Chapter 27 Chapter 26 Observation Period

To: Victor Milson, Chairman, National Astronautical Council, Washington From: Heywood Floyd, USS Discovery Subject: Report on Hal 9000 failure of the ship's computer Class: Secret Dr. Chandra Sekarampilei (hereinafter referred to as Dr. Qian) has now completed his initial examination of Hal.He reinstalled all missing modules and the computer appeared to be fully operational again.Dr. Qian's actions and conclusions will be detailed in a report he and Ternovsky will send back shortly. At the same time, you also asked me to provide an overview in plain language for the committee to read - especially for new members who are not familiar with the background situation.Frankly, I doubt that I have the ability.As you know, I'm not a computer expert, but I'll do my best.

The problem was apparently caused by a conflict between Hal's basic instructions and the needs of security.By order directly from the President, T. M. The existence of A-1 shall be kept strictly confidential.Only those who have a need to know should have access to this information. When T. M. By the time A-1 was unearthed and a signal was being sent to Jupiter, Discovery's mission to Jupiter had been decided and was in the final stages of development.The first echelon members (Bowman, Poole) were only responsible for getting the ship to its destination, and a decision had been made not to inform them of the ship's new destination.Training the research echelon (Kaminsky, Hunter, Whitehead) individually and putting them into hibernation before the voyage begins greatly increases security, risk of leaks (accidental or otherwise) also decreased significantly.

I would like to remind you that at the time (in my memorandum NCA 342/23/Super Secret Document 3 April 2001) I had several objections to this policy.However, they were rejected by the superiors one by one. Since Hal can steer the ship without human assistance, we decided that he should be able to autonomously complete the mission in the event that the crew becomes inoperable or dies.He was therefore well aware of all the purposes of the mission, but he was not allowed to explain it to Bowman or Poole. This situation goes against Hal's original design intention-to do the right processing of information without concealment.As a result, the contradictory conflict caused Hal to suffer from a mental illness similar to humans-specifically, schizophrenia.In technical terms, Dr. Qian told me, Hal was stuck in a Hofstadter-Möbius loop, which is not uncommon in advanced computers with autonomous target-tracking programs.He suggests that you consult Professor Hofstadter himself for further clarification.

To put it bluntly (if I understand Dr. Qian correctly), Hal is confronted with an intolerable dilemma, so he exhibits symptoms of paranoia - resisting the monitoring of his execution by the earth side.So he attempted to cut off radio contact with the mission center, the first step being to report that the AE35 antenna element was faulty (which it wasn't). The tricky part is that not only did he lie - which would surely make his mental illness worse - but he also faced confrontation with the crew.He probably believes (we can only speculate why, of course) that the only way out of this predicament is to eliminate his fellow humans - which he almost succeeds in doing.In purely objective terms, it would be interesting to see what would have happened if he had done it alone, without human intervention. "

That's literally all I can learn from Dr. Qian.I hesitate to ask him further questions, he is exhausted from work, but even so, I will be honest (and please keep this under wraps) that Dr. Qian is not always cooperative.He took a defensive stance about Hal, which at times made the discussion extremely difficult.Even Dr. Ternovsky, who also has a little libertarian leanings, often sees me the same way. However, the only question that really matters is: In the future, will Hal be reliable?Of course, Dr. Qian firmly believes in this.He claimed to have wiped the computer of all memories of the injuries that led to its eventual dismantling.And he never believed Hal to be troubled by anything remotely resembling human guilt.

In any event, the circumstances that led to the original problem do not appear to be recurring.While Hal suffers from many of his quirks, that doesn't inherently cause any panic.They're just minor annoyances, some of them quite amusing.As you know--didn't Dr. Qian know--I've taken steps, and at the end of the day we have full control over him. In conclusion: Hal 9000's restoration work is satisfactory, furthermore, he is under observation period. I don't know if he understands this.