The Vestigial Heart: A Novel of the Robot Age

by Carme Torras

Overview

A thirteen-year-old girl wakes up in a future where human emotions are extinct and people rely on personal-assistant robots to navigate daily life.

Imagine a future in which many human emotions are extinct, and “emotional masseuses” try to help people recover those lost sensations. Individuals rely on personal-assistant robots to navigate daily life. Students are taught not to think but to employ search programs. Companies protect their intellectual property by erasing the memory of their employees. And then imagine what it would feel like to be a sweet, smart thirteen-year-old girl from the twenty-first century who wakes from a cryogenically induced sleep into this strange world. This is the compelling story told by Carme Torras in this prize-winning science fiction novel. We meet Celia, brought back to life when a cure is found for her formerly terminal disease, and Lu, Celia's adoptive mother, protective but mystified by her new daughter. There is Leo, a bioengineer, who is developing a “creativity prosthesis” to augment humans' atrophied capacities, and the eccentric robotics mogul Dr. Craft. And there is Silvana, an emotional masseuse who reads old books to research the power of emotion. Silvana sees Celia as a living, breathing example of the emotions and feelings that are now out of reach for most people.

Torras, a prominent roboticist, weaves provocative ethical issues into her story. What kind of robots do we want when robot companions become as common as personal computers are now? Is it the responsibility of researchers to design robots that make the human mind evolve in a certain way? An appendix provides readers with a list of ethics questions raised by the book.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780262345958
Publisher:	MIT Press
Publication date:	04/13/2018
Series:	The MIT Press
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	264
File size:	427 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Carme Torras, a leading researcher in robotics and artificial intelligence, is Research Professor at the Institut de Robòtica i Informàtica Industrial (CSIC-UPC) in Barcelona and editor of IEEE Transactions on Robotics. A member of the Catalan Society for Science Fiction and Fantasy, she is the author of four novels.

What People are Saying About This

Endorsement

Richard Brautigan rejoiced that in future we'll all be watched over by machines of loving grace—but 100 years ahead thirteen-year-old Celia wakes from cryogenic suspension into a world where our robot guardian angels may be cradling us toward extinction. It's wonderful that this award-garlanded Catalan novel, full of insights, is now more widely available in English.

—Ian Watson, author of the screen story for Spielberg's A.I. Artificial Intelligence, los angeles review of books

From the Publisher

Richard Brautigan rejoiced that in future we'll all be watched over by machines of loving grace—but 100 years ahead thirteen-year-old Celia wakes from cryogenic suspension into a world where our robot guardian angels may be cradling us toward extinction. It's wonderful that this award-garlanded Catalan novel, full of insights, is now more widely available in English.

—Ian Watson, author of the screen story for Spielberg's A.I. Artificial Intelligence, los angeles review of books

los angeles review of books - Ian Watson

Richard Brautigan rejoiced that in future we'll all be watched over by machines of loving grace—but 100 years ahead thirteen-year-old Celia wakes from cryogenic suspension into a world where our robot guardian angels may be cradling us toward extinction. It's wonderful that this award-garlanded Catalan novel, full of insights, is now more widely available in English.

Editorial Reviews

04/23/2018
AI researcher and roboticist Torras, a professor at the Institut de Robòtica i Informàtica Industrial in Barcelona, channels her knowledge into a fascinating and provocative speculative tale. The people of Torras’s imagined near future are attended by robots that see to their every need and insulate them from discomfort. The result is widespread emotional and psychological atrophy. Robotics mogul Dr. Craft seeks a solution in robot enhancements, hiring bioengineer Leo Mar’10 to develop a “prosthesis” to stimulate creativity. “Anti-techno” Silvana, an emotions masseuse, researches anachronistic emotions in books so she can try to stimulate them in her clients. Into this sterile world, a 13-year-old girl named Celia wakes from a century of cryogenic sleep. Emotional and creative in ways that Leo and Silvana can scarcely understand, she tries to adapt while they seek in her psychology a reawakening of what humanity has lost. Torras is not subtle; her characters tend to state the novel’s themes outright. However, where other writers might use this scenario for alarmist antiscience screeds, Torras instead examines her characters’ situations with empathy, seeking a middle way between fear of the future and embracing its possibilities. Some early sections are stiff, but the moving conclusion will leave readers glad they stayed the course. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

Readers of William Gibson, Nnedi Okorafor, Pat Murphy, Neal Stephenson, and other cultural code-tweaking authors will find Torras's vision equally startling in its anticipation—and portrayal—of possible scenarios around complex social issues today's researchers and policymakers are only now beginning to recognize as imminent.—Library Journal, STARRED, 04/16/2018—

A fascinating and provocative speculative tale.

—Publishers Weekly, 4/20/2018—

From the Publisher

A fascinating and provocative speculative tale.

—Publishers Weekly, 4/20/2018

Reviews