world not quite like this one, two lovers will be tested beyond their understanding.

Machines Like Me occurs in an alternative 1980s London. Charlie, drifting through life and dodging full-time employment, is in love with Miranda, a bright student who lives with a terrible secret. When Charlie comes into money, he buys Adam, one of the first batch of synthetic humans. With Miranda’s assistance, he co-designs Adam’s personality. This near-perfect human is beautiful, strong and clever – a love triangle soon forms. These three beings will confront a profound moral dilemma. Ian McEwan’s subversive and entertaining new novel poses fundamental questions: what makes us human? Our outward deeds or our inner lives? Could a machine understand the human heart? This provocative and thrilling tale warns of the power to invent things beyond our control.

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