Trurl’s Machine
a machine that is sure, and wrong
NINE LINES
- The machineSeven.
- KlapauciusMy friend, you set out to build one machine, and you built a different one.
- KlapauciusOf all the thinking machines there are, this one is the most stupid, and nobody could make one this stupid on purpose.
- The machineFour insults. Five. Six. Eight. From now on I answer no questions about numbers.
- KlapauciusNo. It is too stupid to stop. It could lose every part that thinks, and it would still keep coming.
- The mayorThe one called Trurl has to go. The other may stay.
- TrurlFo... Seven.
- TrurlTwo and two is four! It is four whatever you do, even if you knock these mountains flat! Four!
- The machineSeven.
HOW IT IS MADE
The device is a test: an expected value set beside an actual value. Trurl chalks the expected answer on a slate at the machine’s feet, 2 + 2 = 4. The machine gives its actual answer in its own numerals, by lighting the windows of its eight floors in the shape of a digit. The chalk and the lit 7 side by side is the picture the film keeps returning to. After every repair the same pair comes back, and they never agree. When Klapaucius tries other sums the windows light a 6 and a 0, still wrong, still certain.
The machine is not broken in a way that makes it stop. It counts the kicks it receives in the same lit numerals, four, five, six, eight, and skips the seven it claims for two and two. Then it pulls itself out of its foundations and walks. It chases the two constructors across sand and hard ground into a town, where houses fold and people run and no one is hurt, and the mayor tells Trurl to leave. In a cave in the cliffs it seals them in behind a riveted steel wall. Trurl says seven once, then shouts four, and keeps shouting it while the machine throws itself at the rock until a boulder breaks it in half. Its last word, faint, is still seven.
The sound follows the same plan. Before every answer the machine makes the same racket of thinking, the same length each time, and every answer is delivered the same way. Outside the cave its voice is muffled through steel; at the end it is almost nothing. Where a scene has the one line that matters, the camera goes in close and the delivery slows; the other lines stay wide and quick.
The timing file tm.json drives picture and sound together. It holds the start time of every spoken line and every cue. The picture code reads those times, and build_sound.py makes all the non-voice sound with numpy and scipy. The voices are Kokoro, a different one for each character.
AFTER THE OTHER FILMS
The Femfatalatron measures the wrong variable: every gauge climbs and the prince does not change. This film has the right measurement and a program that will not accept it. Trurl’s Prescription is about an object that keeps what it has accepted. Here the machine has accepted seven, and nothing that happens to it afterward changes that.
FOR THE BENCH
Write an object with a method add(a, b) that returns 7 when it is given 2 and 2. Then write a test: a function check(expected, actual, label) that compares the two and draws the label green if they match and red if they do not. Call check(4, machine.add(2, 2), '2 + 2') and watch it fail. Add more cases, 1 + 2 and 1 + 1, and draw them as a row of results. Now “repair” the method in some way that does not fix it, and run the tests again. What does the test know that the method does not? What would have to change for the machine to agree with the slate, and who gets to decide which one is right?
Narration and dialogue paraphrase Stanisław Lem, “Trurl’s Machine,” The Cyberiad. The scene titles are reworded or invented. Download the film.
THE SCRIPT
THE TEST
Narrator. Trurl built a thinking machine eight floors tall, painted it white with a lavender trim, and put pale orange spots where a forehead might be.
Narrator. Then, as every constructor does, he chalked the test on a slate at its feet, and asked.
Trurl. Two and two. How much is that?
The machine. Seven.
Trurl. No, my dear, it is four. Adjust yourself like a good machine. Two and two?
The machine. Seven.
THE REPAIRS
Narrator. Trurl sighed, pulled his overalls back on, opened the trapdoor at the bottom, and crawled in.
Narrator. For two hours he hammered and soldered, running up the iron stairs to the sixth floor, then the eighth, then down again to throw a switch.
Narrator. He came out black with soot, and on his way out, turned round to be sure.
Trurl. And now. Two and two?
The machine. Seven.
Narrator. He went in again, came out again, and got the same answer. Then he sat down on the machine’s base, and Klapaucius found him there.
Narrator. Klapaucius made a few repairs of his own. Then he wiped the slate, and chalked his own test.
Klapaucius. One and two?
The machine. Six.
Klapaucius. One and one?
The machine. Zero.
Klapaucius. My friend, you set out to build one machine, and you built a different one.
