Remember that Headscratchers and Fridge pages are Spoilers Off.
- Is NOMAD incapable of shooting down an incoming plane?
- Well, it's full of civilians and they don't want to kill their own.
- If the plan is not to shut down NOMAD so it will crash when it's down in the atmosphere, or become defenseless to attack, but simply to smuggle a very straightforward bomb up there, why do they need Alphie for the plan at all?
- Alphie has the power to manipulate electronics, but she isn't strong enough to do it with anything that's not right in front of her. It's then mentioned that her power will grow with her as she ages, until she's able to control all electronics from anywhere in the world. So it seems that the plan is indeed to use Alphie to shut down NOMAD but she simply isn't strong enough to do it yet, which is why the Americans are pretty determined to kill her before that can happen. Alphie probably could cause the station to crash if they had enough time to find the right systems to target, but that was a luxury they didn't have as NOMAD was already in the process of attacking the AI bases, so Joshua had to settle for using a bomb to destroy it instead.
- It's a nitpick, but why are simulants built with big holes in their heads, full of exposed moving parts? It seems like an enormous vulnerability, not just to attack but to any small airborne thing that might get in there. Let alone that building simulants that look human would be useful in a war with enemies who murder all robots on sight.
- It could be possible that the holes double as a heat-sink for any processing that happens in the head area.
- Are there no A.I.s without semi-humanoid bodies with approximately the same speed, strength, and abilities as a human? Even the can-shaped mobile bombs have two arms and two legs.
- In a war, all the robots use hand-held guns. Even if they're not built with weapons, you'd think they could attach some.
- If human minds can be, at least temporarily, Brain Uploaded to mechanical bodies, then surely A.I.'s can be copied much more easily. By that logic, shouldn't actually killing an A.I. be really, really hard?
- For that matter, what stopped the rebels from copying Maya's / Nirmata's mind? If it's only possible for those who have just died, you'd think they would have the equipment at the ready if they should die unexpectedly. If it can be done on the living, being able to "rehabilitate" them and have them help the cause would have solved a lot of problems.
- Why are all the AI's humanoids? If they can put free will into a robot like that, what about supercomputers?
- How are the governments of the new Asian countries allowing the United States to just March in and kill A.I.s? Shouldn't this be causing an international incident?
- The destruction of Los Angeles is already considered an international incident.
- Wouldn’t the destruction of NOMAD be seen as the beginning of the end for humanity as a whole?
A.I.s out to kill humans and all that?
