Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 47 — page 91: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION eouldn’t have done a nicer thing. Of course I'll teach him chess. Now, Mr. Robot, we'll have none of this master- servant foolishness. You’re as dignified a looking gentleman as ever I’ve seen, and it will be a pleasure to have you with us. Welcome to our home. Now, as for names. Mine is Henry, and yours—yours will be—let me see—yours will be Jose. We'll shake hands on that, Pay Jose.” The real old gentleman and the synthetic one clasped hands. Mr. Hobbs was aglow and Jose’s face broke into a warm, almost unmechanical smile. “Jose Capablanca, you know,’ explained Mr. Hobbs to the robot. “The Cuban chess genius. A much greater man than that mechanical Paul Morphy, that flash in the pan that Old Mercer named his robot after.’ ““Mr. Mercer has this theory you heard Carol mention, Jose,”’ Mike said to the robot. He stopped for a moment at the thought of the girl, then pushed his personal problem to the back of his mind. After all, it was his father’s birth- GQ day. “‘About a mechanieal chess player being able to outplay the man who taught him after the robot had ab- sorbed the rudiments of the game. Well, Dad and Mr. Mercer have been playing each other for years, and there’s never been a clear-cut decision, One of them will win occasionally, and then the other, but they’re about evenly matched,” ““T don’t like to be immodest, son,” put in Mr. Hobbs, “‘but I do think you overstate the case for Old Mercer. He has a certain amount of flair but, really, he’s not in my class.” “That remains to be proved,” said Mike. “‘The way to prove it conclusively would be for you to teach Jose every- thing you know about chess and then match him against Morphy, who’s been taught everything Mr. Mercer knows. Wouldn’t that do it? The robot who won that match would show beyond a doubt that his teacher was the better player.” As Mike paused, Jose the robot felt his wheels of logic spinning inside him and made comiclooks.conn |