"Gordon R. Dickson - Idiot Solvant" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

"Why, your unconscious isn't tied down by any ropes of logical process
like that. When it wants a solution, it just goes looking for it."
"Just like that."
"Well," Arlie frowned, "not just like that. First it has to fire up a sort of little
donkey-engine of its own which we might call the intuitive mechanism. And
that's where the trickiness comes in. Because the intuitive mechanism
seems to be all power and no discipline. Its great usefulness comes from
the fact that it operates under absolutely no restrictions тАУ and of course this
includes the restriction of control by the conscious mind. It's a sort of idiot
savant . . . no, idiot solvant would be a better term." He sighed.
"So?" said Hank, after eyeing the fat man for a moment. "What's the use
of it all? If we can't control it, what good is it?"
"What good is it?" Arlie straightened up. "Look at art. Look at science!
Look at civilization. You aren't going to deny the existence of inspirations,
are you? They exist тАУ and one day we're going to find some better method
of sparking them than the purely inductive process of operating the
conscious, attention-focusing mechanism in hopes that something will
catch."
"You think that's possible?"
"I know it's possible."
"I see," said Hank. There was a moment or so of silence in the office.
"Well," said Hank, "about this little problem of my own, which I hate to bring
you back to, but you did say the other day you had some ideas about this
Art Willoughby. Of course, you were probably only speaking inspirationally,
or perhaps I should say, without restriction by the conscious mind тАУ"
"I was just getting to that," interrupted Arlie. "This Art Willoughby
obviously suffers from what educators like to call poor work habits.
Hm-m-m, yes. Underdevelopment of the conscious, problem-focusing
mechanism. He tries to get by on a purely intuitive basis. When this fails
him, he is helpless. He gives upwitness his transfers from college to
college. On the other hand, when it works good, it works very, very good.
He has probably come up with some way of keeping himself abnormally
stimulated, either externally or internally. The only trouble will be that he
probably isn't even conscious of it, and he certainly has no control over it.
He'll fall asleep any moment now. And when he wakes up you'll want him to
duplicate his feat of wakefulness but he won't be able to do it."
Hank snorted disbelievingly.
"All right," said Arlie. "All right. Wait and see."
"I will," said Hank. He stood up. "Want to come along and see him? He
said he was starting to get foggy this morning. I'm going to try him with the
monster."
"What," wondered Arlie, ingenuously, rising, "if it puts him to sleep?"
Hank threw him a glance of pure fury.


"Monster!" commanded Hank. He, Arlie, and Margie Hansen were
gathered in Art's hospital room, which was a pleasant, bedless place
already overflowing with books and maps. Art, by hospital rules deprived of
such things as tools and pets, had discovered an interest in the wars of
Hannibal of Carthage. At the present moment he was trying to pick the truth