Peace on Earth (Pokój na Ziemi) is a novel by Stanisław Lem. Despite featuring Ijon Tichy as the protagonist, it's done in a lot more serious tone compared to The Star Diaries. The novel takes place some time after a global disarmament achieved by moving arsenals of the entire Earth to the Moon, with each one setting up a simulated evolution to ensure the arms race continues. However, before long the powers behind the project find themselves worried about a possible Robot Uprising. That's when Tichy enters the picture, and finds that between the Moon surface and the Earth politics, the former just might be a safer place, after all...
Unmarked spoilers ahead.
This work includes examples of:
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Discussed and averted. It's impossible to determine if automated weapon development systems went rogue, or were programmed to break the disarmament rules by their creators. Additionally, the ultimate threat from the Moon does not appear to be sentient at all.
- Affably Evil: One of the robots Tichy encounters is surprisingly talkative, telling Tichy that he doesn't want to fight anyone. Right until he disables Tichy's scout robot and cuts it open.
- Apocalypse How: Class 1, due to global electronic disruption.
- Attack Reflector: The first defensive trick Tichy encounters on the Moon. It was enough to stop previous exploration attempts in their tracks.
- Crippling Overspecialization: Some of the Moon robots were designed to kill or disable humans, rather than destroy other robots. When a free-for-all war between sectors had begun, those models were quickly sidelined due to the lack of appropriate targets.
- Flock of Wolves: Nearly everyone in the Lunar Agency has a hidden agenda.
- Gambit Pileup: Happens twice. First when automatic weapons research projects on the Moon attack each other, later when the Lunar Agency attempts to investigate the issue by sending Tichy over.
- Grey Goo: Downplayed. The ultimate Moon threat can reproduce itself, but only does so in a limited manner. It also completely ignores older tech and living creatures.
- He Knows Too Much: The mere possibility of this is enough to put Tichy's life in jeopardy. Some parties are worried about what he might've actually discovered on the Moon, while others are more worried about what he could decide to tell instead of the truth.
- How We Got Here: Good chunk of the novel is a retrospective recorded by Tichy.
- Job-Stealing Robot: In a rare variant, robots stole military jobs, being better soldiers, strategists, weapon designers, et cetera.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: Tichy loses memories of how his mission ended. However, his newly acquired split personality retains that memory.
- Let No Crisis Go to Waste: The Lunar agency pulls this when someone attempts to assassinate Tichy.
- Mechanical Animals: Some of the products of the automated lunar arms race look like this. Or at least that's the best way Tichy can describe them.
- Mechanical Evolution: Started in each lunar sector by the country owning it, with disastrous results.
- Microbot Swarm: The ultimate scout robot used by Tichy during the mission is this, though this one is bordering on Nano Technology. A simpler versions are mentioned in the backstory.
- Patriotic Fervor: A robot found in a Russian sector behaves like this.
- Poor Communication Kills: Tichy's split personality was trying to communicate with his dominant personality using Morse code. Despite being fluent in it, Tichy failed to notice those attempts.
- Remote Body: Scout robots Tichy uses during his mission are operated like this. They transmit not only visual and radio data, but also temperature and vibration, much to Tichy's discomfort. In the backstory this technology also caused a crisis on Earth, especially when sexbots hit the market.
- Split Personality: Tichy suffers this to an extent during his Moon mission, probably as a side effect of an experimental weapon. It takes a while for them to get along.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Tichy is expected to become one, since the results of his investigation of the state of the Lunar project could upset the delicate political balance on Earth. He turns out to be one for an entirely different reason.
