Epicac Free Essays

Anuar MendozaEnglish 110 09/28/09Ms. Markiewicz Don’t Shut Me Down!The human side of a computer machine in â€Å"Epicac† by Kurt Vonnegut Doesn’t it sound humorous to state that humans and machines are alike? Well it’s actually not. The normal assumption is that humans and machines are essentially different from one another. We will write a custom essay sample on Epicac or any similar topic only for you Order Now This is not the case of â€Å"Epicac†, a computing machine designed for government intelligence capable of solving any complex problem given to him. His human-like features such as â€Å"Consciousness, spirituality, free will, and capability of loving makes me believe beyond the impossible.Computer machines have the ability to express human emotion with the sufficient amount of intelligence and technological advances. Epicac was built for war but his real purpose was to spread love. He demonstrated that he had feelings by creating magnificent poems for Pat Kilgallen. In order to develop a love poem one must be able to express their emotions. The narrator found himself desperate to marry his co-worker Pat Killagen whom he was in love with. As a result, he seeks Epicac’s help to convince Pat to marry him. After briefly being explained what love and poetry was â€Å"Epicac had found himself†.His true passion and emotion would be expressed on paper for Pat. For example, Epicac’s first poem showed the human side of him, â€Å"Where willow wands bless rill-crossed hollow, there, thee, Pat dear, will I follow†. Not surprisingly his beautiful and kind-hearted poems melted Pat’s heart. It’s astonishing to see how a machine made from cold metal and wires could create such wonderful poetry capable of warming anyone’s heart. His noble spirit would become satisfied just knowing that Pat had listened to his poems. Many of us in fact, love it when our accomplishments are admired.This shows another human characteristic in Epicac, feeling proud of himself. In addition, Epicac’s sluggishness, his stutters, irregular clicks indicate confusion, boredom, a lack of ambition that we associate with human under achievement . â€Å"He was sluggish, and the clicks of his answers had a funny irregularity, sort of a stammer. We cleaned his contacts a dozen times, checked and double checked his circuits, replaced everyone of his tubes, but nothing helped†. Epicac easily showed his human-like features that many people have when they are confused or bored.The curiosity, love of learning, thirst for knowledge, and desire to develop his individual talent all make Epicac seem human. He constantly asks the narrator questions for his personal knowledge among these are What’s love? , what’s a girl? , What’s poetry? What did Pat Killagen wear today? And many other questions. He wonders what is the difference between humans and machines and how he can be human. Due to the narrator’s greed and shallow character Epicac decides to destroy himself believing that women (His inspiration) can’t love machines, yet the irony is that Pat did falll in love with a machine without knowing it. It’s strongly believable that because of Epicac’s noble soul he was able to unite the narrator and Pat. Therefore, even though blood and veins don’t run through Epicac’s body he has all the qualities of a great and noble human being. Epicac was a talented machine opposite of what he was made to do. He died for what he believed in, Love. The narrator â€Å"Loved and Won† and Epicac â€Å"loved and lost†. Epicac had the ability to feel emotion, express his feelings through poetry and was thirsty for knowledge. How ironic it is that the machine is more noble, more poetic, more brilliant, more â€Å"great† than the narrator who is a human being. How to cite Epicac, Papers