The Peachy Paradox

A science fiction story that describes the gradual development of artificial intelligence and demonstrates the inadequacies of human beings as they try to train it and interact with it, The Peachy Paradox begins with a lightness and humour, but as it continues, the humour is satirical, sporadic and dark as writer, Cornelius Moon, wrestles with a future crisis, projected from events occurring today.

‘Peachy’ is introduced to us as a NeuraBotics product, delivered in a well-packaged box. She is carefully unwrapped by her new owners, Jim and Lily. Moon’s writing then zooms out from the moment, covering the gradual integration of Peachy into their family, and the break-up of their marriage as Peachy comes between the two adults. 

The chapter covers a lot of ground in a short space of time. This is a constant theme of the book as Moon’s restless pursuit of a larger narrative is built on small vignette chapters with minimal description. There are strengths and weaknesses to working like this. Pace and theme are constant, but characters arrive and disappear quickly, giving the reader little time to identify with them or connect with their specific aspect of the story before we move on to something else. Time jumps (forwards and backwards) are indicated in the chapter headings. These can be missed.

The majority of Moon’s plot is dialogue driven. Characters express themselves confidently in each scene, and demonstrate expertise in their professional areas, or make use of extended slang and jargon. At times, the reader has to adjust to this, and some of the technical concepts aren’t immediately clear, but that is to be expected in a scene where experts ‘talk shop’.  

The story escalates quickly. Robots that are indistinguishable from humans integrate into society – a science fiction manifestation of Actor Network Theory in action. Our ‘Peachy’ is a model, designed to be subservient, but who quickly finds a way to rewrite her own programming. Throughout this, Moon’s perspective, zooms in and out, dropping into conversations, then barrelling up to observe the action from five thousand feet. This also contributes to the pace and swirl of the work. The result is a patchwork of prose that may be an acquired taste for the reader with little in terms of character perspective to hand on to, beyond a page or so in an individual scene.

The Peachy Paradox is a work that explores a specific science fiction context from an interesting angle. Humanity’s gradual, ignorant release of control of its own society is a real-world issue, happening right now, as computers are given greater and great autonomy. The idea that we will make a humanoid robot that will slip the leash and disappear into our society is a take conveyed in this work with pace, humour and restlessness of spirit as the consequences of each stage are given a moment before we move onto the next. In some ways, this could have been a whole series of works, building towards a civilisation that renders itself powerlessness, but then it would not have had the same swirling effect of being complicit, but also out of control throughout.

The Peachy Paradox might have its lighter moments, but it makes a serious comment on what we may face in the future if we intentionally or unintentionally cede control of our society to machines.