Thinking machines (Dune)
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The thinking machines are a fictional group from Frank Herbert's Dune universe. Created by humans, they are intelligent machines which come to dominate mankind. The human revolt against the machines known as the Butlerian Jihad is an epic turning point in the back-story of the Dune universe. The thinking machines are first mentioned in 1965's Dune, and are the primary antagonists in the Legends Of Dune prequel trilogy.
[edit] The original Dune series
Terminology of the Imperium, the glossary of the novel Dune, includes the following:
JIHAD, BUTLERIAN: (see also Great Revolt) — the crusade against computers, thinking machines, and conscious robots begun in 201 B.G. and concluded in 108 B.G. Its chief commandment remains in the O.C. Bible as "Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind."
In Dune Messiah (1969), the Tleilaxu Face Dancer Scytale notes that "From the days of the Butlerian Jihad when 'thinking machines' had been wiped from most of the universe, computers had inspired distrust."
Herbert refers to thinking machines and the Jihad many times in his later works in the Dune series, but does not give much detail on how he imagined either. Herbert's death in 1986 left this topic unexplored and open to speculation.
[edit] Legends of Dune
In 2002, Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson released the first novel in their prequel series Legends of Dune, which they have stated is based on Frank Herbert's work notes left behind after his death, as well as his outline for a seventh novel in the original series.
Chronicling the Butlerian Jihad, Legends of Dune establishes that the thinking machines are led by Omnius, a sentient computer network. A thousand years before, a group of 20 dissident humans had used thinking machines to enslave the rest of mankind, and then converted themselves into weaponized human-machine hybrids called cymeks. Essentially immortal and unstoppable, they had become known as the Titans, but after a century had been overthrown themselves by Omnius and made his servants.
Mankind suffers under thinking machine oppression for another 900 years, before the murder of young Manion Butler at the hands of the independent robot Erasmus incites the Butlerian Jihad. The last remaining free humans, unified under the League of Nobles, fight for a century before finally defeating the machines in the Battle of Corrin.
[edit] Hunters of Dune
In Hunters of Dune, Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson's first of a two-part finale to the original series, the antagonists Daniel and Marty (introduced in Frank Herbert's Chapterhouse Dune) are revealed to be reincarnations of Omnius and Erasmus. In the third Legends novel Dune: The Battle of Corrin, Omnius had sent out a last burst of information before being destroyed in the Battle of Corrin; it is explained in Hunters that this signal had eventually connected with one of the probes disseminated from Giedi Prime several decades earlier, uploading versions of Erasmus and Omnius.
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