Sydney Fowler Wright's"Automata" (short story, singularity, free)

One of the early stories about singularity, long before the term was coined. And a much better read than John Campbell's "The Last Evolution" (download), another early story on the subject.

Story summary.

Three untitled but connected stories that explore the implications of ever more capable machines - first must have read like a rant when it appeared, but now appears so prophetic; second, a funny tale of gossip among 4 women from far future, records a major milestone on the path to man's elimination by machines; last is a dark story of the end of the last man.

Notes.

1. I find it curious that even in future so far off, "the Eastern races had been led to destroy themselves" before the presumably Western ones!

See also.

1. The way human rebels are taken care of in "Automata" reminded me of Joseph E Kelleam's "Rust", one of the very best dystopian classics of the genre.

Fact sheet.

First published: Weird Tales, September 1929. [via Earl Kemp]
Download full text.
Rating: A.
Related: Stories of Sydney Fowler Wright; Fiction from 1920s; Tuesday Classics.