Five Stories Featuring High-Tech Solutions to the Problems of Marriage

Why invest hard work in relationships when technology can solve marital
problems as easily as it provides self-driving cars?

https://www.tor.com/2023/10/25/five-stories-featuring-high-tech-solutions-to-the-problems-of-marriage/
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In article <uhb7qp$oh6$1@reader2.panix.com>,
jdnicoll@panix.com (James Nicoll) wrote:

> Five Stories Featuring High-Tech Solutions to the Problems of Marriage
>
> Why invest hard work in relationships when technology can solve marital
> problems as easily as it provides self-driving cars?
>
> https://www.tor.com/2023/10/25/five-stories-featuring-high-tech-solutions-to-t
> he-problems-of-marriage/

After reading your essay, I wonder why you didn't use the phrase "as
easily as it provides energy too cheap to meter?" (I thought of various
possible reasons, too long ago being the first).

--
"We have advanced to new and surprising levels of bafflement."
Imperial Auditor Miles Vorkosigan describes progress in _Komarr_.
�-----------------------------------------------------
Robert Woodward robertaw@drizzle.com

In article <robertaw-95224B.09580825102023@news.individual.net>,
Robert Woodward <robertaw@drizzle.com> wrote:
>In article <uhb7qp$oh6$1@reader2.panix.com>,
> jdnicoll@panix.com (James Nicoll) wrote:
>
>> Five Stories Featuring High-Tech Solutions to the Problems of Marriage
>>
>> Why invest hard work in relationships when technology can solve marital
>> problems as easily as it provides self-driving cars?
>>
>>
>https://www.tor.com/2023/10/25/five-stories-featuring-high-tech-solutions-to-t
>> he-problems-of-marriage/
>
>After reading your essay, I wonder why you didn't use the phrase "as
>easily as it provides energy too cheap to meter?" (I thought of various
>possible reasons, too long ago being the first).
>
That would have been better.
--
My reviews can be found at http://jamesdavisnicoll.com/
My tor pieces at https://www.tor.com/author/james-davis-nicoll/
My Dreamwidth at https://james-davis-nicoll.dreamwidth.org/
My patreon is at https://www.patreon.com/jamesdnicoll

On 10/25/2023 9:13 AM, James Nicoll wrote:
> Five Stories Featuring High-Tech Solutions to the Problems of Marriage
>
> Why invest hard work in relationships when technology can solve marital
> problems as easily as it provides self-driving cars?
>
> https://www.tor.com/2023/10/25/five-stories-featuring-high-tech-solutions-to-the-problems-of-marriage/

Of course, Robert Heinlein expanded upon Line Marriages in The Moon Is A
Harsh Mistress.

And Isaac Asimov was the first to glorify robot partners for Spacers too
shy to talk with another human being.

Lynn

On 25/10/2023 09.13, James Nicoll wrote:
> Five Stories Featuring High-Tech Solutions to the Problems of Marriage
>
> Why invest hard work in relationships when technology can solve marital
> problems as easily as it provides self-driving cars?
>
> https://www.tor.com/2023/10/25/five-stories-featuring-high-tech-solutions-to-the-problems-of-marriage/

A. E. van Vogt had "All the Loving Androids"[1]. In this one, the
protagonist is continually being called at work by his wife, so that
he doesn't have time to do his job, let alone run all the little
errands she sets him.

So he gets an android double built to take the calls. And another one
to run the errands. Then, he gets a double of her to spend time with.

After this, things get messy. But, all in all, this is a good business
for the makers of android doubles.

There was another one, possibly by Sheckley, in which a "scientist"
makes several hundred clones of himself and an equal number of his wife
(or S.O.) and pairs them off. After a while, things start unraveling,
as male 73 takes up with female 241, while male 409 forms a menage-a-trois
with females 81 and 216.

"Since you're all identical, why couldn't you stay with your assigned
counterparts?" "But, we aren't all the same!"

[1] <https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?63444>
--
Michael F. Stemper
If you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much
more like prunes than rhubarb does.