"They are," I said, nodding.

In the last few years, artificial life had replaced artificial intelligence as a long-term computing goal. The idea was to write programs that had the attributes of living creatures-the ability to adapt, cooperate, learn, adjust to change. Many of those qualities were especially important in robotics, and they were starting to be realized with distributed processing. Distributed processing meant that you divided your work among several processors, or among a network of virtual agents that you created in the computer. There were several basic ways this was done. One way was to create a large population of fairly dumb agents that worked together to accomplish a goal-just like a colony of ants worked together to accomplish a goal. My own team had done a lot of that work.

Another method was to make a so-called neural network that mimicked the network of neurons in the human brain. It turned out that even simple neural nets had surprising power. These networks could learn. They could build on past experience. We'd done some of that, too. A third technique was to create virtual genes in the computer, and let them evolve in a virtual world until some goal was attained.

And there were several other procedures, as well. Taken together, these procedures represented a huge change from the older notions of artificial intelligence, or AI. In the old days, programmers tried to write rules to cover every situation. For example, they tried to teach computers that if someone bought something at a store, they had to pay before leaving. But this commonsense knowledge proved extremely difficult to program. The computer would make mistakes. New rules would be added to avoid the mistakes. Then more mistakes, and more rules. Eventually the programs were gigantic, millions of lines of code, and they began to fail out of sheer complexity. They were too large to debug. You couldn't figure out where the errors were coming from.

So it began to seem as if rule-based AI was never going to work. Lots of people made dire predictions about the end of artificial intelligence. The eighties were a good time for English professors who believed that computers would never match human intelligence. But distributed networks of agents offered an entirely new approach. And the programming philosophy was new, too. The old rules-based programming was "top down." The system as a whole was given rules of behavior.

But the new programming was "bottom up." The program defined the behavior of individual agents at the lowest structural level. But the behavior of the system as a whole was not defined. Instead, the behavior of the system emerged, the result of hundreds of small interactions occurring at a lower level.

Because the system was not programmed, it could produce surprising results. Results never anticipated by the programmers. That was why they could seem "lifelike." And that was why the field was so hot, because"Jack."

Annie was tapping my hand. I blinked.

"Jack, did you hear anything I just said to you?"

"Sorry."

"I don't have your full attention," she said. She blew cigarette smoke in my face. "Yes, you're right, you're in a hot field. But that's all the more reason to worry about shelf life. It's not like you're an electrical engineer specializing in optical-drive mechanisms. Hot fields move fast. Six months can make or break a company."

"I know."

"You're at risk, Jack."

"I understand."

"So. Will you talk to your wife? Please?"

"Yes."

"Okay," she said. "Make sure you do. Because otherwise, I can't help you." She flicked her burning cigarette into the remains of my latte. It sizzled and died. She snapped her laptop shut, got up, and left.

I put a call in to Julia, but didn't get her. I left voice mail. I knew it was a waste of time even to bring up moving to her. She'd certainly say no-especially if she had a new boyfriend. But Annie was right, I was in trouble. I had to do something. I had to ask. I sat at my desk at home, turning the SSVT box in my hands, trying to think what to do. I had another hour and a half before I picked up the kids. I really wanted to talk to Julia. I decided to call Julia again through the company switchboard, to see if they could track her down. "Xymos Technology."

"Julia Forman, please."

"Please hold." Some classical music, then another voice. "Ms. Forman's office."

I recognized Carol, her assistant. "Carol, it's Jack."

"Oh, hi, Mr. Forman. How are you?"

"I'm fine, thanks."

"Are you looking for Julia?"

"Yes, I am."

"She's in Nevada for the day, at the fab plant. Shall I try to connect you there?"

"Yes, please."

"One moment."

I was put on hold. For quite a while.

"Mr. Forman, she's in a meeting for the next hour. I expect her to call back when it breaks up. Do you want her to call you?"

"Yes, please."

"Do you want me to tell her anything?"

"No," I said. "Just ask her to call."

"Okay, Mr. Forman."

I hung up, stared into space, turning the SSVT box. She's in Nevada for the day. Julia had said nothing to me about going to Nevada. I replayed the conversation with Carol in my mind. Had Carol sounded uncomfortable? Was she covering? I couldn't be sure. I couldn't be sure of anything now. I stared out the window and as I watched, the sprinklers kicked on, shooting up cones of spray all over the lawn. It was right in the heat of midday, the wrong time to water. It wasn't supposed to happen. The sprinklers had been fixed just the other day. I began to feel depressed, staring at the water. It seemed like everything was wrong. I had no job, my wife was absent, the kids were a pain, I felt constantly inadequate dealing with them-and now the fucking sprinklers weren't working right. They were going to burn out the fucking lawn.

And then the baby began to cry.

I waited for Julia to call, but she never did. I cut up chicken breasts into strips (the trick is to keep them cold, almost frozen) for dinner, because chicken fingers were another meal they never argued about. I got out rice to boil. I looked at the carrots in the fridge and decided that even though they were a little old, I'd still use them tonight. I cut my finger while I was chopping the carrots. It wasn't a big cut but it bled a lot, and the Band-Aid didn't stop the bleeding. It kept bleeding through the pad, so I kept putting on new Band-Aids. It was frustrating.

Dinner was late and the kids were cranky. Eric complained loudly that my chicken fingers were gross, that McDonald's were way better, and why couldn't we have those? Nicole tried out various line readings for her play, while Eric mimicked her under his breath. The baby spit up every mouthful of her cereal until I stopped and mixed it with some mashed banana. After that, she ate steadily. I don't know why I never thought to do that before. Amanda was getting older, and she didn't want the bland stuff anymore.

Eric had left his homework at school; I told him to call his friends for the assignment, but he wouldn't. Nicole was online for an hour with her friends; I kept popping into her room and telling her to get off the computer until her homework was done, and she'd say, "In just a minute, Dad." The baby fussed, and it took a long time for me to get her down. I went back into Nicole's room and said, "Now, damn it!" Nicole began to cry. Eric came in to gloat. I asked him why he wasn't in bed. He saw the look on my face, and scampered away. Sobbing, Nicole said I should apologize to her. I said she should have done what I told her to do twice before. She went into the bathroom and slammed the door. From his room, Eric yelled, "I can't sleep with all that racket!"

I yelled back, "One more word and no television for a week!"

"Not fair!"

I went into the bedroom and turned on the TV to watch the rest of the game. After half an hour, I checked on the kids. The baby was sleeping peacefully. Eric was asleep, all his covers thrown off. I pulled them back on him. Nicole was studying. When she saw me, she apologized. I gave her a hug.