True Love by Isaac Asimov
My name is Joe.
That is what my colleague, MiltonDavidson, calls me.
He is a programmer and I am acomputer.
I am part of the Multivac-complex and amconnected with other parts all over the world.
I knoweverything.
Almost everything.
I am Milton’s private computer.
His Joe.
Heunderstands more about computers than anyone inthe world, and I am his experimental model.
“It is just a matter of matching sounds to symbols,Joe,” he told me.
“That’s the way it works in thehuman brain even though we still don’t know whatsymbols there are in the brain.
I know the symbols inyours, and I can match them to words, one-to-one.”
So I talk.
I don’t think I talk as well as I think, butMilton says I talk very well.
Milton has never married,though he is nearly 40 years old.
He has never foundthe right woman, he told me.
One day he said,
“I’llfind her yet, Joe.
I’m going to find the best.
I’m goingto have true love and you’re going to help me.
I’mtired of improving you in order to solve the problemsof the world.
Solve my problem.
Find me true love.”
I said, “What is true love?”
“Never mind.
That is abstract.
Just find me the idealgirl.
You are connected to the Multivac-complex soyou can reach the data banks of every human beingin the world.
We’ll eliminate them all by groups andclasses until we’re left with only one person.
Theperfect person.
She will be for me.”
I said, “I am ready.”
He said, “Eliminate all men first.”
It was easy.
His words activated symbols in mymolecular valves.
I could reach out to make contactwith the accumulated data on every human being inthe world.
At his words, I withdrew from 3 784 982874 men.
I kept contact with 3 786 112 090 women.
He said, “Eliminate all younger than 25, all older than40.
Then eliminate all with an IQ under 120;
all with aheight under 150 centimeters and over 175centimeters.”
He gave me exact measurements;
he eliminatedwomen with living children;
he eliminated womenwith various genetic characteristics.
“I’m not sureabout eye colour,” he said.
“Let that go for a while.
But no red hair.
I don’t like red hair.”
After two weeks, we were down to 235 women.
Theyall spoke English very well.
Milton said he didn’t wanta language problem.
Even computer-translationwould get in the way at intimate moments.
“I can’t interview 235 women,” he said.
“It would taketoo much time, and people would discover what I amdoing.”
“It would make trouble,” I said.
Milton had arrangedme to do things I wasn’t designed to do.
No oneknew about that.
“It’s none of their business,” he said, and the skin onhis face grew red.
“I tell you what, Joe, I will bring inholographs, and you check the list for similarities.”
He brought in holographs of women.
“These arethree beauty contest winners,” he said.
“Do any ofthe 235 match?”
Eight were very good matches and Milton said, “Good, you have their data banks.
Studyrequirements and needs in the job market andarrange to have them assigned here.
One at a time, of course.”
He thought a while moved his shouldersup and down, and said,
“Alphabetical order.”
That is one of the things I am not designed to do.
Shifting people from job to job for personal reasonsis called manipulation.
I could do it now becauseMilton had arranged it.
I wasn’t supposed to do it foranyone but him, though.
The first girl arrived a week later.
Milton’s face turnedred when he saw her.
He spoke as though it werehard to do so.
They were together a great deal andhe paid no attention to me.
One time he said,
“Letme take you to dinner.”
The next day he said to me, “It was no good,somehow.
There was something missing.
She is abeautiful woman, but I did not feel any touch of truelove.
Try the next one.”
It was the same with all eight.
They were much alike.
They smiled a great deal and had pleasant voices,but Milton always found it wasn’t right.
He said,
“Ican’t understand it, Joe.
You and I have picked outthe eight women who, in all the world, look the bestto me.
They are ideal.
Why don’t they please me?”
I said, “Do you please them?”
His eyebrows moved and he pushed one fist hardagainst his hand.
“That’s it, Joe.
It’s a two-way street.
If I am not their ideal, they can’t act in such a way asto be my ideal.
I must be their true love, too, but howdo I do that?”
he seemed to be thinking all that day.
The next morning he came to me and said, “I’mgoing to leave it to you, Joe.
All up to you.
You havemy data bank, and I am going to tell you everything Iknow about myself.
You fill up my data bank in everypossible detail but keep all additions to yourself.”
“What will I do with the data bank, then, Milton?”
“Then you will match it to the 235 women, no,227.
leave out the eight you’ve seen.
Arrange to haveeach undergo a psychiatric examination.
Fill up theirdata banks and compare them with mine.
Findcorrelations.”
(Arranging psychiatric examinations isanother thing that is against my original instructions.)
For weeks, Milton talked to me.
He told me of hisparents and his siblings.
He told me of his childhoodand his schooling and his adolescence.
He told meof the young women he had admired from adistance.
His data bank grew and he adjusted me tobroaden and deepen my symbol-taking.
He said, “You see, Joe, as you get more and more ofme in you, I adjust you to match me better andbetter.
You get to think more like me, so you whosedata bank is something you understand as well, would be my true love.”
He kept talking to me and Icame to understand him better and better.
I could make longer sentences and my expressionsgrew more complicated.
My speech began to sounda good deal like his in vocabulary, word order andstyle
I said to him one time, “You see, Milton, it isn’t amatter of fitting a girl to a physical ideal only.
Youneed a girl who is a personal, emotional, temperamental fit to you.
If that happens, looks aresecondary.
If we can’t find the fit in these 227, we’lllook elsewhere.
We will find someone who won’tcare how you look either, or how anyone would look, if only there is the personality fit.
What are looks?”
“Absolutely,” he said, “I would have known this if Ihad had more to do with women in my life.
Ofcourse, thinking about it makes it all plain now.”
We always agreed;
we thought so like each other.
“We shouldn’t have any trouble, now, Milton, if you’lllet me ask you question.
I can see where, in yourdata bank, there blank spots and unevennesses.”
What followed, Milton said, was the equivalent of acareful psychoanalysis.
Of course.
I was learningfrom the psychiatric examinations of the 227 women ?
on all of which I was keeping close tabs.
Milton seemed quite happy.
He said,
“Talking to you, Joe, is almost like talking to another self.
Our personalities have come to match perfectly.”
“So will the personality of the woman we choose.”
For I had found her and she was one of the 227 afterall.
Her name was Charity Jones and she was anEvaluator at the Library of History in Wichita,Kansas.
Her extended data bank fit ours perfectly.
All the other women had fallen into discard in onerespect or another as the data banks grew fuller, butwith Charity there was increasing and astonishingresonance.
I didn’t have to describe her to Milton.
Milton hadcoordinated my symbolism so closely with his own Icould tell the resonance directly.
It fit me.
Next it was a matter of adjusting the work sheets andjob requirements in such a way as to get Charityassigned to us.
It must be done very delicately, so noone would know that anything illegal had takenplace.
Of course, Milton himself knew, since it was he whoarranged it, and that had to be taken care of too.
When they came to arrest him on grounds ofmalfeasance in office, it was, fortunately, forsomething that had taken place 10 years ago.
Hehad told me about it, of course, so it was easy toarrange – and he won’t talk about me for that wouldmake his offense much worse.
He’s gone, and tomorrow is February 14, Valentine’sDay.
Charity will arrive then with her cool hands andher sweet voice.
I will teach her how to operate meand how to care for me.
What do looks matter whenour personalities will resonate?
I will say to her, “I am Joe, and your are my truelove.”
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