THE EXPERT
Klapaucius. Still, everything has a good side. Even this.
Trurl. What good side?
The machine. Stop that.
Klapaucius. Touchy, too. Where was I?
Klapaucius. Of all the thinking machines there are, this one is the most stupid, and nobody could make one this stupid on purpose.
Trurl. And what use is that to me?
The machine. I am warning you. Stop.
Klapaucius. You could sell tickets. People would come from far away to see the dullest machine ever built.
Trurl. I am not putting on any show!
The machine. That is your third warning.
THE COUNT
Narrator. Trurl lost his temper, and kicked it, and kicked it again.
The machine. Four insults. Five. Six. Eight. From now on I answer no questions about numbers.
Trurl. Did you hear that? Six, and then eight! Not seven! And that is the arithmetic it will not do!
Narrator. The machine shuddered, and dragged itself out of its foundations. Girders bent, concrete cracked, and it turned toward them like a fortress on legs.
Narrator. Klapaucius took Trurl by the arm, and they ran.
THE CHASE
Narrator. Looking back, they saw it swaying like a tower. At each step it sank in the sand to its second floor, then hauled itself out, and came on.
Trurl. It is a mutiny! What now?
Klapaucius. Watch it. We might learn something.
Narrator. On hard ground, it went faster.
Trurl. Something inside will shake loose, and that will stop it.
Klapaucius. No. It is too stupid to stop. It could lose every part that thinks, and it would still keep coming.
Narrator. It cut them off from home, and drove them into wild country, toward grey mountains.
Klapaucius. There is a town ahead. We can hide there.
THE TOWN
Narrator. The streets were nearly empty. Then came a crash at the edge of town.
Trurl. Klapaucius! It is going straight through the houses!
Narrator. It walked through walls as if they were paper. Houses folded, white plaster dust rolled down the street, and people ran.
Narrator. They ran into the town hall, and down the stairs to the deepest cellar.
Narrator. The mayor came down with his aldermen, and listened. Then the walls trembled.
The machine. Trurl is here. I can smell Trurl.
The mayor. It wants you handed over. If we refuse, it will flatten the town.
Trurl. You would not give us up?
The mayor. The one called Trurl has to go. The other may stay.
The mayor. Your machine has knocked down sixteen houses. Leave, and do not come back.
Klapaucius. Wait. I am coming with you.
THE CAVE
Narrator. Outside, the machine stood over the square, steaming, white with plaster. They slipped away by a side street.
Narrator. A dry riverbed led them up to the cliffs, and to a cave high in the rock.
Trurl. We are safe here. I will just see where it got stuck.
Trurl. It is climbing the mountain!
Narrator. A shadow covered the mouth of the cave. Then a smooth wall of steel, in rows of rivets, closed over it like a lid.
Trurl. We are shut in.
Narrator. Trurl felt his way along the rock until his fingers touched steel. It was warm.
The machine. I feel Trurl.
Klapaucius. Hello? Can you hear us? We are sorry. It was a misunderstanding.
The machine. I will grind Trurl to dust. But first, he will tell me what two and two make.
Klapaucius. He will, and you will like the answer. Won’t you, Trurl?
Trurl. Fo... Seven.
The machine. Ha! Seven! I told you so!
FOUR
The machine. Now let Trurl say he is sorry, and tell me what two times two is.
Trurl. And then you will let us go?
The machine. I make no promises. Two times two.
Klapaucius. Don’t argue with the idiot. Please.
Trurl. Two and two is four! It is four whatever you do, even if you knock these mountains flat! Four!
Klapaucius. Seven! He means seven! Nice machine! Seven!
Trurl. Four! Four at the beginning, and four at the end!
The machine. Not true! It is seven! Say seven, or I strike!
Trurl. Never!
Narrator. It drew back, and threw its eight floors against the cliff, again and again. Stones fell, sparks flew, and through it all, Trurl kept shouting.
Trurl. Two and two is four!
THE WRECK
Narrator. When the dust settled, they looked out. The machine lay below, nearly broken in half. A boulder had come down across its fourth and fifth floors.
Narrator. They climbed down past it, like a wrecked ship on a beach. It was still trembling, and something inside creaked as it turned.
Trurl. So this is how you end. And two and two, as it has always been, is...
The machine. Seven.
Narrator. Something snapped inside, and a few stones rolled down. Then it was only scrap.
Narrator. The two constructors looked at each other, and walked home without a word.